The NBA playoffs started a few weeks ago, and the second round is more than half over. There has been plenty of drama, and much of it has recently been focused on the Miami Heat, as expected. Once the Heat assembled its current roster before the 2010-2011 season, adding LeBron James and Chris Bosh to a team that already had Dwyane Wade, the expectations for this bunch went through the roof. They are currently being severely tested by the Indiana Pacers, a team that was given little chance coming into the series. The drama of the games themselves is great, but most of the theatrics have been off the court.  I have little patience for any of it, honestly.

After the Pacers won a thriller to take game two and steal home court advantage, the team had a very brief celebration on the court before Indiana forward David West herded his teammates to the locker room. I guess he didn’t do it quickly enough, though, as Dwyane Wade mouthed off about it in a post-game interview, suggesting that the Pacers must not have expected to win. Considering the scope of the so-called “celebration,” Wade came off as a sore loser, which is exactly what he was at that point. If you don’t like seeing the other team celebrate, beat them.

Game three was a runaway win for Indiana, as the Heat were really never in it after the first quarter. Lance Stephenson, a guard for the Pacers, made news by making a choking gesture after a missed free-throw by LeBron James. It was certainly not a very sportsmanlike move, but it was nothing all that shocking. Stephenson even apologized the next day, saying that he never should have done what he did.  Miami forward Juwan Howard took exception anyway, however, and confronted Stephenson before game four. The two had to be separated. Everything about this particular story is irritating, really. Neither of these guys has been playing much at all in this series, so we should not need to talk about them. The part that grabbed me about it, though was this: who knew Juwan Howard was still in the league?  Isn’t he about 700 years old by now?

Finally, after falling behind by 10 points early in the third quarter on Sunday, the Heat roared back to win game four and even the series at two games apiece. LeBron James had an epic game, with 40 points, 18 rebounds, and 9 assists. Unfortunately, following the game, my Twitter feed came alive with comment after comment to the effect of “where are all the LeBron haters now??” This is such a tired argument. I will freely acknowledge James’ skill as a basketball player. My dislike of him has nothing to do with his ability. Yes, I have heard the refrain of “he’ll never win a championship” numerous times, but the people defending LeBron are missing the point. I, and many others like me, dislike him almost entirely because of “The Decision,” the television special from July of 2010, during which he announced that he would be “taking his talents to South Beach” and signing with the Heat. The towering arrogance it took to put on that dog-and-pony show was enough to put me in that “hater” camp forever.

I am rooting for the Pacers to take the series. I still expect the Heat to move on to the next round, and they showed in game four that they still have it in them. If nothing else, I hope we can manage to finish the matchup with a minimum of additional histrionics.

Bad sports, continued:

2) Philadelphia Eagles tackle Jason Peters suffered a huge setback in his recovery from Achilles surgery this week, as he managed to tear the Achilles again during a fall. A device he had been using to allow him to walk apparently malfunctioned, causing the fall.

3) Brett Lawrie, a third basemen for the Toronto Blue Jays, lost his mind after being called out on strikes by umpire Bill Miller on Tuesday in a game against the Tampa Bay Rays. The player spiked his helmet to the ground in anger as he walked back toward Miller. Unfortunately for him, the helmet bounced and actually hit the umpire. Lawrie was ejected from the game and was subsequently suspended for four games by Major League Baseball.

4) Jonathan Vilma, the linebacker for the New Orleans Saints who was recently suspend for the entire upcoming season for his role in the bounty scandal that rocked the football world this offseason, has sued NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell for defamation. Vilma continues to deny any involvement in the scandal, and says that Goodell has permanently damaged his reputation.

5) This was weird and scary. Tampa Bay Rays second basemen Will Rhymes was hit in the arm by a pitch from Franklin Morales of the Boston Red Sox in the eighth inning on Wednesday. As he headed toward first base, Rhymes collapsed and fainted into the arms of coach George Hendrick. Reports are that it was adrenaline that caused the issue, and there appears to be no significant injury.

6) In the midst of the NCAA Softball playoffs, the University of Florida suspended three of its players for the remainder of the season for an undisclosed reason. Despite this, the Gators managed to win on Saturday and move on in the playoffs.

Good sports:

1) NBA Hall of Famer Larry Bird added another huge accomplishment to his incredible resume. After winning the league Most Valuable Player award three times and winning Coach of the Year once, Bird, now President of the Indiana Pacers, has now won the league’s Executive of the Year award. Amazing.

2) Rhein Gibson, an Australian golfer, shot a 55 at the River Oaks Golf Club in Oklahoma last week, tying a world record set by Homero Blancas in 1962.

3) Last week, I took New York Giants defensive end Osi Umneyiora to task for his repeated attemptts to essentially use “girl” as a derisive term. Sarah Spain, an anchor for ESPN Chicago, had the same idea and lambasted the football player. To his credit, Umenyiora issued a thoughtful apology, indicating that he understood why his comments were wrong.

4) Surprise Kentucky Derby winner I’ll Have Another showed Saturday that maybe his victory in the Derby should not have been so much of a surprise, as he won the Preakness in dramatic fashion. He will now move on to the Belmont Stakes, attempting to become the first Triple Crown winner in over 30 years.

Bad sports, good sports appears every Monday

I guess I am naive. I tend to believe that adults, by their very nature, should be reasonable people. I manage to be regularly amazed by how often that belief is proven wrong. The world of sports is as susceptible to this as anything else, of course, and this column is usually dedicated to illustrating all kinds of foolish behavior. This week is no exception. On Wednesday night, two high school baseball teams from Arizona were scheduled to play each other in the state championship game for their classification. Instead of playing, however, one of the schools, Our Lady of Sorrows Academy, forfeited the game. Why would they do this, you ask? Because Mesa Preparatory Academy, the other school, has a girl on its team.

