Sports, Athletics, and Competition

Discerning What Is Best
With Dr Rex Rogers

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Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 14 December 2010

I couldn’t quite believe my eyes, but replays and game announcers quickly confirmed what I thought I saw—a New York Jets coach tripping a Miami Dolphins player. Assistant Coach Sal Alosi stuck out his knee as Dolphins cornerback Nolan Carroll ran to cover a punt, tripping him. Bad enough behavior as it is, but Alosi’s incredible lapse of sportsmanship played out live and in color on Sunday night national television.

What words come to mind when you hear this? Dumb. Poor sportsmanship. Conduct unbecoming. Are you kidding me? Did he think he could get away with this? Did he think?

Today, we heard the NFL verdict: Alosi will be suspended from the team without pay for the rest of the season, including the playoffs, and be fined $25,000. Pretty steep penalty, but not steep enough.

Alosi has “taken responsibility,” apologized, said he won’t do it again, and promised to write 500 times “I will not be mind-numbingly stupid. I will not be mind-numbingly stupid.”

OK, but still not enough. As leaders and as compensated professionals coaches bear a greater responsibility. They’re supposed to be the grown-ups. They’re supposed to set the standard, be a model, inspire others. Sal Alosi may have done a credible job as a team fitness coach. He may be, apart from tripping, a nice guy who mows his Grandma’s lawn every week. But for all that, he’s a man who squandered a stewardship. In a time when more professional athletes are engaging in bad, ill-advised, and even violent behavior, you'd hope that coaches, at least, would still be capable of demonstrating character.

Organizations have long since lost the will to fire people. Organizations are afraid of lawsuits, afraid of being singled out on national television as a bad corporation, or worst of all, afraid of being considered “insensitive.” But there was a day when being fired served as a statement of accountability.

No one likes to lose a job. In fact, there’s no pleasant nor easy way to tell someone he or she has lost a job, and there’s certainly no pleasant or easy way to receive such information.

But losing a job, even being fired, is not the worst thing that can happen to a person. It's not capital punishment. In fact, if a person is indeed guilty of some workplace infraction, as Alosi assuredly is, than being fired can be a turning point in life. It gets ones attention and it can be turned to the good.

I don’t mean to romanticize getting fired. It’s not fun and games, and shouldn't be done arbitrarily. But organizations must attend to their missions and that does not generally include giving a second chance to employees guilty of egregious behavior.

Alosi was a professional, some would say privileged professional. Yet he acted in a highly unprofessional manner. This is grounds for firing. In the end, Alosi need not be banned forever from football, but neither should he be permitted to reengage with this team. Who among the players would respect him? Time for Alosi to move on for the good of the team and, truth be told, for him too.

*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Dr. Rogers or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow Dr. Rogers at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 30 November 2010

Wide receiver Andre Johnson and cornerback Cortland Finnegan were fined $25,000 each today for fighting in Sunday’s NFL game between the Houston Texans and Tennessee Titans. Both players were ejected from the game but neither faces further suspensions.

In a modest apology, Johnson said, “What happened out there today was not me…” Huh? Who was it then? Last year, Johnson was fined $7,500 for fighting with Finnegan, pulling him to the ground by his facemask. Two similar infractions, particularly involving the same opponent, suggest Johnson is less than truthful with us and maybe himself. If he doesn’t have an anger management problem than he certainly has a problem with this one player. It “was not me” doesn’t hold water.

Of the two, Johnson got in the most blows including fists to Finnegan’s head. Johnson, the bigger man, even threw Finnegan to the ground and as Finnegan was on all fours attempting to get up, Johnson stood over him pounding fists to Finnegan’s head area.

But Finnegan is no angel. Both Finnegan and Johnson tore the other’s helmet off. This was no push-and-shove testosterone contest. Both were clearly trying to hurt the other. And this is Finnegan’s fourth fine this year for fighting and taunting other players bringing his total to $45,000. Finnegan had been taunting Johnson throughout the game and taunted Houston fans as he left the game nearly causing a fan riot in the process.

Fines have not caused either player to own or change his behavior. Both players are repeat offenders. Both are guilty of unsportsmanlike conduct undermining the integrity of their sport. Fines will never result in changed behavior. Players simply treat fines as a cost of doing business, for some a budgeted expense.

Near the beginning of my years as a university president, several student-athletes committed some serious rules violations. The athletic director, coach, and a couple of other university administrators deliberated the matter with me and we eventually suspended the players for four games.

Some critics accused the university of being over the top, way too severe in its punishment. Other critics thought this discipline was too light, that we were “coddling athletes.” I don’t think either criticism was valid.

