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An even more egregious example may be seen in the recent Oregon Ducks vs. Oklahoma Sooners game, where two blatantly incorrect calls changed the outcome of the game and left even the Oregon home team's TV crew shaking their heads in disbelief that Oklahoma had lost. (rivals.com September 16, 2006)
News media occasionally are forced to cover this type of corruption, even while burying many other examples. The Seattle TIMES, June 11, 2008, printed the following deplorable story which relates to commercial (NBA) basketball:
"NBA officials allegedly told referees not to call technical fouls on star players so that ticket sales and TV ratings of the games wouldn't be affected," a disgraced ref told the FBI according to court filings Tuesday.
The bombshell letter filed in Brooklyn federal court by the defense attorney for disgraced gambling referee Timothy Donaghy contained claims of favoritism, improper gratuities, conflict of interest, blown foul calls and alleged interference by league officials in the work of refs in the NBA.
Commercial Sports Cause Major Life-Long Injuries
Because of the pressures to win, to break records, and to fulfill multi-million dollar contracts, athletes are motivated to shake off injuries and even to play while hurt seriously, despite prudent medical advice. (Sadly, team physicians often compromise their Hippocratic Oaths by sending players too injured to play back into tight games; admittedly, if they acted otherwise, team owners would surely fire them and hire more compliant physicians.)
Any person who has worked in health care has likely witnessed in their treatment rooms prematurely aged patients-usually former NFL players-crippled by arthritic joint degeneration at an early age of 35-40 from the constant and excessive force characteristic of professional contact sports.
Neurologists also see many examples of brain dysfunction (remember the glorious Muhammed Ali at the peak of his career-before his brain damage became manifest?) in retired professional athletes. Now, a recent study confirms that chronic brain injury from concussions is even worse than anecdotal evidence had previously suggested:
"What's been surprising is that it's so extensive," said Dr. Ann McKee, a neuropathologist at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Bedford, Massachusetts, and co-director of the Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy (CSTE). "It's throughout the brain, not just on the superficial aspects of the brain, but it's deep inside."
CSTE studies reveal brown tangles flecked throughout the brain tissue of former NFL players who died young -- some as early as their 30s or 40s. McKee, who also studies Alzheimer's disease, says the tangles closely resemble what might be found in the brain of an 80-year-old with dementia. (CNN American Morning, 1/29/09)
Actually Vince Lombardi Was a Putz
Perhaps the greatest recent damage to all sports, both college and professional, has been the pernicious win-at-any-cost philosophy embodied by former Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi. One of Lombardi's most telling quotes was: "If winning isn't everything, why do they keep score?" Well, Vince, you've just told us that after a lifetime of coaching you still didn't "get it" that sport is really about playing, and that winning or losing is just a by-product of an important human activity that intrinsically promotes life skills, character development, health, personal satisfaction, camaraderie, and teamwork.
Here's another of Lombardi's mixed-up, (and sexist) thoughts that confuse sport with war: "I firmly believe that any man's [sic] finest hour, the greatest fulfillment of all that he [sic] holds dear, is that moment when he [sic] has worked his [sic] heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of battle - victorious." (Emphasis added) This tragic confusion between playing a sport and fighting a war-truly a life-and-death matter-can ruin the benefit and suck the fun out of any sport. Perhaps Lombardi himself suffered too many concussions during his own playing career to understand this.
Hundreds of coaches have reaped millions of dollars in fees for conducting clinics and delivering speeches that glorify Mr. Lombardi's philosophy that only winners qualify for respect. Thousands and thousands of eager young athletes have been permanently disenchanted with sports by the derisive criticisms of their coaches and teammates after dropping a pass, missing a pitch, or failing to block a shot. Maybe each locker room should keep a few pistols, with a single round at the ready, available for the hapless athlete whose blunder loses the game.
Lombardi drove his own players as if each game, each kick-off return, and each play would be the final judgment on their worth as human beings. While no one would dispute that encouraging each person to do their best is commendable, only the very simplest of acolytes would accept Lombardi's thesis. What Lombardi utterly failed to comprehend is that the process of practice, study, self-improvement and of playing (yes, "playing' is the operative term here) is the core of the sport-not the result, or score, of a game or season.
But for the generation of men and women who lionized Lombardi's philosophy, one solution (appropriate for those oafs who can never attain major league status in commercial sport-like activities) may be to convert their former love of the sport itself into a life style of TV viewing reinforced by the players, coaches and commentators who echo Lombardi's win-win-win approach.
