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Friday, July 15, 2011

Sports Now and Welcome Back!

It has been a dark time. I have made the executive decision to delete all of the previous sports according to slice columns. They can be compared to the first 20 years of the NBA. Good things happened during the first run of Sports According to Slice, but it's time for a new era. I took a break from writing and really scrutinized it. Consider the first columns a test run. To the people who have read my columns from the beginning: I would like to quote Chris Berman: "You've been with us for the beginning. But now that's all about to change." Sports has changed a lot in the last few months, so let's get to the topics of the past week to bring us up to date.
JAMES HARRISON: HIS HARDEST HIT
The great writer Richard Wright once said that words could be used as weapons. These weapons were more damaging than any tangible item when used correctly. James Harrison certainly used words as his weapons in a May interview with Men's Journal. During this interview, he posed shirtless holding two pistols to imitate the pose on the cover of the video game Mortal Kombat. He described teammates and competitors in an extremely negative light, calling Rashard Mendenhall a fumble machine and telling Ben Roethlisberger to stop thinking that he is Peyton Manning. Harrison saved his most venomous words for commissioner Roger Goodell. He described Goodell as a devil and a puppet dictator. He directed a homophobic slur at Goodell among other obscenities. Other than the actions described in the last three sentences, it was a pretty normal interview. Harrison has apologized since the magazine feature and claimed that his words were taken out of context.
I don't buy that at all. How can "devil" and "puppet dictator" be taken out of context? It can't. I already had a negative opinion of James Harrison for his whining about illegal hits earlier this season. I don't like it when an NFL Player glorifies himself, I hate it when an NFL Player glorifies harmful and illegal actions, and I despise it when an NFL Player glorifies himself by promoting his spine crushing illegal hits. So what if they land people in the hospital? So what if people end up dying from those hits in a decade or two? I want to have a good clip on the Sportscenter Top 10! That attitude has led to my hate of James Harrison. However, this is really too much. Harrison is spitting in the face of his teammates an anybody who has ever respected him as a player, not to mention the man who is fighting to have a season so players like Harrison can make his millions. The only thing worse than Harrison's comments are the people who applaud them by saying that he is "voicing what other players feel about Goodell." I get it. It happens all the time. There have been times when I have hated how people I know have acted. Every sane person knows that the way to solve everything is to run up to them, grab them by the shirt collar, and call them a dictator and a devil. Very few other players feel that strongly about Goodell. Why have Brady, Manning, and Brees calmly stated "It's time to get a deal done" while Harrison is ready to snap Goodell's head off? My take is that Harrison is trying to play up the "I'm a freak of nature!" angle during interviews and went too far this time. Once the lockout ends, strong punishments will come down on James Harrison and it will not be pretty. I would expect a four game suspension and a heavy fine. Of course, he's getting off easy. Because if I were Roger Goodell, I would prove to Harrison that I am a dictator and suspend him for more than half the season. That kind of behavior would not be tolerated if I ran the league. It would not be tolerated by Bud Selig and it certainly would not be tolerated by David Stern, who would have Harrison disappear faster than Don Imus. For the sake of the NFL, let's hope Goodell does not tolerate it either.
MLB: ALL STAR EVENTS IN THE DESERT AND THE ESPYS
All-Star events have come and gone in Arizona. I give the Home Run Derby a solid B and the all-star game a B-. The ESPYS get an A.
The Home Run Derby was entertaining as always. Highlights from the Derby include Robinson Cano belting 12 home runs in the finals (a derby record for the last round) to narrowly defeat Adrian Gonzalez. The enduring moment from the derby will be Cano hugging his father after the last home run, just overcome with pride and happiness that his father could be there to share in the moment. Another enduring image was the fan who dove in to the pool to catch a foul ball. He caught the foul ball while in mid-dive and yet he still managed to save his beverage (Priorities!). The two other things that stood out for me were Prince Fielder's 474 foot shot (amazing even when Fielder had just started to swing) and the kid's diving catch of Cano's pop-up (good effort, kid). Of course, only the most unathletic and uncoordinated kids are picked to chase the non-home runs. It's the baseball equivalent of the out of shape people picked to shoot a half court shot at halftime of a basketball