What the
hell happened to pro sports?
Seriously. We used to be able to
turn on a game, be it Football, Basketball or Baseball (the big three in America) and
just be able to enjoy the game itself.
Now, the first thing we have to worry about is “who’s doping”? That’s a tragedy. Sure, back in the day your questions would
center more on who was carrying a vial of crystal meth in their back pocket to
snort between innings, but that didn’t really affect “fair play”. Being drunk, high as a kite, or just wore out
from a night of banging every able-bodied and willing female in the vicinity
really didn’t provide a distinct advantage to those individuals partaking in
the merriment. Was there steroid or PED
usage back then? Probably a little but
I’m sure it wasn’t nearly to the degree it is now.
Nowadays we
get the Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Roger Clemens etc. cone of shame. Now we get players in football (Ray Lewis,
according to a recent report) using deer velvet extract to help them come back
faster from an injury. I am a little
more accepting of the utility of the substance when that is the reasoning
behind it than when it is used to gain a distinct advantage, but a banned
substance is a banned substance. The
fact that these individuals find it necessary to use these substances, be it
testosterone, HGH or rhino penis extract, whatever they decide, just means to
me that their inability to grasp the passage of time, to live in the now, is a
chronic problem.
Let’s examine why this problem exists. The fact of the matter is that these
individuals are treated like superheroes, like modern day gladiators. Once they fall out of the public eye,
regardless of their past accomplishments, they will be discarded. This is not just a matter of a group of
people growing up with different sports heroes to worship. Unless you were the absolute best at your
position, of all time I’m talking, then it is hard to stay in the public’s
consciousness much past your shelf life.
Even then, you have to constantly market yourself in order to stay
relevant.
Ex.
Michael Jordan (the best basketball
player ever) – Owner of the Charlotte Bobcats, loves Hanes T-Shirts
Dan Marino/Steve Young/Troy Aikman
(three of the best quarterbacks of their generation, if not ever) – All popular
and well respected analysts, on TV every Sunday at least.
Pick an old baseball player that is
still relevant. Go ahead. Is he a manager or a TV personality? Probably one or the other.
The only
other way to stay relevant is to be the best ever at something. And by best ever, I mean top of the
list. This is where the Hank Aaron’s of
the world come in. Do you think anyone
would know or care about Hank Aaron if he was #6 on the home run list? Of course not. He stayed relevant all these years because he
was (and many say still is) the home run king.
Babe Ruth, while not #1 on that list was also an accomplished pitcher in
his time and stories of his off-field antics will probably outlast stories of
his on-field accomplishments. Joe Montana
won four Super bowls, which guarantees him a spot in the national
consciousness. The list goes on and
on.
The thing
is, there is only one Joe Montana, there is only one Hank Aaron, and there are
only a few coach/manager/announcer gigs out there to be had. If you want to make your mark as an athlete
and be remembered, you need to do your best to get to the top of whatever list
you are aiming for. If you are not a
freak athlete, or cannot sustain that freak athlete performance over an entire
career, then you cheat.
Fame is
intoxicating. Let’s look at Alex
Rodriguez for example, as he is the main reason this is being written right
now. He was a kid when he came to the
major leagues, and yet he was instantly viewed as one of the best, if not the
best, shortstops in the league (this was during the Jeter/ Ripken Jr. days
though so I’d argue he was never the best shortstop). The thing is A-Rod could hit. Sure, Jeter can regularly hit for average,
but A-Rod was hitting for power, and people like a power hitter; see Sosa,
Sammy and pretty much anyone with giant heads from the 1990’s. This culture of blowing these individuals and
their accomplishments way out of proportion resulted in a god-like status for them. Regardless of the fact that they were just
playing a game, they became figureheads of the sport and reaped the rewards of
that status. This obviously meant more money,
and who doesn’t want that? Between the
bigger paychecks, and the adulation of millions of fans, the heads of these
individuals became more swollen than even the steroids could make them.
Back to
A-Rod. He is not the player he was with Seattle when he first came into the league, hell he’s not
the player he was in Texas. He had one good postseason and a couple
decent years with the Yankees and that’s about it. He’s been okay in the regular season but not
spectacular (regardless of his MVP's) and I can almost guarantee that this eats away at him (the New York media doesn’t
help I’m sure). In order to recapture
that former glory, A-Rod has decided to turn back the clock through artificial
means. Now many have tried, be it through
experimental blood spinning techniques or actual drugs themselves, be they
natural or otherwise. The main problem
here is that baseball has been severely burned by steroids in the past, so much
so that they closed the doors to the Hall of Fame this year in terms of
inductions. The first year of
eligibility for many of the “steroid era” players yielded no recipients of the
sport’s highest honor, even for those not linked to steroids at all. These god-like figures during their playing
days will now fade away into obscurity, their names just hushed whispers on the
lips of those that saw the McGwire-Sosa home run race, or Bonds slug his way
past Aaron’s record.
Ok, so that’s
the problem. What can we do? How about we stop treating people that play a
game like they are that much more important than those that help us through our
daily lives? This goes for all
entertainment, not just sports. Why are
people that are basically there for our entertainment multi-millionaires? Because we create them, that’s why. As a society, it’s time to start valuing
those that work hard and not just those that are there for our viewing
pleasure. That will not only help to
right our backwards culture, but also get these pro athletes to stop trying to
hang on to the past through artificial means.
