With all this talk about drug use in sports, the effect that it has on our children, and questions about a level playing field, I found myself wondering how similar the situation is with drug use in the entertainment industry. And it led me to ask myself this question:
Why isn't their drug testing in Hollywood?
All these actors and musicians are role models aren't they? Kids look up to Lindsay Lohan, Justin Timberlake, and the Olsen twins just as much (if not more) than our sports stars. Why doesn't Charlie Sheen have to #### in a cup before the director yells "Action!"? Wait, bad example. He probably does have to #### in a cup for his probation officer.
But why should our kids be allowed to think, "If I do heroin, I could write some great songs!" or, "Look at the awesome life these people have! Maybe if I get coked up all the time, I'll be rich and famous too!"?
One argument against drug testing in Hollywood could be that there aren't sacred records being broken by the users. But that's not entirely true. What about the Oscars, Emmys, and Grammys? Should the band that's jacked up on heroin get an edge over the sober bands? I can't even count how many musicians have admitted to doing their best work while flying high. Would anyone even know who Jimi Hendrix was if he had never "indulged"? Where would Willie Nelson and Kurt Cobain get their inspiration from? Would Robert Downey Jr have gotten another job after Weird Science without "the juice"? There's little doubt that many of the illegal drugs out there can be considered performance-enhancing. With that in mind, should any of Heath Ledger's awards be stricken from the books now? Sure there weren't any Hollywood rules against his drug use but he was breaking the law, wasn't he? Should Nirvana be kept out of the rock and roll hall of fame due to Cobain's well documented heroin use?
Sorry for all the questions, but I've got a few more.
Is there less outrage about drug use in Hollywood because people accept that it happens, and that it's just "part of the game"? Is drug use OK for actors and musicians because the culture has been to condone and probably, in many cases, support and encourage it for so long? Similar to how the culture in baseball was to do anything you could to be out there on the field, help your team win, get the big contract, and entertain the fans?
Will people ever care about Hollywood? Is anyone going to
pressure the Screen Actor's Guild to throw some testing into their
contract? Are we going to see some congressional hearings with the
heads of Paramount and BMG getting grilled about their industries? I doubt it. But the spotlight will be leaving baseball soon and it may head towards football. After that?
The sports world is beginning to understand why San Francisco Giant fans have stood behind their man for so long. They are realizing why Barry Bonds is revered and loved, despite extreme scrutiny of his milestones. You may ask, why are sports fans empathizing now? I'll tell you. It's because they are seeing their own teams/players/idols in the same boat as Bonds, and they don't think it's a big deal.
Case in point, Rick Ankiel. Rick came up to the big leagues, reinvented as a power hitter. How'd he do? Awesome. It seemed like he was hitting a home run every other at-bat. It was a great story. Then it came out that he used HGH. Ouch. This story didn't have a happy ending. However, in St Louis, he is still cheered and revered. Cardinal fans now can empathize with San Francisco Giants fans.
Case in point, the New England Patriots. Super Bowl champs thrice. Dominant team nearly every year. Golden boy quarterback. Best coach in the NFL. Classy organization. And now...cheaters. These weren't just allegations of cheating, as we've seen with Roger Clemens. This was a situation where the organization has admitted to wrongdoing and accepted their punishment for the offense. And yet, Belichick is praised and loved after the fact. After seeing proof that their team cheated in order to gain a competitive advantage, excuses abound in the northeast:
"Everbody does it, why is it a big deal?"
"Come on, how much does it really help them anyway?"
"They are a great team without it!"
Sound familiar? It's the Bonds defense. Pats fans, you now empathize.
Case in point, Lance Armstrong. Evidence concerning his drug use is readily available to anyone willing to google it. Not just speculation here and there, but lots of evidence. But the American public chooses to put their fingers in their ears, close their eyes, and chant "La-la-la-la-la". This guy was/is an All-American hero. If a video was released on youtube showing Armstrong shooting up 10 years ago, people would not care. They would see past it and love the guy regardless, as they do now. America, you can now empathize with San Francisco Giants fans.
Case in point, Shawne Merriman. Star linebacker for the San Diego Chargers. Famous for his "lights-out" celebration and busted for using the juice. Lost 4 games last year to suspension. Came back after the suspension and was still a fan favorite. He even got elected to the pro-bowl after being caught cheating. Charger fans, you empathize, don't you?