Our Lady of Sorrows Academy is a private school that is associated with something called the Society of Saint Pius X, which split off from the Catholic Church about 30 years ago due to difference of opinion about the Vatican II Council reforms from the Sixties. I know little about this group’s beliefs, but apparently one of them is that boys and girls should not play baseball together. The two teams played twice earlier this season, and Paige Sultzbach, who plays second base for Mesa Prep, sat out those games in an attempt to appease the other school’s beliefs. On Wednesday, though, Sultzbach chose to not step aside. It was the championship game, after all, and she had worked hard all season to be there. Instead of letting its team compete for the title it had been striving for, the religious school decided to quit.

OLSA’s actions are just so wrong on a number of levels. First of all, to be so openly chauvinistic shocks me, despite the fact that it’s not as rare as it should be. What exactly are they afraid of? I am not even sure I want an answer to that, as I have little doubt that it would disgust me. The school not only denied its own kids the chance to compete, it denied Mesa Prep the same thing. Sure, they were crowned champions, but anyone who has ever played a sport knows that players want to win it on the field. A forfeit win is just not the same thing as a real victory. Sultzbach should feel insulted and disrespected, and I imagine she does. Honestly, as an intelligent, thinking human being in the 21st century, I feel insulted by this myself. Mesa’s athletic director Amy Arnold was quoted as saying, “I respect their views, but it’s a bit out of the 18th century.” I agree with the latter but not the former. I don’t respect those views at all. Sure, the school and its players have a right to their beliefs, but that sure does not mean that I have to respect them. To the contrary, those beliefs nauseate me, and I know a few others who felt similarly. I was sent this story by several different people who had spotted it this week, as it is the kind of story that evokes a visceral reaction from a lot of people. As a father of two girls, I shudder at the thought that there are still people and organizations out there that would like to set them and all other females back decades to a time when women were regularly treated as if they were less than their male counterparts.

The decision-makers at OLSA should be ashamed of themselves. Any parent who would allow his or her child to attend a school that could make that decision should be similarly ashamed. Paige Sultzbach and her teammates should be applauded for not giving in this time. They never should have had her sit out the other games, and I am glad they did not do so this time.

Bad sports, continued:

2) Guillermo Mota, a pitcher for the San Francisco Giants, has been suspended for 100 games by Major League Baseball after failing a test for performance enhancing drugs for a second time. 100 games may seem like a lot, but I feel this is far too lenient. If you fail a steroids test, get suspended for 50 games, and then fail another, you should be out of the game forever. This isn’t marijuana…this is cheating.

3) Phillies pitcher Cole Hamels was suspended for five games after admitting he intentionally hit Washington Nationals rookie Bryce Harper with a pitch last week. He said he was trying to deliver a message to Harper that he needed to tone down his act. Whether or not you agree with Hamels throwing at Harper, there is no doubt that admitting it to the media was a seriously dumb move.

4) Speaking of Bryce Harper, he made an awfully dumb move of his own later in the week. After escaping injury from that beaning by Hamels five days earlier, Harper was having a rough game against the Cincinnati Reds. He went 0-5 with three strikeouts, prompting him to swing a bat against the wall of the tunnel behind the dugout. The bat bounced back and hit Harper in the face, opening a gash near his eye that required ten stitches. Something tells me Hamels was onto something, as far as Harper needing to calm down a bit.

5) Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic, arguably the two best men’s tennis players in the world, are talking about boycotting next year’s Madrid Open if the organizers don’t change the surface by the time the tournament comes around. This year’s tournament, which concluded this week, was played on a surface that was not only bright blue, but was also quite slippery, according to the players.

6) With the whole Bobby Petrino mess still a very recent memory, the University of Arkansas football team was back in the news this week. Three of the team’s players were arrested on Saturday, charged with burglarizing several dorm rooms on campus.

7) Sixteen people were injured in a fire in a Formula One garage on Sunday at the Spanish Grand Prix in Madrid. The race winner, Pastor Maldonado, was the driver for one of the team’s involved in the fire.

8) Boston Red Sox pitcher Josh Beckett is in trouble in his home city. After sitting out a start last week due to some kind of injury, Beckett went out and played golf the next day. When questioned about it after getting hit hard in his Thursday night start against Cleveland, Beckett was surly and arrogant, stating that he could do anything he wanted with his precious days off. Way to endear yourselves to the fans who buy the tickets there, Josh.

9) Osi Umenyioria, continued his feud with Philadelphia Eagles running back LeSean McCoy on Sunday, tweeting a Mother’s Day greeting to McCoy. This started last summer, after McCoy referred to Umenyioria as “soft,” and the defensive end for the New York Giants replied by calling McCoy “Lady Gaga” and referred to him as “she.” Oh, haha, I get it. You’re saying he’s a girl, and that is inherently funny, because, well, you know…girls are so beneath you. Maybe you should go to Our Lady of Sorrows Academy.

Good sports:

1) Josh Hamilton had a rough offseason, which included a partial relapse into his well-documented alcoholism. It does not appear to have impacted his season, however. The Texas Rangers outfielder hit four homeruns in a 10-3 win over the Baltimore Orioles on Tuesday. As of Sunday night, Hamilton not only leads the league in homeruns with 18, but he has five more than anyone else does.

2) Manchester City won its first EPL title in 44 years in amazing fashion on Sunday, scoring two goals within four minutes during extra time to beat Queens Park, 3-2.

Bad sports, good sports appears every Monday

Ok, I’m a smart guy who can be very stupid at times. This is particularly true when it comes to physical limits. I know, for example, that enrolling in the ProAM Bull Riding contest would be a serious mistake. I know that. It would have been a serious mistake 20 years ago and there’s no reason to think it might be a good idea now. I know that   El Capitan is not in my future unless they build an escalator. I’ve figured that out…

So, of course, I made a wise crack to a guy 20 some years younger than I that the Mojave Free Press ought to enter a team for the Barstow Mud Run. Figured a leisurely job across the desert, splash through some forgiving water obstacles and then pick up a T-shirt at the worst case. At the best case, he’d laugh and say no thanks, he had to cover it for the paper. How hard could it be? What could go wrong?

