Category: Sports

Generally speaking, athletes do not make the best — and frequently not even good — role models. Would that veterinarians and cancer researchers topped all lists.

Playing a game is not particularly important; it doesn’t win any victories for humanity; but it does catapult players to society’s center stage. Especially this one’s. And impressionable kids in America’s celebrity-lionizing culture will always be impressionable kids.

Cue Ben Roethlisberger.

By virtue of being the quarterback of the Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers, he is a major marquee name and a de facto role model. By virtue of being a helmet-less motorcycle rider, he is a major doofus. He also had been – prior to his recent accident — an undeniable traffic distraction on the streets of Pittsburgh, where no one is more easily recognized these days.

Fortunately, Roethlisberger survived his run-in with a car.

He will play another day and continue to be a high-profile role model to a bunch of kids who can only vicariously relate to a world class professional athlete. But by donning a helmet the next time he mounts a motorcycle – or by dismounting permanently – he will have gone where few famous athletes this side of Pat Tillman will ever go.

To a place where hero-worshipers can actually identify with their heroes. It’s time for Big Ben to take one for the real home team.

And who knows, such a prudent act could even help reverse the mindless trend of states repealing helmet laws. The number of “unhelmeted” deaths in Florida, for example, has risen from 22 in 1999 – before the helmet-law repeal — to 250 in 2004.

Congratulations to the University of Tampa baseball team that captured the NCAA Division II national championship less than a fortnight ago. The Spartans virtually went wire-to-wire as the top-rated D-II team in the country and topped off a remarkable 54-6 season in dramatic fashion by coming from behind to defeat Cal State-Chico, 3-2, in Montgomery, Ala., in the national title game.

UT outfielder Lee Cruz was Player of the Year, and two other Spartans were first team All-Americans. A school record five Spartans, including Cruz and fellow All-Americans Sergio Perez (pitcher) and Orlando Rosales (outfielder) were selected in Major League Baseball’s draft.

UT was – and has been over the years – that good. It was UT’s fourth such national title. Once again, UT made its hometown proud.

All that was missing was hometown media coverage commensurate with such success. UT won four games in Montgomery – and all were covered by stringers or “correspondents” for the Tampa Bay dailies. Local TV was no better.

Granted, UT is a D-II school, and this is a major metro market with pro sports, NASCAR fever, a D-I university in USF and lots of interest and allegiances to the Gators and Seminoles. And, of course, there are budgetary and personnel considerations. But there are also priorities. Being the very best warrants, well, better coverage.

“I think we were undercovered all year,” says UT’s Athletics Director Larry Marfise. “We can compete with any baseball program in the country.

“Look, I know the media can’t cover everything, and not having football probably hurts us overall,” points out Marfise. “But we’re an incredible story. I think the media’s missing some great human interest angles. I think it cheats the kids.”

One way for UT to garner more coverage would be to play some D-I teams, such as USF. Unfortunately, the bigger schools often look at D-II opponents as an “everything-to-lose, nothing-to-gain” proposition. Bigger is expected to be better. Stepping down in classification certainly doesn’t help a major school’s chances for post-season play.

Marfise has tried unsuccessfully to arrange a baseball game with USF – at Legend’s Field. “You get a local charity involved. I think it would be great for the community and local baseball,” he reasons. “But I understand. They’re trying to get themselves established in the Big East.”

Perhaps next season could be different. Perhaps a USF team with a losing record in 2006 would find value in playing – if not defeating — the defending D-II national champion and perennial powerhouse in front of an uncommonly sizable and spirited crowd.

Perhaps the media could get behind it and cover it for what it would be: an intriguing and fun match-up of well-regarded city rivals who could use the exposure.

Perhaps.

The baseball season is a quarter of the way through, and this much is apparent around here. The Rays are a more likeable, hopeful, also-ran team. When healthy, its eight position players are collectively better than many other teams’ starters. But the Rays can’t pitch Scott Kazmir every day.

After an impressive debut by new management – featuring free parking, tail-gating and bring-your-own treats, they have – well, kept at it. Up next, the promised, 10,000-gallon, sting ray tank. Installation behind the right centerfield wall is now underway.

But much less noticeable has been the Stuart Sternberg regime’s involvement in the community – away from Tropicana Field. Latest outside-the-lines contribution was the refurbishing of Oliver Field, an inner-city baseball facility near the Trop that had fallen on harder times than the Rays’ bullpen. Under the aegis of the Rays Field Renovation Program, the team – along with Bank of America – overhauled the field, its flawed drainage system and its shabby grandstand. The cost was in excess of $100,000.

