Monday, September 28, 2009
I Can't Keep From Crying Sometimes
Yesterday's emotional NFL moment did not
involve Michael Vick returning to the field — sniff! give me a second,
I'll be okay — after 18 months in federal prison. No, it was the Lions
winning a game, and it proved too much for offensive linemen Stephen
Peterman and Dominic Raiola, who were caught on camera, teary-eyed, as they left the field.
(The pictures haven't surfaced online yet, for some reason. Here they are, not crying, as their team went to 0-14 last year.)
Personally, I think they were crying because, well, there's another game next week. One and 15, anybody?
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Thursday, September 24, 2009
A New Use for That Webcam
I felt a little older than I should have today after reading about new "Topps 3D Live" football trading cards. Participants in Topps' virtual sports community acquire coded cards featuring one of 25 current NFL quarterbacks — hmm, no Brett Favre — that are tucked inside every pack of the company's 2009 football series. Then they select that player on the ToppsTown web site, hold the card under a webcam, and — voila! — Jay Cutler will "pop up" on the computer screen. With the help of a few keystrokes, Cutler can fire passes to virtual receivers while dodging defensive obstacles.
Whoa! Whatever happened to collecting trading cards just for the sake of, well, collecting trading cards and making new friends? This latest technology — apparently modeled after Topps 3D Live baseball cards, which passed me by completely – seems more like an attempt to meld "Madden NFL 10" and fantasy football into some sort of virtual gridiron experience that will give kids even more reason to ignore the info printed on card backs. Participants can even trade cards virtually.
I'm sure many children and adults will rejoice at this development. But not me. I spent many a grade-school recess during some of my formative years in east-central Iowa trading football cards with other kids — some of whom I didn't even like, but who had a card I needed — and building my social network the old-fashioned way.
Earlier this week, a colleague and I admitted to each other that we each still own at least one Larry McCarren football card. (The subject came up because the former All-Pro center is now a broadcaster for his old team on the Packers Radio Network.) Neither one of us knows exactly where those cards are now, but I think I’ll go looking for mine in some boxes in the garage this weekend. And when I find it, I’m going to hold it in front of my webcam — where it will do exactly what it’s supposed to do: nothing.
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CPSC Issues Alert Regarding Light Pole Inspections
When AB reported in August
that light poles manufactured by Whitco Co. LP had collapsed at
multiple stadium sites since 2007, the Consumer Product Safety
Commission was winding down a months-long investigation but had yet to
shed its light on the matter. On Aug. 24, the commission released an alert,
stating in part, "CPSC recommends that Whitco Co. LP outdoor steel
stadium light poles be inspected by a qualified professional
immediately to reduce the risk of poles falling over and crushing a
patron or bystander."
Fortunately, despite significant structural
damage resulting from nine CPSC-confirmed failures of Whitco poles
installed between 2000 and 2006, the commission is unaware of a single
reported injury. That said, even poles that show signs of defects but
remain standing can wreak havoc on athletic department operations. This
month, visible cracks in four poles forced administrators at North
Point High School in Charles County, Md., to reschedule or relocate
games and practices involving its football, field hockey, and boys' and
girls' soccer teams until the poles could be removed. ROTC exercises
and physical education classes were displaced, as well. "With the
information we have now, we are not taking any chances," Charles County
Public Schools superintendent James Richmond stated in a release. "The
result of not removing the poles could be devastating."
Days later, University of Arkansas-Monticello athletic director Chris
Ratcliff announced that cracks found in the base plates of poles
surrounding Convoy Leslie-Cotton Boll Stadium would shut down not only
that facility until welders could make repairs, but the adjacent
Steelman Fieldhouse and a nearby residence hall, too. "It's just been a
very stressful time ever since we discovered the problem," Ratcliff
told the Pine Bluff Commercial.
Such discoveries serve to reinforce the need for every institution
that hosts activities on lighted fields to heed the CPSC's advice and
have poles inspected immediately and regularly, and — as Wesley
Oliphant of ReliaPOLE Solutions Inc. told us this summer — preferably by a licensed professional engineer experienced in the design and manufacture of poles.