Most things.

Well, the principal architect of that electronic fish wrapper is a guy named Charles Waybright. He’s a nice guy, but he either has a sense of humor more twisted than mine or he’s very stupid. Charles thought it was a great idea. So, there we were, Charles, Bruce Klein and me, surrounded by 1000 or so of like-minded lunatics set to take off across the desert to benefit the Barstow Veterans Home and the Barstow Kiwanis. Both of which are worthy of support for their services to this community which really needs it and more of it. Oh, the guys who bailed on the run so that Charles had to recruit Bruce but volunteered to video the thing and provide coverage for the paper, also bailed. Charles had his lovely wife worried that I might not show or be found and that she would have to pick up the banner. She was prescient enough to be glad to see me.

Drove up there from my home. This being primarily a fund raiser for the Vets Home there were lots of guys and gals there who were former Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines who were volunteering, and of course, in charge. One of the nice things about people with military experience is that if someone needs to be in charge of something, and no one else will do it, they’ll step up. At the same time, a lot of times they’ll take charge because they need to be in charge. Of something, anything, doesn’t matter what. I work very hard at not being like that – it’s less tiring. Still, I can understand the tendency. Six to twelve of these guys were directing traffic. Guy who directed me into my parking space and made certain that I was parked on-line with the rest of the cars must have been an Aviation Bosun’s Mate in the Navy, because a couple of those folks shared with me that their primary function underway was to serve as a valet parking lot attendant for airplanes. Deviance from the line was not to be tolerated…

I kind of regretted that this guy wasn’t organizing the start. It gets hot in Barstow, in the sun, in May, and there was limited shade. Like almost none – the crowd mulled around, and the start was in heats. Somehow Charles and Bruce found me, and I pinned up my number, tied my timing chip to my shoe and we muddled our way through. One reason for running as a team – in our case, Old and Fat! – was to support each other, but somehow we all wandered into different heats.

Now, back in the day, I was a distance runner. Then my back went to wherever things go when they decide not to work anymore, and I don’t run. I was figuring the high intensity workouts I do in the gym would cover me. I wasn’t planning on setting records. I may have…probably was the slowest finisher. Hit the first water obstacle and found myself running through water and mud but only up to just below the knees. Climb out, over a birm and head for the next obstacle…which was slightly deeper, and had tires that had embedded themselves in the mud at this point. If you are light on your feet, long legged and run with a high knee lift, this isn’t a problem. If you’ve just turned 61, have always had a squatty body, lift weights for sport and have short legs, this is not going to work. Step, spash, fall, get caught in the mud, pull boots out of mud and repeat.  This turned into an ordeal. Got out, shook my head, and started slowly jogging toward the next obstacle. More tires and a birm on each end…you get through the first one, and over it and then there’s another one, just like the other one…

Crashed on the next one, which may have involved piranha but did involve a water truck raining on you as you fought you way through the mud, tires and so on.  Got through, got out and started walking…got to the first water stop, and stood there drinking warm water out of a cup, which frankly didn’t help all that much. I started to feel less bad when I realized that two college girls were there, both wearing women’s cross country team t-shirts, and one of them had just had an exercise induced asthma attack. She probably weighed about 100 pounds.

So, on I slogged. Skipped an obstacle, continued to slog. Got to the water slide thing…slide down the slide into the water, what could go wrong. Well, a lot…as I found out when I landed and slammed my leg into some immovable object –heap of dead bodies? Left-over rocks? Railroad ties? – pinning my leg back. Guy manning the thing in the pond pulled me out of the way, and I realized that I was now golden – I had a low calf/high ankle strain and could hobble through the rest of the course but couldn’t go through any more obstacles. Yeah, buddy – of course, I’m soaking wet, my Palladium BUDS course boots are full of desert and water as well, my ankle is not swelling that much because it is encased in a muddy, tied running boot, but it hurts like hell, and I have a mile or so of desert to cross. And, so I did. Bumped into Charles who was having problems seeing, because he had listened to someone talking jive and decided he had to splash him, primarily splashing himself. Muddy water in the eyes…hot…dirt…he told me that I had mud on my teeth and looked like a caveman in a rugby game jersey. Didn’t see Bruce…I hope it wasn’t him dead in the mud at the water slide….

OK, I can see the attraction of this event. I think it’s important not to over- or under-think the obstacles – one tire obstacle with several non-tire obstacles before the next tire obstacle one for example would be better – more aid teams and watering spots, and more attention to safety would be helpful, and if you decide to run one of these crazy things, I strongly recommend making certain that they are in fact paying a lot of attention to safety. I heard about a couple of broken bones, and the MEDEVAC chopper taking off from near the finishing line was, well, troubling. But, this is a budding sport similar in a lot of ways to Cross-Fitness – it’s simple, it’s cheap and anyone can play. Even 61 year old men with bad backs and a smart mouth.

There were a lot of kids and families which I thought was great. I was particularly taken by the number of kids running with their moms and dads, although I did see more than a few groups where the kids who appeared to be about 9 were waiting for Mom or Dad to catch up. I saw a few people I used to work with who were volunteering and having fun. Interestingly, one guy who used to work for me and resembles Mr. Clean physically and a wimpy weasel spiritually but who always had to be taking time off to take care of his two very athletic boys was there with the boys. He was dry and clean and I overheard him say, “Oh yeah, they did good…”

Well, I didn’t but I still feel good about it. Don’t know if I’ll ever do one again…whom I kidding, no way! Put this on your reverse bucket list along with spending time in a North Korean Labor Camp, using a do it yourself appendectomy kit or, hell, bull riding! But, if you feel the need, look around. I’m sure’ll you’ll find one. And, in order for there to be a “There I was, me, myself and I, alone, surrounded,” you have to be there first.