Those who thought the university was unfair failed to take into account that we did not kick the students out of school and they were permitted to continue their studies, thus losing no time, course credit, or money.

Those who thought the university was giving special favor to athletes failed to account for the fact that the worst discipline an athlete can experience is loss of playing time. In other words, these student-athletes would rather have done anything, including lose academic time and money, if they’d just been allowed to continue on the team.

This is why I say the NFL, or any other professional sport, will not be successful in changing players’ behavior on the field or the court simply by fining them. Many of these athletes are millionaires, or at least earn a lot of money. Losing cash might hurt a little but not much.

Another thing: a fine is individual. You fine the guilty player, he pays the fine, and he continues to play, so his team feels nothing. If you suspend a player, i.e. take away his ability to play, you get his attention and you get the attention of the entire team. Now, this player’s unsportsmanlike conduct has put at risk the entire team’s ability to win games and championships. You’ve created a collective interest and incentive in playing according to the rules. This results in positive peer pressure.

So you can fine athletes all you want, even large fines, and you’ll only be minimally successful, if at all, in altering their actions. For athletes, playing matters most. Suspend players from a game(s) and I guarantee you their unsportsmanlike behavior will be reigned in when they come off the bench.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell should ditch the fines and set up a system of game suspensions appropriate to the infraction.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 15 September 2010

There’s something about sports heroes. They’re different from other heroes. We get to know them.

Unlike other heroes—the woman who rescued a child from an oncoming car or the fellow who served his country in harms way—sports heroes do their deeds in front of us. We get to see it happen, time and again, in HD, TiVo, or live at the event. We get to be heroes vicariously, one of the great joys of sport.

So when sports heroes go awry it brings us up short. It’s no fun, unless you’re a bit perverse, to see sports heroes brought down to earth.

That’s the case with the New Orleans Saints Reggie Bush who yesterday gave his Heisman Trophy back. Bush returned the award to spare the Heisman Trophy Trust from having to ask for it. Both giving it back and asking for it back are unprecedented in the award’s 75-year history.

The NCAA recently ruled Bush was ineligible during his award winning 2005 season on the basis of evidence his family received hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts, free housing, and more from California agents. In other words, Bush was paid like a professional before he turned professional, a clear violation of NCAA policy.

Sports heroes are falling from grace, in part, because cultural commitment to character has declined in the past few decades. More youngsters are growing up without moral teaching, good role models, or moral restraint. You can see this in elementary and middle schools. If you don’t believe this ask school teachers, EMTs, fire-fighters, nurses, or police personnel who’ve been on the job for more than 25 years. They see it.

Tiger Woods, Michael Vick, Marion Jones, Art Schlicter, Darryl Strawberry, Mike Tyson, O.J. Simpson, Barry Bonds, Pete Rose—athletes whose character failures harmed their careers and their lives. There are many more.

I think incidents like this are going to increase. Reason being, kids are still growing up in homes without both parents, without instruction in right and wrong, and little chance of getting either anywhere else. Neither schools, nor churches it seems, can handle it.

One of the great beauties of sport is the purity of competition. It’s the idea that we can watch athletes go head to head at the pinnacle of physical talent and skill with all the heart they can muster. And “May the best man/woman/team win.” And when they win it’s because they deserve to win, not because they cheated but because on that day they are truly the best.

The integrity of sport. Lose it and lose the meaning of sport.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 05 September 2010

In a very short time, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has become the new poster boy for poor sportsmanship in American professional sports. The National Basketball Association has repeatedly assessed him six-figure fines for his courtside actions, the latest coming during the NBA finals with the Miami Heat. Cuban was recently cited for "several acts of misconduct" that occurred during Dallas’s 101-100 overtime loss to the Miami Heat. He screams at officials, uses profanity in press conferences, and in general is known for his explosive fan behaviour as much as for his ownership of the team.

Since buying the team in 2000, Cuban has earned a business reputation as a turnaround specialist, taking a team in the doldrums and positioning it to double its revenues to $100 million in the past year. Meanwhile, his recent fine is his tenth in the 6 ½ years he’s owned the team and brings his total fines to about $1.5 million. He claims to have matched this fine total with similar donations to charities.

The question is, is Mark Cuban another example of what’s wrong with professional sports—too much greed, too many prima donna personalities, too much unsportsmanlike conduct? Or is he an otherwise nice guy who has shrewdly positioned his fan behaviour as part of a larger marketing scheme to put the Dallas Mavericks on the map? If that’s so it seems to be working. A million and one-half dollar fine doesn’t mean much in financial terms if it’s just one of the costs of running a business grossing one hundred million dollars.