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Those Hallowed Halls
By a strange coincidence, two halls of fame are in the news this week, and the news ain't good. First, the National Soccer Hall of Fame and Museum, which opened in Oneonta, N.Y., in 1999, announced it would close to the public except on days when matches are being played on the surrounding fields. It will next open its doors Nov. 21-22, when the New York State Public High School Athletic Association holds its championships there. Then, yesterday, the College Football Hall of Fame announced it would move from South Bend, Ind., to Atlanta when its lease is up on Dec. 31, 2010.
In both cases, location seems to be the issue. The college football hall moved to South Bend in 1995 from Kings Mills, Ohio, hoping that proximity to Notre Dame would keep the cash registers ringing. Supporters had predicted 150,000 visitors a year there, but it has instead attracted about 60,000 visitors a year since 1996. The soccer hall's web site notes it opened in Oneonta because of the presence of Division I college soccer programs at Oneonta
State and Hartwick College — uh-huh — as well as the nearby National Baseball
Hall of Fame and Museum located in Cooperstown.
Which brings up the obvious question: How in the world does the baseball hall of fame manage to attract 350,000 people a year to tiny, out-of-the-way Cooperstown? Even if you're a believer in the Ken Burns-Bob Costas-George Will axis of evil (pro football fan here), that's a pretty extraordinary number of people paying $16.50 apiece to stare at the George Brett pine-tar bat.
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Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Game-Day Gluttony
The West Michigan Whitecaps finished the Minor League Baseball season
13 games out of first place, but the franchise scored big with the Fifth Third Burger.
During the 73-game home schedule at Fifth Third Ballpark, the Whitecaps reportedly sold 1,948 burgers,
each one featuring five third-pound burger patties fanned across a
layer of chili and topped with five slices of cheese, lettuce, tomatoes
and a helping of chips and salsa. The burger cost $20 and untold time
off consumers' lives, yet an astonishing 298 fans (of the 476 who
approached the meal as a solo mission) packed away all 299 of its fat
grams in the span of a single game. One guy ate the 4,800-calorie
concessions curiosity in just over 11 minutes.
As impressive as
that seems, I once saw a man try to consume a burger more than twice
that size at a Milwaukee Brewers bar near Miller Park. Waiting the 45
minutes for the kitchen staff at Kelly's Bleachers to prepare the
Four-Pound Burger, I thumbed through a stack of Polaroids of those who
had tried and failed to choke (and keep) down the $19.95 signature menu
item and the side of waffle fries that comes with it. A clean platter
inside 60 minutes meant a clean tab.
The patty alone was roughly
the size of a cake pan, and the whole entree was served on a tray
typically reserved for large pizzas. Having had my own eating
prowess chronicled in a coworker's column during my days as a daily
newspaper sports editor, I took it upon myself to coach this complete
stranger. "Eat half in 20 minutes," I advised, the thought being that a
full 40 minutes would be required for the second half. He devoured that
first half — the equivalent of eight quarter-pounders — in 15 minutes.
But with just five minutes to go in his hour-long odyssey, five
bite-size morsels still remained. He paced. He perspired. He was
followed into the men's room by purge police. And ultimately, as with
all those before him, the clock ran out. I can't say what fate awaited
the guy's own ticker.
I have no desire to ever step up to the Kelly's plate. However, AB group publisher Shawn Gahagan threw down a tempting gauntlet of game-day gluttony last month when he ate for the sausage cycle
at Miller Park. I think I can stomach a bratwurst, a hot dog and
Polish, Italian and chorizo sausages in one nine-inning sitting, but
I've lost my appetite for the 2009 Brewers. There's always next year.
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Monday, September 21, 2009
Executive Director Departs, But the Beat Will (Still) Go On
Got word over the weekend that Linette Derminer, executive director of Parent Heart Watch, will leave the organization next month. Derminer was one of the founding members of the truly grassroots PHW, the leadership of which had all lost children to sudden cardiac arrest. Ken Derminer, whose face prominently graced the cover of AB for an October 2005 feature on automated external defibrillators, was 17 when he died during football practice in June 2000.
With Linette Derminer at the helm, PHW created a national database of SCA cases mainly from newspaper sources, which while not exhaustive was used to demonstrate the prevalence of the problem. Derminer was instrumental in expanding Ohio's pre-participation physical examination form, and in getting legislators to appropriate tobacco settlement money for the large-scale purchase of AEDs.
Derminer says it's "the right time to move on and pursue other interests" — understandable, given that she has spent many years now helping others avoid the same tragedy she and her family have endured. We wish her well.