Charles asked me if it was fun when we finished. I laughed and said it was more fun after it was over than while I was doing it. Ain’t that the truth?

Greetings from Las Vegas. I used to come out here every year for the opening weekend of the NCAA Basketball Tournament. In fact, that was the subject of my very first Bad Sports, Good Sports column back in early 2009. I had not been out here since we stopped going for basketball, though, until today, when I arrived for a work conference. Although this city gave me fodder for that initial weekly missive, today it is likely to only keep this column short, as a long travel day has left me pretty beat, and the clock is simply mocking me with its bogus three-hours-earlier-than-it-feels-like reading glowing in green letters next to the bed.

The big news of the week was the untimely death of former NFL great Junior Seau. The long-time San Diego Charger was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the chest on Wednesday in his home in Oceanside, California. Seau played in the NFL for 20 seasons, most of them with the Chargers, and the last few of his career with the New England Patriots. He retired for good in 2009. He made the Pro Bowl 12 consecutive times, from 1991 to 2002, and was one of the best linebackers of this era. He also seemed to be one of those guys that was beloved by everyone. His suicide has come as a shock to most people, although there was an incident back in 2010 that might have been an early indicator of what was to come. Seau was arrested on a domestic violence charge after a reported attack on his girlfriend in October of that year, and then, just hours later, was in a scary car crash that saw his vehicle plunge down a 100 foot cliff. He survived that crash, amazingly, and told police that he had fallen asleep while driving.

This whole incident has intensified the focus on the problem of concussions in football, which remains a very hot topic, as it has been for the last couple of years. Seau would appear to have suffered his share of concussions over his long career, and the details of his death are very reminiscent of those of another former NFL player, Dave Duerson, who also shot himself in the chest. Duerson had left a note indicating that he killed himself that way, rather than with a shot to the head, so that his brain could be studied and more could be learned about the dangers of concussions. Seau’s family initially said that his brain would be donated for the same kind of study, although, at the time of this writing, they may be changing their minds on that, due to religious concerns. For the sake of so many other football players and their futures, I do hope that they decide to go ahead with the donation. The man is dead, and certainly has no current need of his brain. If he killed himself the way he did in order to facilitate that research, it would be a real shame if the family denied that final wish. It must be an extremely difficult time for them, of course, but this would seem to be a pretty clear decision.

It is clear that there is still a lot to learn about the dangers of head injuries. Current and future players will benefit greatly from the research that is being done. Yes, as a fan, it is easy to lament the rule changes in football that have seemed to make the game much less macho than it used to be, but these are people’s lives we are talking about here. It is important to keep that in perspective.

Bad sports, continued:

2) In the aftermath of Seau’s death, former NFL quarterback Kurt Warner, now a commentator for the NFL Network, stated that he would prefer that his sons grow up to do something other than play football, as he is scared for their health. Amani Toomer, the one-time New York Giant, took exception to Warner’s comments, saying that Warner should keep his mouth shut since he benefitted so much from the sport. I am not sure what one thing has to do with the other. Warner was simply being a concerned dad, and Toomer should think before he speaks.

3) New York Knicks forward Amare Stoudemire punched a glass fire extinguisher case as he left the court after his team lost to the Miami Heat in game two of their playoff series on Monday. What a genius. The damage to his hand forced him to miss game three.

4) Dale Oen, a champion swimmer from Norway, died on Monday at the age of 26. He suffered an apparent heart attack during training for the upcoming Olympics.

5) Long-time New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera, a sure-fire Hall-of-Famer, will miss the remainder of the 2012 season after tearing his ACL during pre-game warmups on Thursday. Although he is 42 years old, Rivera insists he will make a comeback.

6) Clemson star receiver Sammy Watkins was arrested on drug charges on Friday. A traffic stop led to the discovery of marijuana and some pills in Watkins’ car.

Good sports:

1) New Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach Greg Schiano bought himself a lot of goodwill this week when he signed one of his former players from his time at Rutgers. Eric LeGrand was paralyzed back in 2010 when he made a tackle that broke his neck. He will never play for Tampa, as he remains partially paralyzed, but the gesture was a great one.

2) The Miami Dolphins signed linebacker Cameron Wake to a contract extension this week that includes $20 million in guaranteed money. Wake’s story is a great one, as he went undrafted out of Penn State and ended up playing in the Canadian Football League. He became a dominant pass rusher there, and that led to him being signed by Miami. He has been a great player for them for the last three seasons, and they have rewarded him for his persistence.

Bad sports, good sports appears every Monday

Once, during my Pulitzer Prize-winning days as an editor at Maxim, I interviewed the boxer “Pretty Boy” Floyd Mayweather before his much-hyped title fight with Oscar De La Hoya. I’d already chatted with Oscar about his favorite fashion accessories — like I said, some serious journalism was going down — and Oscar revealed he wore a watch that cost roughly as much as an Ivy League education, grad school included. Floyd revealed that he sported a timepiece that was much pricier than the Golden Boy’s piece of crap and added, “I have to treat myself. I work so hard…”

And whether that quote makes you want to laugh or jack the tax rate way up on luxury goods, you have to give credit: the man knows how to give an interview.