These were just a few examples of how America is learning to condone, ignore, or disregard cheating. There are many more, and will be many more in the future. The point I'm trying to make is that people will preach about ethics and morality until it is their player...or their team...or their idol that is guilty of cheating or accused of cheating. And at that time, everything will change and they will begin to rationalize why there is nothing wrong with it, or why it is not a big deal.
Week 1 of the NFL season will be wrapping up Monday night and we have already seen more injuries than I can count. During the Sunday night game we saw Brandon Jacobs and Osi Umenyiora go down. Eli Manning had to leave the game too. The Cowboys lost their nose tackle, maybe for the season. The Buffalo Bills lost several key defensive players today, and a tight end that may be paralyzed for life.
Mike Brown, Al Harris, Cadillac Williams, Orlando Pace, Chester Taylor, and Chad Pennington have all been hurt. I won't mention the rest of the star players that left their games hobbling, later returned, but will still show up on the injury reports next week. Is it just me or are the frequency and severity of injuries in the NFL gone through the roof? I understand that it is a rough sport and injuries are part of the game, but to what extent can we let that continue? At this rate, by week 8, we'll be watching games on Sunday and not recognizing half of the players on the field! It will seem like we are watching a game with replacement players during a strike season.
Can anything be done to curb the frequency and severity of injuries in the NFL or do we just need to continue to pray that our star players get back up after every tackle? Are players getting too fast and too strong? Are performance enhancing drugs making players more dangerous and possibly more fragile at the same time? It seems as though there is an injury timeout nearly every other play during an NFL game. Run a play...care for the wounded...run another play...care for the wounded...Are we playing football or fighting a war here?
People complain that they want to be able to believe what they see is natural ability. They want a level playing field. They want records to be "real" and not manufactured by utilizing performance-enhancing drugs. If you think this way, it will be very difficult to enjoy any sporting event for the rest of your life. Why? Because the truth is, every game you watch probably has some degree of "taint" to it.
Athletes in every sport that you watch will be doing whatever it takes to be the best that they can be. Some will stay within the rules, but many will bend or break the rules in an effort to be great and make millions. Some of these people will get caught and be dealt with accordingly. But basically, the result of any sporting event that you watch will have some "taint" to it. Whether you are a fan of football, cycling, baseball, horse-racing, hockey, etc...participants are doing what they can to win.
People focus on the home-runs in baseball as a target for performance enhancing drug abuse, but the fact is, sporting events are affected far more often in far more subtle ways. A baseball player may gain the speed to beat out an infield single and later score a game-winning run. An offensive lineman may be able to block for a split second longer, enabling a touchdown run. Were these plays made possible by natural ability or by the next undetectable steroid? Or maybe by HGH, which still isn't tested for in baseball or football. With people so up in arms about past records being broken, how can they tolerate the MLB games that are going on tonight? We can't know for sure what is going on. Not now, not then.
NASCAR race teams cheat every single weekend, but it's OK because it's "part of the sport". All cars are the same, so the teams that are able to cheat the best improve their chances to win. NASCAR reminds me of the NFL. Cheating is just part of the sport. Hardly anyone cares if NFL players get caught doping, mostly because we all assume they are on something to begin with. What's a positive steroid test result in the NFL to us? Page 2. Speculation of steroid use in MLB? Page 1. Steroids are part of the NFL culture just as car-tweaking is to NASCAR. Bruce Bowen is a master craftsman of defensive basketball. Some believe he cheats. I liken him to an NFL linemen that holds as often as he can get away with it. Sometimes they get caught and are given a foul or a flag is thrown. Are all these things actually "cheating" or are they just generally accepted parts of the sports?
90's baseball had a similar culture where many were doping and noone (teams, players, management, MLB itself) cared. It was part of the game until records started to be broken and people like Canseco (bitter over his black-balling) began talking. But should the steroid era be treated the same as cheating in other sports has been? Allow it for as long as it was generally accepted?
Some people believe that the steroid era in MLB is over just because testing is in place. In a way it is, but there will always be another era waiting around the bend. The next designer drug will be here soon, if it isn't already. And eventually, maybe in 40 years or something, players may have bionic implants to help them perform better. How ironic would it be if, in the future, people argued that Barry's record is legit because he used actual muscle mass to hit his home-runs? "These darn cheaters and their nanite technology! Back when I was young, people actually earned their records!"