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Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Facility of Merit Judging — Second Day
Dateline Chicago — A very hard-working group of panelists this year, the first in my 19 years of involvement in the Facility of Merit judging to require pushing back our dinner reservation to 9 p.m. They've lent credence to this photo, which an architect friend sent me years ago:
Consensus is notoriously hard to achieve among architects...as one of this year's panelists, David Dymecki of Sasaki Associates, just noted to us, "The only thing two architects can usually agree on is that the work of the third [is poor]." I would imagine there will be a spirited discussion this afternoon to rival last night's marathon session. The remaining 26 entries to survive to Day 2 (there were 97 submittals to the June Architectural Showcase in 2009) skew toward the larger university projects, but there's quite a range here. We'll know the 10 winners by 5 p.m. — maybe.
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Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Lenny Dykstra's Final Plate Appearance
Is something valuable just because it was owned by somebody famous? Reading over the list of Lenny Dykstra memorabilia left unclaimed by the erstwhile baseball star and business exec at a Beverly Hills pawn shop, I find myself thinking of the scene in Taxi Driver in which a barely hinged driver tries to give Travis Bickle (the really unhinged titular driver) "a piece of Errol Flynn's bathtub" so he can sell it. Dykstra's 1986 World Series ring would no doubt draw some bids from Mets fans, as might a few other pieces of jewelry and championship hardware, but I find it hard to believe anyone would bid on a signed ball that Dykstra hit for a home run to win Game 3 of the 1986 NLCS against Houston. Okay, it's only expected to fetch four grand — but I can't imagine it appreciating in value, especially given the downward spiral that is Dykstra's post-baseball life.
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Monday, September 14, 2009
You Haven't Come as Long a Way as We All Thought...Baby
The Lingerie Football League...let's see, has there ever been a sport named for the clothes its participants wear? Even beach volleyball doesn't go by the name, "Beachwear Volleyball."
Aside from that, it's hard to know whether to expend any energy on this
one. The LFL's maiden season opened Sept. 4 with a Chicago Bliss win
against the Miami Caliente at the Sears Centre in Hoffman Estates,
Ill., and the fans in attendance presumably got a closer look at some
of the nation's "most athletic and beautiful women," as the site's host
(an inches-tall tight end, or something) says. The league's Facebook fan page
has comments both helpful (one clued the league in that it hadn't
updated its standings in the three days that had elapsed since the game
he saw) and predictable ("i wanna see these sexy ladies play in the
rain now that would be hottt," wrote one).
Photos posted there by the league show fairly good crowds, whereas photos posted by some of the league's 14,000
fans show large swaths of empty seats. The demographic looks about as you'd expect — I found this picture to be the most telling, with its backdrop of cameras and Greek letters. It was taken at the debut of the Seattle Mist, one of three teams that didn't
get the memo about choosing a sex-related nickname.
Will it catch on? One can only hope. Not. One thing's for sure, Bobby Riggs is cackling right about now, wherever he is.
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Monday, September 07, 2009
Another Case of School Colors Gone Wrong
We all know that universities are far cozier with beer companies than educators of underage drinkers probably ought to be. It's tough, though, when part of your educational mission is to send your boys out onto the gridiron in front of 70,000 paying fans who, let's face it, have been known to — on occasion — pop open a few beers in the parking lot beforehand. So, let's give props to the University of Wisconsin athletic department for "taking one for the team" (in the words of Vince Sweeney, the school's vice chancellor for university relations) by giving up an annual $425,000 in beer ad revenue prior to this season. Athletics fought it, but the school deserves credit for following through in its battle against binge drinking by UW sports fans.
Credit, also, individual schools around the country that forced Anheuser-Busch InBev to pull back on its "Fan Cans" program, which it launched to coincide with the start of the college football season. The Bud Light cans — painted black and gold in West Lafayette, Ind., crimson and blue in Lawrence, Kan., and so on — made it look very much like the universities had a financial stake in the campaign, which it turns out they don't. Reaction varied by location; in Manhattan, Kan., Kansas State officials say that because the purple and white cans don't include a university logo or Powercat, there's no possibility for confusion by the buyer. Pat Bosco, K-State's vice president for student life, said, "We have a commitment to educating our students about underage drinking, but we don't have a trademark on purple and white."