Sadly, since then he’s seen fit to turn boxing from a joke that isn’t funny into a joke that actually makes baby Jesus cry. Boxing is a sport — sort of — where a handful of fighters manage to establish themselves as gate attractions and then, for a time, call the shots. (It should be noted “skill” and “popularity” are often unrelated: Sergio Martinez is one of the most exciting athletes I’ve ever seen and remains largely unknown, while the Brit David “I broke my little toe!” Haye was once considered a superstar.) (Yes, in a sport where guys are beaten until they pee blood he really did cite a sore wittle piggy as the reason he embarrassed himself and the entire British Empire with his showing against heavyweight champ Wladimir Klitschko and seemed genuinely shocked that everyone didn’t immediately go, “Oh, that completely explains you sucking!”)

Once on top, the fighters (with a little guidance from the assorted sanctioning organizations and promoters and pay-per-view execs) mull three key factors before a bout:

1. How much money will this earn me?

2. How dangerous is the opponent?

3. How will this affect my legacy?

As a fan, I like to believe that point 3 is the key factor; as a human being, I assume it’s always point 1; as a dreamer, I pretend that point 2 barely enters into it at all. Of course, that’s not the case, because if a fighter reaches the level where he’s capable of selling tickets, he doesn’t want to do anything to jeopardize his status, such as getting his ass whipped. And, equally importantly, he doesn’t want to get his ass whipped because getting your ass whipped — try to follow me on this — hurts.

And so he goes after a guy too young to know what he’s doing (like Floyd’s most recent opponent Victor Ortiz) or too old to pose a threat any more (like Floyd’s second-most recent opponent Shane Mosley).

It’s particularly tricky in Floyd’s case, because he’s undefeated. Never been beaten. It sounds impressive when a fighter is without a loss, until you remember this: he picks the guys he fights. Takes away some of the mystique, doesn’t it? Rafael Nadal doesn’t have the right to cancel a match with Novak Djokovic so he can face Andy Roddick. The New England Patriots don’t get to say, “New York Giants? Ooh, that’s not the ideal match-up for us… so instead we’re going to play the St. Louis Rams in the Super Bowl again. YAY, FOOTBALL!!!” And Michael Jordan didn’t become a legend by announcing, “Wait, in the Finals I’m facing Karl Malone and John Stockton? Two future Hall of Famers? Nah, I ain’t down with that. Y’all need me, I’ll be making Hanes ads.”

Level of competition matters in sports, which is why we hail Sandy Koufax as a pitching icon, not the guy who on weekends totally dominates his Beer League.

The fight that everyone wants is Floyd versus Filipino congressman/mediocre lounge singer Manny Pacquiao. (I’d actually prefer to see either of them battle Sergio, but he offers limited financial rewards/a serious risk of a whupping, so that’s not even on the table.) The fight’s good for legacy — whoever wins is, for a night at least, undisputed pound-for-pound champ — and better in terms of bucks, as it’s a lock to generate over $100 million.

Yet it hasn’t happened.

Why?

Not to put too fine a point on it, but Floyd’s a pussy.

Wait, that word is harsh and judgmental.

He’s a mangina.

And he’s a mangina by his own admission.

You can read all about Floyd’s recent explanation for why he can’t face Manny Pac, but it boils down to this:

1. I fear no one.

2. I am very afraid to get in the ring with Manny Pacquiao.

3. I fear no one. I am just deeply concerned about what that man might do to me if we got in the ring together and hence I heroically decided not to get into it.

4. I do not want to get in the ring with Manny Pacquiao cuz dude punches hard and that’ll mess you up, yo.

5. How is admitting that something terrifies you and you’re fleeing from it the same as being scared? Fetch me a dictionary, lackey!

6. For the millionth time I claim without proof Manny’s using performance-enhancing drugs and I have to think of my health and my future and that’s why I’m so scared. Not that I am.

7. Sometimes people confuse “scared” with “smart.” Like if there’s a shipwreck and a guy shoves past the old women and toddlers to get to a lifeboat, everyone watching would cry out, “Smart!”

8. Everyone’s stupid but me.

The article notes that at least one of Floyd’s musings “eventually drew applause from his entourage.”

For the record, I completely respect Floyd saying he’d prefer not to have a crazed man with hands of stone shattering his ribs. And, while there is zero evidence so far, it’s possible Manny’s on performance-enhancing drugs… though his lawyers say otherwise, since they’re suing Floyd. (I should note it’s every bit as likely that Floyd himself is taking something — I tend to assume all athletes from this era have juiced, with the possible exception of Philadelphia’s own beloved tub of goo John Kruk.)

I would happily duck a fight with Floyd or Manny or any other number of people.

But I would not try to spin it somehow so that the other guy is the problem.

The fact is, Floyd is currently turning down at least $50 million — possibly significantly more, as he insists if there is a fight, he deserves the majority of the money — because he watches film of Manny fighting and it so utterly freaks him out that he has to keep insisting that there must be some underhanded explanation for it.

Which, according to Webster’s, is the very definition of scared.

So instead he lines up another hand-picked opponent… and expects us to pay for the privilege of him taking on this “challenge.”

Lucky us.

I predict Floyd will beat current straw man Miguel Cotto this Saturday.

And if he wins easily enough, maybe Floyd will test himself a little in the future and grant rematches to two past foes: insubordinate security guard and mother of some of his children.

Let’s get it on.

Have you ever watched an all-star game and thought it had been time well spent? At least in the major sports, those games are usually pretty awful, if not completely unwatchable. Baseball probably has the best one, as the game usually involves pretty full effort on the part of the participants. Sure, catchers are unlikely to block the plate and risk injury, especially after the Pete Rose-Ray Fosse incident in the 1970 MLB All-Star game, but the hitters try, the pitchers try, and the fielders try. The worst thing about baseball’s game is that the commissioner decided to make the game count for something a few years back, and now the league that wins gets home field advantage in the World Series. That was a horrible decision and needs to be changed. Still, the game is usually a gem compared to the defense-less circuses put on by the NHL and the NBA. The scoring in those games rarely resembles that of a real game, as no one shows any interest in playing defense at all. Amazingly, even those games look like must-see TV when compared to the crapfest that is the NFL Pro Bowl.