game. Among these kids, there are always two or three people that are stronger, faster, and more coordinated than everyone else. They look like those guys in a baseball movie that hit the game winning home run. The smaller kids look like the happy to be there 9th hitter in a generic baseball movie that always strikes out until the championship game. Basically, they are there to make the hero look good. That's what the outfield at a home run derby is like. The lowlights of the Home Run Derby was that it was not exciting until the last round. Nobody hit a particularly memorable homer or hit a lot of them. Since the stadium was enclosed, there was a limit to how far the ball could actually travel. This caused ESPN's presumably high tech distance tracking device to keep giving inaccurate readings. Big hitters like Matt Kemp and Jose Bautista did not do as well as originally anticipated. What uneducated fans don't get is that some people have swings that are great for succeeding at batting practice and some players have swings that are great for actual pitches. Some of the greatest power hitters in batting practice are contact hitters in the real game and vice versa. Despite this indisputable fact, some people around the Sports Broadcasting Camp that I attended were saying that Baustita was awful and predicting a second half collapse. These are the same people who probably think that Chris Johnson is slipping because he didn't get 2000 yards this past year. Anyways, Home Run Derby was not bad.
The All Star Game was a B-. There were entertaining moments, however. Prince Fielder's home run was an exciting part. And don't forget about...... wait, that's it? Fielder's home run was the only entertaining moment? Besides Heath Bell's running slide in to the mound and Brian Wilson attempting to grow Sasquatch off his chin, it really wasn't an entertaining all star game. Besides Fielder's home run, nothing else happened that really got people excited about the game. The NL won for the second year in a row and Brian Wilson had a forest on his face. You know it was boring when I re-use the same joke from two sentences ago. All I can say is that I don't know what I or anybody else would do without Brian Wilson's beard.
              AN EVENT WITH SPORTS AWARDS AND MORE BRIAN WILSON JOKES
I loved this year's ESPY awards. I would have rated them as a perfect A+, but they hit one little bump in the road. This bump is that they let Justin Beiber in to the ceremony. Even at the ESPY Awards, you can't get away from Justin Beiber. Other than Beiber, I loved the guests at this year's awards. You had every relevant athlete from this past year. Dirk Nowtitzki, Aaron Rodgers, and Serena Williams were there among others to attend the night of honoring our greatest athletes. I would argue that you can determine what happened, who mattered, and why they mattered in any given year (at least the raw facts, maybe some of the details) by watching any given ESPY Awards ceremony. Not only were the athletes there, the entertainment stars were there. I mostly noticed Brooklyn Decker, Drew Barrymore, and Erin Andrews. Um, not for any particular reason. We also had Seth Meyers hosting the ESPYs and cracking jokes about the Miami Heat (never gets old) and the Los Angeles Dodgers. Also in attendance for the show was Brian Wilson. Not only was Sasquatch (his official beard nickname as given by me) in full bushiness, but he was sporting a spandex suit. He completed the ensemble with a cane and a bow tie. He looked like a homeless guy who raided Mr. Peanut's wardrobe. In other words, he's exactly the kind of guy you would want to have at your party. However, the most vivid memory of this year's ESPY awards was not Brian Wilson. It was not Dirk Nowitzki and the Mavs (who cleaned up on this year's awards). No, this awards show belonged to Dewey Bozella and Anthony Robles. Bozella won the Arthur Ashe courage award for refusing to admit that he committed a crime that he did not commit in exchange for freedom. Bozella fought for 26 years to be free, finally being liberated by the Innocence Project after spending half of his life behind bars. That story was awe-inspiring. Celebrities who are practically in the businuess of self-absorption shed a tear. Crowds were riveted by Bozella's story. I was shocked at his determination and iron spirit. The story of Dewey Bozella is something that will stay with me forever. So too will Antohony Robles. Robles won the Jim Valvano award. Robles was a champion wrestler for Arizona State. He put in countless hours in the gym and never surrendered to his critics. He was literally always standing on his last leg. He was born without his first one. Having one leg never hampered Robles. Naysayers took Robles as a joke and a living cautionary tale. Robles never let the negativity affect him. He rose to the occasion and won the state wrestling championship. The story of Anthony Robles and the image of him standing on one leg with his arm raised to the sky is the one shining moment from this year's ESPYs.

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