But even if we give him the benefit of the doubt that he might be a decent person in his “other life” out of the arena, and even if we bought the idea that his antics are a part of some marketing scheme, his fan behaviour is a form of leadership pointing in the wrong direction. Unsportsmanlike conduct, cheating, drug abuse, and even violence are increasingly defining sports culture in America and globally. One more example of a person who misuses and abuses his notoriety and position is not something American sports culture needs. A “Bobby Knight” in the owner’s box isn’t very appealing.

While the Dallas Mavericks are winning, people will tolerate Cuban’s bad example. Some will even point to it as a supposedly necessary part of their winning organizational formula. But sometime, as it comes to all teams, the Dallas Mavericks will lose again, and when that happens people will not likely celebrate a choleric, fickle owner. His actions won’t be amusing. They’ll be annoying.

Cuban could learn to evidence passion and enthusiasm for the game and his team in a way that models sportsmanship for young players on his team and even younger players and fans across America alike. He could yell for his team, not against the other team or the referees. He could promote wearing team colors. He could literally wave their logo flag or dance with their mascot. He could compliment the opposing team, coaches, and owner during press conferences. He could do silly fan-atical things that otherwise do not illustrate negative attitudes, language, and actions.

He could do all this and more in a positive way and be even more effective in marketing his team than he has been as a shrewd businessman and poor fan. If he did these things, others in professional, intercollegiate, and interscholastic sports would respect him. Now they just think he’s a flash in the pan like other misbehaving sports figures have been in the past.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 05 September 2010

Sports culture suffered another blow in the past couple of weeks when high school quarterback standout, Mark Sanchez, now at the University of Southern California, was arrested on suspicion of sexually assaulting a female student. This follows an NCAA investigation of whether the parents of Heisman Trophy winner, Reggie Bush, also of USC, gained some questionable housing advantage from a businessman supporter of the team. And this follows national attention focused on allegations of assault and rape against some members of the Duke University Lacrosse team.

Athletics at the intercollegiate and professional levels are microcosms of society. There are good people and not so good people who play sports. It’s not too surprising, therefore, to think that “bad things happen” from time to time. So the fact that these kinds of incidents occurred is nothing new in American sports, but then again the intensity and frequency of such incidents seems to be increasing

Negative fan behavior, near-violent parents, cheating prima donna athletes, belligerent coaches, and dishonest officials are all now a part of the American sports scene.

So how do we move sports culture back toward achievement and sportsmanship? It’s a complicated issue, one that’s rooted in the moral fabric or lack of it in culture at large, in elementary and secondary schools, and in the home.

There aren’t enough rules or honest officials to keep athletes from misbehaving on and especially off the court or field. It all goes back to each person’s moral code.

This is one reason I’m a fan of the NAIA’s “Champions of Character” program. In this intercollegiate organization of some 300 schools nationally, the focus is on winning and on character: Respect, Responsibility, Integrity, Sportsmanship, and Servant Leadership.

Cornerstone University has experienced problems, sometimes serious problems, with student athletes. But the university draws lines of acceptable behavior for student athletes and coaches and, when necessary, holds accountable those who cross the line. Sports in this context is part of life, not isolated from it. A student or a coach wins when he or she is at their best as athletes and as people. Demanding that athletes behave properly is even more important than demanding that they perform their sport well.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 05 September 2010

So-called professional wrestling has always perplexed me. It’s crass, it’s fake, and on top of all that, it’s fairly expensive to watch: tickets over $60. These big boys are athletic, no question, but World Wide Wrestling is more about schlock entertainment than it is competitive sports.

I suppose proponents could say that watching the “morality plays” of faux wrestling is no different than watching a drama on stage or at the cinema. I mean, the star didn’t really fall five stories without injury. The actors didn’t really shoot twelve people while nary a return shot nicked them. It’s just a story. It’s entertainment. Maybe the same is true for professional wrestling.

But somehow it still seems different to me. If Jim Carrey is guilty of over-acting at times, than pro wrestlers must really be over-the-top. They yell, scream, argue, look bug-eyed into the camera, “threaten” “opponents,” develop their bodies into grotesque caricatures of the real human body, prance around in ridiculous outfits, and in general demonstrate that while they have the gift of gab they do not have facile minds.

Why would people pay good money to watch other people act like fools? I don’t know. But then again, I like comedians—at least clean comedians, and they act like fools too. God made a big world and gave us a lot of room to move around in it. I’m just glad there’s enough room for me to move away from the WWF.