Sure, the Rays got a PR boost from the Oliver Field renovation and rededication that featured Jackie Robinson’s daughter. But after the ribbons were cut, the speeches delivered and the cameo performers had departed, there remained a legacy no less important than satisfied fans. Teams with Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities League (the RBI League), a Major League Baseball initiative, will play there. This season.

Next up for the Rays: a similar inner-city field of dreams in Tampa.

When I was a kid in Philadelphia, my family lived about two blocks from the house where the Phillies’All-Star shortstop, Granny Hamner, resided. (I doubt that anyone other than Tom McEwen, Don Zimmer and Larry Thornberry would remember him.) This wasn’t the Philly suburbs, mind you, but a city neighborhood of row (not town) houses. Little did I realize what an anomaly that would become – a prominent sports celebrity living in a neighborhood.

Now, because such celebs tend to make a whole lot of money and too many people want a piece of their time, they’re pretty much relegated to gated communities and other high-end variations on an exclusive-enclave theme. You see them at the stadium or arena or maybe a banquet or VIP event – not reading the paper at Indigo or Starbucks after a morning stroll or bike ride.

Unless you’re talking about Devil Rays’ manager Joe Maddon.

Much has been made of his “new breed” style. A college-educated, iPod-savvy, red-wine savoring, diet-conscious bicycle enthusiast. His gray hair is semi-spiked. He doesn’t need a cuspidor. His girl friend just graduated from law school.

After all his years with the Angels of Anaheim, Maddon, 52, figured he’d try to replicate his California experience by living, once again, on the beach after he was hired by the Rays. But one of his players gave him a heads up about what might suit him best in the Tampa Bay area.

“Josh Paul (a catcher, who also has moved on to the Rays) said that I needed to check out Hyde Park,” said Maddon. “He said it was my kind of place. He was right. You don’t find many neighborhoods right in the city like this any more. And Bayshore is obviously special.”

Granted, Hyde Park is more ritzy than “Rocky,” but it’s also a leafy, historic, family-friendly neighborhood. It has its share of doctors, lawyers, and industry captains, but certainly no sports celebrities.

Maddon is currently renting there with an eye on several bungalows. He needs one with a garage apartment – to accommodate visiting family and friends from Pennsylvania. He owns a late 19th century Victorian house in his native Hazelton, Pa., and is enamored of the Craftsman bungalow architectural touches he sees around him.

“I’m comfortable here,” he underscored.

One footnote to Maddon’s current, temporary townhouse setup. “Tampa Bay Illustrated,” the upscale lifestyle magazine, has a Maddon feature upcoming for its July issue. “TBI” came by for a photo shoot last month expecting, well, the luxury digs of a major league manager. Maybe some languid shots by the pool or a lavishly appointed living room or a posh, in-home theater.

They got more of a “bachelor apartment,” according to Maddon.

Reportedly, creative minds ultimately carried the day.

Speaking of baseball, anomalies and my home town, the “Philadelphia Inquirer” recently ran a nostalgia piece on Babe Ruth. On Sept. 3, 1923, Ruth, 28, led the New York Yankees to a doubleheader sweep of the Philadelphia Athletics. Immediately afterwards, Ruth left Shibe Park – still in uniform – and was whisked by private car to the blue-collar Kensington section of the city and the rectory of the Ascension of Our Lord Catholic Church. There he changed into an Ascension uniform.

He would play first base and bat clean-up in a charity game to raise money to pay for a new Ascension ball field. The well-promoted exhibition drew an overflow crowd estimated at an unprecedented (for non-Major League) 10,000 fans. Ruth went one-for-four, including a towering blast that was estimated at 600 feet by observers. He also stole a base. But Ascension lost 2-1 to Lit Bros.

The Philadelphia media was understandably all over the event – but cut the Bambino no slack on his triple-header endurance test for charity. “Ruth’s Bat Fails Ascension Club” read the headline in the next day’s “Philadelphia Evening Bulletin.”

A vintage Philly media moment.

A more contemporary take on Philadelphia’s famously fault-finding media came from Phillies’ Hall of Fame third baseman Mike Schmidt, whose career spanned most of the 1970s and ’80s.

“Philadelphia is the only city,” deadpanned Schmidt, “where you can experience the thrill of victory and the agony of reading about it the next day.”

Still a great line.

Still true.

There’s a lot not to like about Barry Bonds and his enhanced performances since 1999. But Bonds has not lacked for enablers. Major League Baseball and the Players’ Association were never credible in denial. And the media played along.