Somebody ought to send Pat to the legal databases so he can bone up on Louisiana State University v. Smack Apparel Co. There's a lot of money to be lost by letting beer companies, or any other corporate interests, co-opt a university's colors.
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Thursday, September 03, 2009
The Purists’ Plunge
When U.S. Olympic swimming legend Mark Spitz spoke at the 2008 Athletic Business Conference, he told a decades-old story about how coaches from the Soviet Union had once asked Spitz why he wore a mustache in competition. At the time, he knowingly relayed the falsehood that the facial hair reduced drag in the water. By the next international competition, every Russian swimmer sported a ’stache. Such was the level of gamesmanship in 1970s aquatics.
Today, competitive edges — real or perceived — aren’t right under swimmers’ noses. They’re far more obvious. Full-body swimwear, their materials and manufacturing processes engineered for optimum water-repelling performance, have rendered quaint not only the anecdotes of standard-bearing athletes like Spitz, but to some degree their accomplishments, too.
AB first examined the pros and cons of advancing swimsuit technology in December 2005, and again this past January. In between, the 2008 Olympics saw 20 swimming world records fall. Spitz in his prime wouldn’t even have qualified for those Games. His world-record 200-meter freestyle time of 1:52.78 set in 1972 in Munich was nearly 10 seconds slower than the new standard set by American Michael Phelps last August in Beijing. Pools have gotten faster, as has swimwear. Yet many remain unconvinced that those factors alone can account for a 10-second differential, even if the times were separated by 36 years. “There’s a big disconnect between cause and effect,” George Washington University professor Rajat Mittal, a leading researcher in hydrodynamics, told Popular Mechanics last year. “Even when coaches have figured out things that work well, they don’t know why they work well.” For Mittal, a swimmer’s technique (in Phelps’s case, his near-flawless dolphin kick) trumps all else.
Meanwhile, FINA, international swimming’s governing body, can’t seem to make up its collective mind whether the suit makes the swimmer. In April, it appeared to endorse the covered-arms (and legs) race among suit manufacturers when it announced Speedo’s LZR Racer (worn by Phelps and a host of other elites) would remain legal, despite widespread concern over its impact on the sport. (Italian coach Alberto Castagnetti has referred to the use of such suits as “technological doping.”) Five weeks later, the organization did a philosophical flip turn, banning 10 high-tech suits outright, ordering modifications to 136 others, and sparing 15 LZR models entirely. The backstroking began anew in late July, when FINA announced a ban on all full-body suits, allowing only those extending from the waist to the knee on men and from neck to knee on women, effective Jan. 1. By September, mounting pressure to allow the same neck-to-knee coverage for both sexes had forced FINA to reconsider — and the international swimming community to keep holding its collective breath.
Of course, the hair-removal cream is already out of the tube. Can we say with confidence that past razor-thin victories were won by the best swimmer in the water? Can we objectively compare the best swimmers of all time? Do today’s world records have true meaning?
Perhaps a unisex suit policy is the closest we’ll get to FINA taking a purists’ plunge. For decades, when we thought of the Speedo brand, we pictured Spitz — wearing the standard for male swimmers of his time: the brief. Let future generations of would-be legends compete uniformly in similar, if slightly more modest, fashion. Mustaches optional.
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Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Remembering Ed Thomas
Last Friday night, less than 10 weeks after Aplington-Parkersburg (Iowa) High School football coach Ed Thomas was gunned down by a former player, the Falcons swarmed onto the field that bears his name and defeated their northeastern Iowa neighbor Dike-New Hartford, 30-14. It was the first time in 35 years that Thomas wasn’t on the sidelines, and ESPN was there to capture every play.
I’ve interviewed several people since I spoke with Thomas for April’s cover story, but something the coach and athletic director said during our 40-minute conversation about A-P’s recovery from a deadly 2008 tornado — which claimed Thomas’ home, the school and its athletic facilities — has stuck with me: “One of the most valuable lessons our kids have learned is that if you see people in need, reach out and help them, because it’s the right thing to do. That’s a lesson you can’t learn in school. And it’s going to make them better parents and better members of a community. We’re not going to face any greater adversity on Friday nights than what we’ve already been through.”
Thomas’ words seem truer now than when we last spoke. Even though A-P secured a victory last weekend, winning football games will continue to be among the least of this small and tight-knit community’s challenges.
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