Thankful Thursday

Let us give thanks.

• I am SO. THANKFUL. for a job. I'll be going in Saturday to fill out paperwork and resume working at Starbucks. No, it's not in sports, and I don't anticipate it being long-term. However as I am REALLY wanting to get into sports broadcast production but am having difficulty getting in the front door, I really needed to do something to bring in a paycheck. Plus, there's something that happens mentally when you sit at home and don't have a job, and it's not good. I had to get out of that and get busy.
• I am thankful for Men's Fraternity. MF is a weekly curriculum that focuses on helping men identify, learn about, develop, and maximize their God-given responsibilities. We started back up last week and its really been a blessing for me, and I hope that Sarah has benefitted from it too. If there is a church near you that is offering the program, I highly recommend looking into it.
• I am so thankful that the Braves were successful in returning to the playoffs after a 4-year hiatus. We didn't make it in pretty, but we're in and that's all that matters now. Obviously its a little extra sweet because of this being Bobby Cox' final year. The Braves are going to have it tough facing the Giants because both teams have great pitching and both teams struggle to score runs, but I am really hoping we can split the two games in SF to start the series. If we can do that, I like our chances of moving on.
• I am thankful for a new opportunity to serve as a "Trail Guide" in the NACofC Youth Group this year. Trail Guides is kind of like a mentoring program where I've been given 4 7th-grade young men to meet with each month and just be a positive influence in their lives. I met these young men this past Sunday and I can already tell I'll benefit from this as much, if not more than they will.
• I am thankful for our small group at church. Sarah and I were reading a humorous blogpost yesterday about small groups in general, and while we were laughing at some of the parts of the blogpost that applied directly to us, it yet again reminded us how thankful we are for ours.
• As always, I am constantly thankful for Sarah. She's really hung with me through the job issue and I know that she spends a lot of time helping me find job postings and helping me think of possible ways to get some editing training. She's the best!

Sorry I haven't been around much. Fan Friendly Fridays will return tomorrow.

22

Jason Heyward seems to be a pretty special guy. I'm glad the Braves have him. This clip is from ESPN's E:60, Buster Olney reporting.

What the Olympics, NFL, and NCAA Basketball have in common over the other leagues.

Yes, you read correctly, I just said that football and BASKETBALL have something better than baseball. I'll get to that...

Yesterday, the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver concluded in high-fashion, and I haven't even watched the closing ceremonies yet. I'm talking about the USA/Canada hockey game for the gold medal. The game was almost everything you would want out of a "championship" event. There was the neighboring nations rivalry, there was the "home" team on its home soil (even though technically Canada was the "Away" team), there were normally teammates now opponents, and you had a clear favorite in Canada's all-star team vs. a clear underdog in USA's very young team. I almost forgot to mention the previous upset where Team USA stood up to the favored Canada and dominated them just one week earlier.

What made this game so exciting though, was that it was a true case of the popular saying, "Win or go home." For the loser, there was no chance to tie the series up the next day. There was only one simple question going into yesterday's game: Who will step up when it matters and come out on top?

That is the fundamental questions of sports, and, when it gets boiled down, is why most of us watch. The particular sport has no bearing on the question because that question is universal. Ice hockey, ice skating, luge, skiing, track & field, gymnastics, baseball, football, swimming, and yes, curling all come out with an answer to that question.

Sure, you can say that Canada played defensive yesterday for the majority of the game, but so what? In the end, they have a gold medal and Team USA has the silver. Canada won, USA didn't - end. of. story. I love it. There are no questions about the outcome.

I know why MLB, NBA, and the NHL use the series system in their championships. The idea is that they help prevent flukes, and maybe they do to an extent. All you have to do, however, is go back to the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals winning the World Series to question how much they really prevent a weak team from winning. The real problem with the series format is that there is really no drama until at least game 4, and usually not even then. A team can have a bad day, and still have a chance.

In the Super Bowl, if you have a bad day, you're probably going to lose. Same in NCAA Basketball. Same in the Olympics. The question is, can you step up, and not let that happen? That's the question I love about sports.

Perception and reality

A few weeks ago, I was in a bible study where another guy talked about how Tiger Woods had become his object lesson in why it's best to not put his faith in other people - moreover, celebrities/professional athletes. I knew exactly how he was feeling.

The events leading up to my lesson started during the Summer/Fall of 1998.

Mark McGwire.

I've pulled for the Cubs ever since my childhood, but that summer, "Big Mac" won me over, albeit competing with Cubs slugger, Sammy Sosa for the single season home run record.

I remember the early rumblings about McGwire and steroid use, but I wrote them off as people just trying to create a story. I had read about his use of androstenedione, but since it wasn't banned by MLB at the time, I didn't care. Someone had likened "andro" to creatine to me, and so I didn't dwell on it.

I believed in Mark McGwire. He was the next Cal Ripken Jr. He was one of the good guys. He helped save baseball. Screw Jose Canseco and his stupid book. No educated person would take anything he had to say seriously...right? He was just a washed up, broke, former player trying to make a buck by publishing a sensational book...right?