So how are you supposed to believe anything you are watching? You can't, really. Unless, of course, you watch a Pro-bowling event. But my point is that we need to take sports at face value. Don't focus on whether what you are watching is real or not real. You will never get enjoyment that way. Let athletes entertain us. Don't over-analyze. Cheer on the players that you like. Boo the players that you don't like.
Michael Vick is speaking out against the anti-dog fighting crowd. Someday they'll come around and fight dogs like everyone else.
Pac-Man Jones is speaking out against laws in general. Who's got time to earn millions of dollars when there is anarchy waiting to be created?
Kobe Bryant is rebelling against adulthood. Who needs it? Just act like a child every day and you'll never feel old.
Jason Giambi is speaking up about doing certain things that you shouldn't do. Things that are bad and can't be named. You know..."that stuff".
Michelle Wie is rebelling against sexism in golf. Women deserve to play on the same tour as men. Isn't it obvious with her domination of the women's tour that she deserves...errrrr...wait a sec...
Sports media has taken a stand against any sport that is not football. Basketball and hockey? Borrrrriinnnnnnnnggggg. Baseball? Tainted with steroids! We can’t trust these stats! Football? Look at all these awesome sacks by Shawne Merriman! He’s got my pro-bowl vote!
Anderson Varejao has dispelled the myth that athletes cannot be good actors too.
J.R. Smith has rebelled against seat-belts and stop signs. Too soon?
Vince Young has proven to the sports world that you don’t have to be “Smarter Than a 5th Grader” to make it as an NFL quarterback. When did football fans believe that NFL players were intelligent to begin with? When Houston passed on Young on draft day, he could be heard mumbling under his breath, “Wonderlic my balls”.
Barbaro, the horse that won hearts all over the country, has ended the tradition of putting a horse down when it severely breaks it’s leg. Instead, the common practice will now be to keep the horse alive as long as possible, no matter how much pain it is in, and harvest as much sperm as you can before it dies. Here’s the equation:
Fast Horse’s Sperm > Horse Ethics
Speaking of Barbaro, Chad Johnson has proven that humans can beat horses in a foot-race. (That is, of course, if the human in question gets a wicked long head start). So while Ali was fighting the government during Vietnam, who was out there racing the quadrupeds? Who, I ask you!
Tiki Barber has come out with the fact that he is retiring after this season. Michael Irvin of ESPN thinks he is quitting on his team and is causing a distraction by leaking this information during the season. Tiki fired back, calling Irvin an "####" and questioning his character but stopped short of calling him a crack-head or coke-fiend. A large majority of journalists have disagreed with Irvin's opinions on this matter.
I believe Irvin has alterior motives in his attacks. He may truly believe what he says, but in my opinion he is trying to disrupt the team chemistry of the Giants. Having listened to him for years since his retirement, Irvin is clearly very biased towards his former team and would like nothing more than for the Giants to sel####estruct, giving Dallas a better shot at making the playoffs.
Basically what I am saying is that if Drew Bledsoe announced plans to retire a week or two ago, Irvin would be supportive and probably encourage the team to rally around him in his final season.
He is merely trying to create conflict in the Giants locker room.
False start penalties are detracting from my enjoyment of football. I think it's time to remove them almost entirely from the rulebook. I'm getting tired of all these false start / offsides penalties that do little other than slow down the game and lessen the building excitement. A portion of the time, the officials don't even see that one of the O-linemen twitch and call an offsides penalty instead. And on the other hand, many O-linemen twitch only after a D-lineman jumps at them. On top of all that, O-linemen move often to check the QB when a play is changed at the line of scrimmage. The line between a false start and no-call is far too thin. It's not OK to bob your head a half inch, yet you can lift your head completely and swivel it towards your QB? And one more point: Expecting a 300 pound lineman to make absolutely no movements for up to 10-15 seconds just seems like too much to ask.
My idea is to eliminate the false start completely, save for the center who will still have an "illegal snap" possibility. Put the onus on the defense to stay onsides until the ball is snapped. It would take some getting used to, but in the long run it should make for a more exciting and enjoyable game.
This blogger is a New Yorker, born and raised. I'm a huge sports fan, following pretty much every major sport out there. Sadly, this does not include hockey, NASCAR, or boxing. Hockey lost my affection during the lockout, NASCAR is not a sport, and boxing has become incredibly boring since the dawn of MMA. If you want to talk football, baseball, basketball, or MMA, then I'm your man. I could also debate NASCAR with anyone, but we would probably end up just going around in circles...