Much of it still does. None more so than ESPN.

There have been ESPN cut-ins for live coverage of every Bonds’ at-bat. As in when will he tie or pass Babe Ruth’s 714 home run total? Since when did passing the player in second place warrant that kind of coverage? Much less doing so under a steroid cloud.

Hank Aaron (755), whose dark cloud was the vestiges of racism, wasn’t accorded the Second Coming treatment when he passed Willie Mays (660) before surpassing Ruth.

Nothing, however, is as journalistically repugnant as ESPN’s weekly reality show, “Bonds on Bonds.” It’s as “real” as Bonds wants to make it. It’s his forum.

It gives show biz a bad name.

Give ESPN an * too.

It’s now been the better part of a fortnight since we said “So long, Stanley.” The Lightning, alas, was finally pried away from its two-year, lockout-extended grip on the Stanley Cup.

The disappointment was the culmination of the perfect hockey storm.

The colossally stupid lockout produced a salary cap at precisely the time that the Lightning had a bounty of prime-time players they wanted to keep. The cap, in effect, precluded that, and goalie Nikolai Khabibulin cashed in by bolting for bigger bucks in Chicago. Ironically, one of the targeted beneficiaries of a cap would be smaller-market franchises such as Tampa Bay that can never outspend the New Yorks and Chicagos.

A few others also left, but nobody, especially in big games, stands as tall as a top goalie. Without one, you can’t win enough – let alone win it all with a John Grahame between the pipes. It was the beginning of the end of the reign.

And, true, there were other factors, including rule changes that magnified mobility chinks in the defensive armor and the luck of the draw in getting up-tempo, high-scoring Ottawa, the worst possible match-up for the Lightning, in the playoffs’ first round. And maybe that oversized Stanley Cup banner and those loudly expectant, sell-out crowds in a sequel-obsessed culture induced more pressure than inspiration.

The cap, the rules, the anxiety. Hat tricked by fate.

But let’s also remember this. In a professional sports universe that is too often defined and dominated by its rap-sheet prodigies, talented boors and celebrity mutants, the Lightning wore their championship mantle well. Individually and collectively, they made a city and a region proud. They were fun to rally around – and identify with.

They play an incredibly intense, collision-course game in front of frenzied fans — yet manage to keep it all in perspective. Tough and nice are not incompatible.

The players come from uniformly middle-class backgrounds and act like they know they’re fortunate to make a very good living playing a game. They are usually cut clean and typically well spoken in more than one language. They look like John Lynch on skates.

As a league, note that when a player scores, it only results in a fleeting moment of exuberance – not some “look-at-me,” cartoonish choreography. And there are no NHL edicts telling players that “business casual” attire — when representing one’s employer – doesn’t include (backwards) ball cap-doo-rag-shades-T-shirt-and-bling ensembles.

When’s the last time a Lightning player has been mentioned in the context of drug bust, DUI arrest, battery, sexual assault, road rage, weapons possession, parole violation or paternity suit? Or just generically acting like an arrogant horse’s hindquarters in public?

No, the National Hockey League is not the Ice Capades. But we also know what else it’s not.

Go, Bolts.

Over the past 25 years, Rick Bradshaw, 56, has given more than 100,000 golf lessons. To weekend duffers. To scratch golfers. To PGA pros. To sports celebs such as Rick Pitino. And to countless others who have seen any of the nine instructional videos he’s produced.

Among instructors, he’s a national player, an award-winning PGA teaching pro.

One lesson proved particularly propitious. The student was Willye Dent, the wife of Jim Dent, the prominent PGA Tour veteran and long-drive legend. Dent, a 12-time winner on the Senior Tour, was impressed with Bradshaw’s enthusiastic, common-sense, applied-physics approach. And patience. Heavy on the patience.

“It’s usually not a good idea to give your wife lessons,” diplomatically explained Dent, 65, the 10th all-time money winner on the PGA Senior Tour. “I liked Rick’s style.”

Also sampling the Bradshaw mien: Jim Dent, Jr. And finally Jim Dent.

A bond was born.

For the past 15 years, they have been partners in the Jim Dent & Rick Bradshaw School of Golf. Since December, they have been based at Heritage Isles Golf and Country Club in New Tampa, a venue outfitted with state-of-the-art digital video feedback equipment and staffed by five assistants. At Dent/Bradshaw, private lessons (with Bradshaw) start at $70 an hour and rates range as high as $900 per person for a “3-Day Power Package,” which is geared more to the out-of-state golf vacationer.