This week, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell made comments suggesting that the league was considering doing away with the Pro Bowl entirely. If you watched this year’s game back in January, you’ll know why. For years, this game has been different from the other leagues’ all-star games, as it happened after the season had ended and a champion had been crowned, while the others all occurred around mid-season. With the risk of injury so much greater in football, it made sense to not have the game at a time when an injury could debilitate a team. Still, playing the game the week after the Super Bowl was the ultimate anti-climax, and few people cared or bothered to watch. A couple of years ago, in an effort to jolt some life into the game, the NFL moved it to the week before the Super Bowl. No luck. It was still far less than exhilarating. The 2012 edition, though, was the worst of all. No one seemed to put forth any effort whatsoever, and the game was an absolute joke. So much so, I guess, that the league is seriously contemplating simply not having the game. Sounds like a great idea to me. What’s the point, really? I imagine they will still name a Pro Bowl team, or something like one, as the real interest in that kind of thing lies in who makes it, not in the game itself. I play in a computer-simulation keeper league (don’t ask), and the Pro Bowl roster plays a significant part in the player ratings for each season. I wouldn’t want to lose that, but I am glad to sacrifice the actual event.

Exhibition games before the season are a chance to get your interest revved up for the return of the sport. Exhibition games during the season are a chance to change the channel. Once you get to the ones after the season, there is just no reason for it. Baseball, hockey, and basketball can all keep their games, I suppose. Baseball needs to change the home-field rule, and hockey and basketball need to find ways to get people to play at both ends of the ice/court. The skills competitions at these events are far more interesting than the games themselves, actually.  Maybe football can do something like that, and just leave the game out.

Good sports, continued:

2) Rafael Nadal became the first tennis player to ever win two different events seven times each on Sunday, beating David Ferrer to take the Barcelona Open. Monte Carlo is the site of his other seven-plus win tournament.

3) The Oakland Raiders decided that they will be donating ten percent of every season-ticket package sold in May and June of this year to the Oakland public school system.

Bad sports:

1) An Israeli basketball team has hired former Syracuse assistant basketball coach Bernie Fine as a consultant. I know that charges have not yet been filed related to the accusations that Fine sexually molested two former ball boys, and the man has a right to make a living, but I don’t think I would want to be the team that hired this guy while that investigation is ongoing.

2) Some racist idiots tweeted slurs at Joel Ward, a forward for the Washington Capitals, after Ward scored in overtime to send the Boston Bruins home for the season on Wednesday. Revolting.

3) Not long after being suspended for half of the next NFL season for his part in the New Orleans Saints bounty scandal, it was revealed that team GM Mickey Loomis is being investigated for allegedly having a device in his box at the Superdome that would allow him to eavesdrop on opposing coaches during the 2002, 2003, and 2004 seasons. Aside from punishment by the league, Loomis could be charged with federal crimes for this.

4) Delmon Young, who plays left field for the Detroit Tigers, was charged with something called “hate crime harassment” for a fight that he was in on Friday at the team hotel in New York. Young is accused of yelling some kind of anti-semitic comments at the person with whom he was having the confrontation.

5) The Chicago Bulls’ chances of getting to the Eastern Conference finals for the second straight season seemed to go down the tubes on Saturday, as star player Derrick Rose tore his ACL as the team’s game was ending against the Philadelphia 76ers to open their first round playoff series.

6) Rajon Rondo, point guard for the Boston Celtics, was ejected from the team’s loss to the Atlanta Hawks in the first game of their first-round playoff series on Sunday. Rondo was given two technical fouls, earning him the automatic ejection, after he vehemently complained about a call and then appeared to bump into a referee.

Bad sports, good sports appears every Monday

10. Man o’ Peace

9. It’s A Grand Old Nag

8. No Way José

7. Artificial Hip

6. Save-Your-Money

5. Mucilage

4. Stumblebum

3. Tripod

2. Chris Christie

1. Wrong Way Corrigan
 

Bob Sullivan’s Top Ten Everything appears every Monday.

Every once in a while, an athlete or coach transcends sports. The group of these individuals is small and obviously quite distinguished. Those of you who read my column regularly know that Joe Paterno was one of these in my eyes. Whatever you feel about the Jerry Sandusky situation and Joe’s role in it, it is hard to dispute his place in the pantheon of college football figures. This week, another towering figure has exited the sports scene, and her sport will be much the worse for it. Pat Summitt, the head coach of the University of Tennessee women’s basketball program, has retired.

Summitt coached the Lady Vols (why can’t they just be called the Vols, by the way?) for 38 years, winning eight NCAA championships along the way. She retires as the all-time winningest coach in the history of college basketball, having compiled 1098 wins during her career. Her teams won titles in three different decades and took home the championship of the Southeastern Conference 15 times. The last time a team of hers won fewer than 20 games in a season was in 1975, her second season as head coach, when they went 16-11. The numbers are simply staggering. She is to women’s college basketball what John Wooden, the legendary coach of UCLA, was to men’s college basketball, and, yes, what Paterno was to college football.

Last year, Summitt was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s Disease. She finished out the season, taking her team to the semi-finals of the NCAA Tournament, before an eventual loss to the Baylor Bears, who went on to win the whole thing. It was a very cool thing to watch Kim Mulkey, Baylor’s head coach, talk extensively about her respect for Summitt in the on-court interview at the end of that game. The respect and admiration was obvious, and she was clearly not doing it to just pay lip-service to what the fans wanted to hear.

The University of Tennessee faces the impossible task of replacing such an icon. Holly Warlick, who had been an assistant coach under Summitt for the last 26 years, has taken over as head coach. I don’t envy her the challenge she faces in trying to reach a standard to which no one could measure up. I hope the fans give her a chance, and I am certain Pat Summitt will be rooting for her.