I banged the drum for Mark McGwire for years, well after most people had come to believe that it obvious that he had been "doping," I was reminding whoever would listen that without a confirmed failed drug test, you have to extend the benefit of the doubt.

Then, on March 17, 2005, I learned my lesson. I was actually excited leading up to that day. Congress had called a hearing in which current and former players would be asked, under oath, about steroid use in professional baseball. McGwire would finally shut everyone up who had been talking trash about him.

But he didn't.

He didn't want to "talk about the past." I put down the drumstick. By saying nothing, he said everything. I sat in a hotel room that day, watching that subcommittee hearing feeling numb, like someone had punched me in the gut and knocked the air out of me.

I didn't give a crap what anyone else said at that hearing. To me, that hearing was about McGwire having a chance to silence his critics with "the truth." I learned that day, however, that the "truth" didn't exist as I imagined it.

Today, we learned, definitively, that where his critics smelled smoke on that day in 2005, and after the 1998 season, and apparently back to the early 1990s - there was indeed fire.

I wish I could say that after the level of disappointment I felt on that day in 2005, I'm not that fazed about McGwire's confession today. For most of this evening, I believed it. But as I finish writing this, remembering how badly I wanted McGwire to be what I wanted him to be, the reality is that it sucks now, just like it did then.

"Stop breaking the law...!!!!!"

Several years ago, when I still thought that Jim Carrey was still funny, he made the movie Liar Liar, where he played the role of a lawyer who suddenly found himself unable to lie. He had one of my favorite movie lines in this movie...

Greta (his secretary): Boss...boss, it's [name of client], he knocked over another ATM. This time at knife point. He needs your legal advice.
Fletcher (Jim Carrey): [picking up phone and shouting] Stop breaking the law,...!

I'll come back to that in a minute.

Major League Baseball and its players have done a lot over the past several years to damage its reputation and lose the confidence of the fans in the integrity of the sport. When I say fans, I am certainly not excluding myself as the author of this post. I love baseball. I love this sport more than any other sport. Yet it continually makes me sick to my stomach every time more steroids news comes out.

There is one thing in particular that I am getting more and more sick of, and that is the saying, "It [steroids] was part of the culture in the 90's" or that it was just accepted as part of the game back then, that "everyone was doing it." You've heard some version of that from any number of commentators, players, or other representatives.

I get so mad at such a stupid idea!!!!

Let me get this straight, so I get pulled over for speeding on GA 400. I go to court to contest the ticket because, well, everyone speeds on GA 400, that's just how it is. Am I really supposed to expect the judge to say, "You know, you're right, 'everyone' does speed on 400, so why should I penalize just you if I'm not going to pull over and cite every other person who speeds on 400?" How stupid is that?!?! I broke the law, there's a consequence.

So why on earth should the 103 players in addition to Alex Rodriguez, and any other player who has tested for positive for use of anabolic steroids...which are ILLEGAL...not be penalized by law. "Well that was just how it was back then." Screw that!!! Since when has that been a reasonable explanation for doing something wrong?!?!

This past summer I was walking through Times Square in NYC when I see a billboard that says "Have an affair in New York City." Apparently having an affair is so accepted now that we can put billboards up advocating it, so does that mean it's OK for me to go out now on weekend flings? At work, foul language is pretty commonplace. Does that mean that it's OK for me to loosen up on moderating what I say because my coworkers don't see anything wrong with it? Well you could respond, "Michael, those are issues of morality and depends on your system of beliefs." And you're right, someone who is not a Christian may not see anything wrong with those. There's no law banning affairs or language as far as I know.

But there ARE laws on steroids. And I don't give a crap whether drug testing was part of the contract between MLB and the Players Association. If you used steroids, you broke the law. You shouldn't be given annonomity, and you shouldn't be given a pass because it was part of the culture. If you used steroids and got caught, don't ask your publicist how you should handle it. Own it, take the punishment, and DON'T DO IT AGAIN!! Better yet, don't give yourself a chance to get caught, come out with it!!! You don't even have to tell us why, we already know. Just admit you screwed up, show that you're willing to take punishment, instead of acting like you have a legitimate reason as to why you shouldn't be punished, and we the fans can and will move on.

I am so mad that I have to look at the generation of baseball that I grew up in out of the corner of my eye and wonder about everyone who played. I am so mad that what I was watching was not an honest product. I am so mad that I have to hope and pray that Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, and John Smoltz never used steroids, because I think that would end me and baseball.

There is one other group I serve notice to: To those players who did not use steroids, you have no right to ask the fans to not associate you with those who did. You have no right to ask us to trust you more than those who used. You had the opportunity to speak up in your clubhouse; to not allow steroids to become "part of the culture." But you didn't. You may have refused offers from your teammates to join in, but you didn't stop them. And as it got worse, you didn't publicly fight to keep the sport clean. It wasn't until people got caught, and your integrity started getting questioned, that a few of you finally said that you don't want it in the sport. You could have been proactive, but you weren't. We the fans have every right to question you. Unfortunately, because of your innaction, we have to.