Blog

Was Eugenie Bouchard’s twirl sexist?

January 23, 2015

They got their knickers twisted Down Under after courtside reporter Ian Cohen asked fetching Canadian tennis player to do a little twirl, showing off her pink and yellow dress following her second-round win at the Australian Open.

Was it sexist? Sure. Was it ageist when she called him “an old guy”? Probably.

We see people in shorthand. She’s pretty, and that will always be part of her play.

But many fans enjoy it, too, when Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray change their shirts, or Grigor Dimitrov does a faux striptease. Tennis players are sexy people, male and female.

I have no objection to the enjoyment of female sexuality as long as we can enjoy male sexuality as well. The problem is our society tends to be a bunch of Ian Cohens, asking pretty girls to twirl. (To be fair, courtside reporters often ask Nole to dance...

A season in hell for the NFL

January 23, 2015

A year that began badly is ending badly for the NFL. It’s a cliché to say that there are no winners here, but there are no winners here, just liars, cheaters, abusers and deniers.

It’s fitting that the Baltimore Ravens should be the ones to tip off the Indianapolis Colts to the New England Patriots’ use of deflated footballs, which makes it easier for the quarterback to grip the ball and the receivers to catch it. The Ravens, after all, are the people who gave us two troubled Rays – Lewis, who pled guilty to obstruction of justice in the fatal stabbing of two men; and Rice, who coldcocked his fiancée in an Atlantic City elevator, setting the year of crisis in motion. (The Ravens also win the award for tweet of the year when they had Mrs. Rice say she was very sorry for her part in being coldcocked by her husband.)

Bitter losers and no lovers of the Patriots, the Ravens seemed only too happy to pass along knowledge of the Pats’ cheating ways to the Colts. But the Ravens aren’t to blame here anymore than the Adderall-using Seattle Seahawks are or Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers is. Rodgers, to borrow from his State Farm Discount Double Check commercials, likes to pump (clap) footballs up. Which begs the question: Was someone on the Pats trying to achieve yogic balance by deflating theirs?

Several wrongs cannot make a right. The only questions that really matter in this Nixonian narrative is, What did the Patriots know, and when did they know it? ...

Of inflation – over and under – in the NFL

January 22, 2015

Well, it looks like we’re all set for a Super Duper Bowl between the deflated (literally) New England Patriots and the inflated (metaphorically) Seattle Seahawks.

First, the crafty – or should that be Kraft-y, after their owner Robert Kraft? – Pats, are apparently up to their old tricks, using deflated footballs in their blowout A.F. C. Championship win against the hapless Indianapolis Colts, who, let’s face it, don’t require cheating.

It was in 2007, that the Patriots – led by head coach Bill Belichick, alias the Emperor from “Star Wars,” it’s the hoodie – and quarterback Tom Brady, aka Darth Vader, were caught spying on, yes, the hapless New York Jets in an incident that has become known as Spygate. Nothing like stacking the deck. So they’re always suspect.

But wait, the NFL – which is so anal-retentive that it cares about Colin Kaepernick wearing his outlaw Beats headset on the podium – allows each team to play with its own footballs? Everybody gets to play with his own toys in the sandbox?

Speaking of kindergarten, we’ve learned that Aaron Rodgers likes to overinflate his balls, so to speak...

The “I” of the (championship) storm

January 20, 2015

So it’s to be the Seahawks and the Patriots, two self-satisfied teams that I loathe.

Really, the only thing worse for me would be watching the Boston Red Sox play the Boston Red Sox in the World Series. Or perhaps Roger Federer playing Roger Federer for the Wimbledon title.

It’s hard to say which was more painful – the Green Bay Packers’ collapse against Seattle, or the Patriots’ mauling of the Indianapolis Colts.

Both Aaron Rodgers and Andrew Luck, the Packers’ and Colts’ respective, put-upon QBs, talked about the importance of teamwork before their games. And the role of teamwork, or lack thereof, was especially key to yesterday’s losses. They reminded us that while stars can win games, teams win championships. While their paths to defeat were different, in the end neither Rodgers nor Luck had the guns.

That’s why there’s no “I” in team. Although that’s usually meant as an admonition – the “I” as ego.

But the “I” also stands for the individual. In my upcoming novel “The Penalty for Holding,” New York Templars’ head coach Pat Smalley – a gridiron Capt. Bligh if there ever was one – likes to remind his headstrong, long-suffering quarterback, Quinn Novak, that there’s no “I” in “team.” ...

Aaron Rodgers – soul brother

January 17, 2015

Today’s tempest in a teapot is brought to you courtesy of Earl Thomas, All-Pro Safety of the Seattle Seahawks – my, how they love to stir the pot – who said he’s not buying the notion that Aaron Rodgers’ calf is injured. (Translation: The Hawks have to prepare as if the Green Bay Packers quarterback were healthy, because he’s that good.)

But wait, that’s not what got everyone riled up. Thomas went on to say of Rodgers, whom the Hawks will face Sunday for the NFC championship: “I just respect him as a football player in general. You can tell that he knows the game. He has a lot of confidence back there. You don't really see a lot of quarterbacks of his skin color with soul like that, and I like it."

Uh-oh. You can imagine the Hurricane Sandy that kicked up. Reaction was swift and predictable...

Musical coaches – and quarterbacks?

January 15, 2015

The NFL postseason is upon us: Let the game of musical coaches begin.

Actually, it already has. The Buffalo Bills have hired Rex Ryan, late of the Jets, who’ve hired Todd Bowles. (It’s interesting that one team’s discard is another’s great hope.)

But the big story may be out of Denver, where John Fox got the boot from the Broncos after failing to win a Super Bowl with Peyton Manning, who looked flat against Andrew Luck and the Indianapolis Colts last weekend in a bid for the AFC championship game. (Peyton had quad issues, but he’s not a mobile quarterback anyway.)

The 411 is that Peyton – who just won the Bart Starr Award for character and leadership on and off the field – is angling to make Broncos’ offensive coordinator Adam Gase a head coach – but of which team? Gase was said to be headed to the San Francisco 49ers. Which begged the question: Would Peyton go there? ...

The closer: Aaron Rodgers

January 13, 2015

So many story lines in this past weekend’s playoff games:

*The Seattle Seahawks’ Russell Wilson and the Indianapolis Colts’ Andrew Luck emerging as the class of their generation. This is not a rap against the Washington Redskins’ Robert Griffin III, the Carolina Panthers’ Cam Newton and, my favorite, the San Francisco 49ers’ Colin Kaepernick. But they seem at this point to lack a poise, a maturity that Luck and Wilson have, which may be why Wilson and his team are moving on to the NFC championship game while Luck and his go on to the AFC game.

*Luck, of course, found himself involved in another storyline as the Colts defeated Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos, 24-13. Manning was once the Colts’ man. They let him go when Luck came aboard. So you had the past/present going up against the present/future, and the present/future won. Whither Peyton? He might come back next year. But he and his team looked almost as flat-footed as they did in last year’s disastrous Super Bowl appearance. Meanwhile, the Colts will take on Tom Brady and the New England Patriots next weekend. Though I hate to admit, Brady – Manning’s contemporary – appears to be aging better in the job. Go Colts. ...