“Whatever the format, the key is finding a way to communicate,” avers Bradshaw. “I tell my assistants, ‘They don’t walk out of here without getting better.'”

There’s also a newsletter, DVDs, periodic Golf Channel appearances, national corporate clinics and the growing market niche of young players with tour potential.

Abbas-Ali Mawji is a prime example of the last category. The 18-year-old native of Harare, Zimbabwe, is here on a visitor’s visa after seeing a television piece on Dent/Bradshaw while in the United Kingdom. He is a two-time junior champion of Zimbabwe.

“I have dreams and aspirations for the (PGA) Tour,” says Mawji, “and this is a place that can help me realize those goals.”

And there’s the chemistry.

Dent and Bradshaw. They could be as different as a laid-back black man from Augusta, Ga., and an outgoing white man from Philadelphia, respectively. Instead, they are as complementary as two guys with a passion for golf.

Dent, still a specimen at 6’3″, 224 lbs., is the marquee name. He maintains as active an instructional role as his playing schedule permits. He’s especially popular at clinics. Dent’s powerful and seemingly effortless swing, which officially has propelled a golf ball 426 yards, is considered the nonpareil of the sport.

Bradshaw, an on-site fixture, is considered a “teacher’s teacher” and a smooth salesman — as at ease one-on-one as he is on video.

“He’s a workaholic,” quips Dent. “He only has time to get to the bank.”

“Jim’s a team player,” responds Bradshaw. “He spent time perfecting his game to make money. I taught to pay the bills.”

However it’s phrased, that’s a lesson for any partnership: Play to your strengths.

The good news is that nearly 53,000 fans saw the Devil Rays’ opening two games of the season against the Baltimore Orioles. The bad news is that less than 13,000 of them were on hand for the second game. Reality set in that fast.

The first night sellout was, in large part, a visceral response to all that has been done right by new ownership – from sprucing up the Trop, to overhauling attitudes to initiating free parking. (Last year’s opening night attendance was a paltry 26,000.)

The second night was a stark reminder. Banishing the ghosts of Naimolis past is not nearly enough. Nor should it be.

Lifestyle-wise, there’s a lot to compete with indoor baseball around here. And (the skewed) spring-training tradition notwithstanding, going out to (or into) the ballpark in the summer is not embedded into the local culture. This isn’t Pittsburgh, Cincinnati or St. Louis – let alone New York, Chicago, Philadelphia or Boston.

What it will take for a real Rays’ revival is what it took for Bucs’ and Lightning success. Proof positive that winning can be an expectation – not a bonus.

Now about that pitching staff

The Tampa Bay Devil Rays were the subject of a page-one story – “Case Study: Fix a Baseball Team” — in the business section of last week’s New York Times. Much was made of the “boys club” chemistry and “slap happy camaraderie” among principal owner Stuart Sternberg, 46, and his 20-something assistants, Executive Vice President Andrew Friedman and President Mathew Silverman.

Terms such as “positive arbitrage” came tripping off the tongues of all three when discussing player valuations. Their quantitative approach, it was noted, has much in common with “Moneyball” subject Billy Beane, the well-regarded, iconoclastic general manager of the Oakland A’s.

The contrast with 75-year-old senior coach Don Zimmer, practically a boyhood chum of Abner Doubleday, couldn’t be more stark. Zimmer acknowledged a recent “heated argument” with Friedman over whom to keep on the major league roster.

The upshot?

“Stu Sternberg is no dummy,” Zimmer told the Times, “and he must think they will grasp a lot. I say give them a chance.”

I say he has no choice.

* In the NYT‘s baseball preview, it listed six players “knocking on the door” of major league impact. Among them, Rays’ outfield prospect Delmon Young. “The only thing keeping the 20-year-old Young out of the major leagues is his organization’s unwillingness to start his salary-arbitration and free-agency clock,” stated the Times.

True, but in fairness to the Rays, that’s not the only factor. Young did not have a particularly impressive spring.

* The Wall Street Journal ran a recent piece on Baseball Info Solutions, a statistics firm that has devised what some baseball insiders say is the most accurate gauge of fielding. It doesn’t focus on the players with the fewest errors, but the players who convert the most batted balls into outs. By BIS’s calculations the best-fielding leftfielder over the past three years has been Carl Crawford of the Rays. Ironically, the worst-fielding third baseman is the Rays’ Ty Wittington, based on his play with the Mets and Pirates.