Good sports, continued:

2) Chicago White Sox pitcher Phillip Humber threw only the 21st perfect game in Major League Baseball history on Saturday, shutting down the Seattle Mariners in a 4-0 win.

3) Jamie Moyer, now pitching for the Colorado Rockies, became the oldest pitcher to record a victory in a major league game on Tuesday, leading his team to a 5-3 win over the Sam Diego Padres with seven solid innings. Moyer is 49 years old.

Bad sports:

1) People need to stop listening to this guy. Zach Tomaselli, the Bernie Fine-accuser who recently recanted his statement and said he never even met Fine, has changed his tune yet again. Now he is again saying Fine molested him.

2) The parent of a recruit who was visiting the University of Alabama somehow kicked over a stand that was holding the school’s BCS National Championship trophy from last year. The crystal football, formerly valued at $30,000, is now valued at zero, and is in many more pieces than it had once been. Oops.

3) Alfonzo Dennard, a cornerback from Nebraska, who was expected to be a pretty high pick in the upcoming NFL Draft, got himself arrested less than a week before said Draft. He was reportedly in a bar fight that police tried to stop, and the charges indicate that Dennard must have assaulted one of the officers.

4) Raffi Torres, a left wing for the Phoenix Coyotes, was suspended for 25 games by the NHL after a nasty hit on Marion Hossa of the Chicago Blackhawks. Replays show that Torres clearly intended to injure Hossa, leaving his feet to deliver a shoulder to the head. Hossa was taken off the ice on a stretcher.

5) The Boston Red Sox have started the season off very poorly, going 4-10 in their first 14 games. The worst of those losses happened Saturday, when they blew a 9-0 lead against the New York Yankees, eventually losing 15-9. Ugly.

6) Delonte West, a guard for the Dallas Mavericks, has proven a number of times over the years that he is an idiot. He took that idiocy to new heights this week, incurring a $25,000 fine for delivering what amounted to a “wet willy” during a game against the Utah Jazz on Monday. I guess West thought it would be amusing to stick his finger in the ear of Gordon Hayward in the first half. The NBA obviously did not find it quite so funny.

Bad sports, good sports appears every Monday

Earlier this week, a Dallas television station reported on a story about a local coach/teacher who had been fired from her job for having a child despite being unmarried. Cathy Samford, who had coached volleyball at the Heritage Christian Academy for the last three years, and who had also recently started teaching science, was let go by the school in the fall. She has filed a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and is considering a lawsuit. I am quite surprised by this, but I find myself siding with the school.

I want to be clear that I find the idea of firing someone for having a child out of wedlock to be reprehensible. The very idea goes against every instinct toward fairness that I possess. I am regularly amazed that people are still judged by social mores that either did or should have gone out of style decades back. The world is a very different place than it was 100 years ago. Will a single mother have a hard time raising a child in 2012? Perhaps. The thing is that Samford will not be a single mother. She is in a committed relationship…she just doesn’t happen to be married. The current debate about gay marriage tells me that I should not be surprised that there are people who would openly judge a woman as being immoral for being pregnant without being married. I fail to understand how people can think this way, but I certainly know that many do.

Here’s the thing, though: Samford was not a public school teacher. She taught at a Christian school. I do not know this for a fact, but I would not be at all surprised to learn that she had signed some kind of contract with a morals clause when she took the job. As much as I dislike this kind of archaic thinking and basic unfairness, a school like that has the right to dictate a code of behavior to its employees. People enroll their kids in a school like that because they want them to receive a very specific type of education. I would assume that they would prefer that the teachers who are imparting that specific education be held up as excellent examples of the types of people being discussed in the material being taught. If fairness and equal opportunity were the goal, they would send their kids to public school. I am sure that sounds like a condemnation of religious education, and it probably is, but that is beside the point. These people made that choice, and I am sure they paid good money as part of that decision. Ms. Samford chose to ignore the teachings of the private organization that employed her. They had the right to terminate her employment.

I know this is a bit off of my usual subjects, and it is only barely sports-related, but I thought it was an interesting case. I hate to agree with the school here, but I really do feel that they were within their rights here.

Bad sports, continued:

2) Skiing great Lindsay Vonn has had a huge tax lien filed against her by the I.R.S. Apparently she owes over a million dollars for the 2010 tax year which was never paid.

3) One of the accusers of former Syracuse assistant basketball coach Bernie Fine has changed his story. Zach Tomaselli, who, along with several other men, accused Fine of sexual abuse a few months ago, now says that he never even knew Fine.

4) Piermario Morosini, an Italian soccer player who played for Livorno, collapsed and died during a match at Pescara on Saturday. He suffered cardiac arrest early on in the match and was dead before he reached the hospital. Morosini was 25.

5) This has been a fantastic year for Baylor athletics, but it hasn’t all been good news. The school was put on probation for three years by the NCAA this week for a number of secondary violations in recruiting that occurred over the last several years. The number of transgressions is what brought on the punishment, as opposed to the nature of them individually. The issue involved text messages and phone calls during times that those things should have been limited or not happening at all.

6) Lamar Odom has essentially been sent home by the Dallas Mavericks. After spending much of the season disgruntled after being traded to Dallas from the Los Angeles Lakers, the Mavericks decided, ostensibly with Odom’s agreement, that the team would be better off without him. They did not waive him, however, so he is not eligible to sign with another team this season.

7) If you want to see one of the worst baseball slides ever, watch this video.

Good sports:

1) Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Aaron Harang struck out nine consecutive batters in a game against the San Diego Padres on Friday, setting a team record. The major league record was 10, and it was set by Tom Seaver back in 1970.

