By GREGG PATTON
The Press-Enterprise
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
They used to call the 1920s "The Golden Age of Sports,'' a nostalgic reference to a time when bigger-than-life characters such as Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey and Red Grange helped thrust sports into mainstream prominence.
Frankly, sports have done nothing but expand in influence and popularity ever since, suggesting that the Golden Age never really ended.
Funny, but this doesn't feel much like a golden week. The biggest stories in the three most American of team sports -- football, basketball and baseball -- shouldn't be read without antacids and moist towelettes handy.
Michael Vick's kennel club, Tim Donaghy's point-shaving service and Barry Bonds' awe-uninspiring pursuit of the home run record are almost enough to make a fan look to embrace a new team sport.
Perhaps that sport could be one that doesn't get a lot of attention in this country yet, but might benefit from the arrival of a foreign superstar whose charisma and enormous celebrity could transcend the playing field.
I wish I could think of someone, or such a sport, but nothing comes to mind. Oh well. As if something like that could happen anyway.
No doubt that football, basketball and baseball will weather the Vick-Donaghy-Bonds storms, but not before we all feel a little bit sick or cheated.
Vick has had a Niagara-like fall. This would be a good time to put away the Atlanta quarterback's No. 7 jersey, one of the best-selling pieces of National Football League merchandise since he entered the league.
Details from his indictment on dog-fighting-related charges have been sickening. You don't have to carry a PETA membership card to wonder how someone could be so callous and cruel toward dogs, especially someone living the privileged life of a college-educated, popular professional quarterback.
There's no way Vick can play this season with this ugliness hanging over his head. Shame on the NFL for not making that clear already. With his kingly powers, Commissioner Roger Goodell has told Vick to stay out of training camp this week. Why not take the ultimate step now? Vick should come nowhere near an NFL stadium all year. Without the boot from the commish, I'm guessing Vick might be so callous and cruel toward humans, too, that he would torture us with his presence and not even get that, either.
As for ex-NBA referee Donaghy, all he did was bring the legitimacy of an entire league under suspicion. Commissioner David Stern is intent on casting Donaghy as an isolated rogue, which may or may not be true.
What Stern loathes to admit is that he had a guy accused of fixing the results of games for the past two years and no one noticed any irregularities in his work. Where else but in the NBA, where call after non-call after call is nothing more than a subjective, arbitrary whim, could a ref get away with point-shaving and come out with an above-average review, plus get himself assigned to playoff games as a reward?
Donaghy is Exhibit A of the NBA's primary problem: that refs have more influence and power than officials in any other sport. It is a near-impossible game to officiate cleanly and consistently. Thus, no one has any idea if one of them is making bad calls or good calls. Correct calls are a luxury. Mostly there are just calls and non-calls.
There's a reason Stern has made penalties so high for criticizing the officiating. Silence is the only way to hide the San Andreas-size fault line in the NBA's foundation -- that a crooked ref is indistinguishable from an honest one.
Then there is baseball, where the commissioner can't even commit himself to honoring the man who is on the verge of breaking the sport's most hallowed record _ the all-time home run mark.
Of course, it's been a difficult year for most baseball fans, not just Bud Selig. Bonds has been unlikable for two decades, but I suspect there would have been a warming to the old curmudgeon as he approached Hank Aaron's mark, out of respect for the feat and his skills, had he not become the central figure in baseball's steroids scandal. Nothing has ever been proven legally or officially, but long ago in the court of public opinion, Bonds was tried, convicted of juicing and sentenced to jeers and disrespect.
Surely the outcast outfielder and the San Francisco Giants will do everything within their means to have him hit home runs Nos. 754, 755 (to tie) and 756 (to break) at home this week. But even as he celebrates his 43rd birthday, the gods of baseball seem to be conspiring to have him crush the Big One in Dodger Stadium next week, in front of Bonds' most disapproving adversaries, under a roaring cascade of boos.
The way things are going, it would certainly fit the tenor of the times. The Crimson-faced Age of Sports.
(Contact Gregg Patton at gpatton@PE.com)
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