2) Alabama running back Trent Richardson, who is likely to be a top five pick in the upcoming NFL Draft, showed that he is also a pretty good guy this week. Richardson attended a senior prom in Birmingham with Courtney Alvis, a high school senior who is suffering from Leukemia.

Bad sports, good sports appears every Monday

During the heart of the Tiger Woods drama of a couple of years ago, I wrote about the fact that I was pretty uninterested in the personal lives of professional athletes. The same goes for coaches in professional sports. I am not totally immune to the off-the-field stuff, of course. I am prone to disliking players who are simply bad teammates (see Terrell Owens) or coaches who lose their minds on a very regular basis (see Brian Kelly), but, for the most part, I look for results. Amateur sports, on the other hand, are a different story. College coaches, for example, have a very different kind of responsibility than pro coaches. Parents have entrusted their 18-year-old kids to these people, so college coaches need to hold themselves to a higher standard, whether that means their in-game demeanor or their off-the-field behavior. Of course, winning usually trumps the bad stuff, which is why a lot of these guys manage to end up in top jobs. The latest offender is University of Arkansas head football coach Bobby Petrino, who found himself in hot water this week after injuring himself and another person in a motorcycle crash.

The story that has been circulated is that Petrino was riding his motorcycle in the Fayetteville area with a passenger when he lost control of the bike and crashed, sliding off the road into a ditch. Petrino suffered numerous injuries, including a broken vertebra. The passenger was Jessica Dorrell, a 25-year-old former volleyball player whom Petrino had recently hired to a position with the football team. I have not read specifics of her injuries, but it appears that they were less serious than those of the coach. Rather than calling 911, Petrino called a local police officer who also worked for Petrino doing security. He then lied to the university about the details of the accident, only changing his story when he found out that the police report would be made public.

So let’s review the details here. This 51-year-old married father of four was having an affair (yes, he has admitted that) with a woman half his age, whom he had just hired to come work for him at the university. He was riding a motorcycle with her on the back and with no helmet on. After crashing, he tried desperately to cover up what had occurred, including lying to his employer. The most amazing thing about this is that he has not yet been fired. Instead, the school has put him on administrative leave. Are they waiting for him to display more incredibly bad judgment? What more does he need to do?

Petrino was no angel before this, as you can imagine, although his previous offenses centered mostly around being an untrustworthy employee. Shortly after insisting that the University of Louisville, where he was head coach from 2003 to 2006, add a clause to his contract extension requiring a large payment from him if he were to leave (to prove how serious he was about staying), he jumped ship and headed to the NFL to coach the Atlanta Falcons. He then bailed on the Falcons after less than a full season, leaving a 3-10 team to take the job at Arkansas before his first season was even over.

I hate the fact that guys like this keep getting hired at the college level. A college football coach needs to set an example for his players, whether it be by demonstrating a strong work ethic, stressing academics, or by being a decent person. Most of all, they need to have good judgment. I have two girls about to head to college, and although neither one is an athlete, I can still identify with the parents who send their kids to play for some college coach. A professional athlete is responsible for himself, but a college kid is a kid. Sure, it is the parents who have the ultimate responsibility for setting the right example, but these coaches have such enormous significance to these kids, influencing them in every facet of their lives during their time at school. The University of Arkansas can not retain Bobby Petrino if it wants to have any credibility as an institution of higher learning.

Bad sports, continued:

2) Detroit Lions defensive lineman and recent first-round pick Nick Fairley was arrested on Tuesday for possession of marijuana. He is the second Lion to be arrested on that charge in recent days, following running back Mikel Leshoure’s arrest a few weeks ago.

3) Stephen Gant, a high school pitcher from Tennessee who was expected to be a high pick in the next amateur draft, was found dead by a roadside this week. It is believed that he committed suicide. He was supposed to head to Vanderbilt this fall.

4) A linebacker from the University of Minnesota was found dead in his apartment on Friday. Gary Tinsley was 22 years old. The cause of death has not yet been determined.

5) One of my favorite sports memories involves a time when I got to watch the annual regatta between Cambridge and Oxford on the Thames back in 1987. It was a fantastic experience, and quite unlike most other sporting events I have attended in my life. On Saturday, this year’s race was interrupted by some moron who jumped into the water and swam between the two boats, causing the whole thing to be held up for 31 minutes while they fished him out and got him out of harm’s way.

6) Miami Marlins head coach Ozzie Guillen has managed to prove, yet again, that he should not be allowed to speak to the media unless it’s absolutely necessary. This time, while talking to Time Magazine, Guillen actually uttered this bit of genius:

“I love Fidel Castro … I respect Fidel Castro. You know why? A lot of people have wanted to kill Fidel Castro for the last sixty years but that [expletive] is still there.”

I have no idea why the magazine was asking him about Castro, so yes, I am clearly taking this quote out of context. That said……what??  In your first week as the head coach of a team in Miami, of all places, you are going to praise Castro? Wow. I am guessing this will not ingratiate him to many of the people that the team has been trying to bring to its new stadium in South Florida.

7) Some fans were so excited about Kentucky’s win over Kansas in Monday’s national title basketball game that they started shooting each other.

8) The Baltimore Orioles finished their exhibition season on Tuesday by losing to a community college.  Awesome.

Good sports:

1) The Baylor women’s basketball team capped off a perfect 40-0 season by defeating Notre Dame in the national championship game on Tuesday. Star center Brittney Griner is a pretty fantastic player, and at 6’8 and very athletic, she is extremely difficult to stop.

2) The final day of The Masters was a great one on Sunday. It began with an incredibly rare double eagle by Louis Oosthuizen, who managed to hole out from 253 yards away on his second shot at the par-5 second hole. It ended on the second hole of a playoff between Oosthuizen and Bubba Watson, with Watson making a par to take the green jacket. Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, the two favorites coming into the tournament, were non-factors.

Bad sports, good sports appears every Monday