thoughts on the news of the day: sports

hmmm…..

            Two seemingly unrelated stories captured my interest this morning.  First, the news that ESPN’s newscaster, Jaworski said a bad word on national television last night.  He was covering Monday Night Football and slipped in some foul language.  Jaworski apologized as soon as he knew that the mistake had been made and ESPN said that it was moving on after the error.

            Second, the Piedmont Hills High School in San Jose, California has a problem.  The principal has decided to enforce a dress code that doesn’t allow girls to wear skirts or shorts that do not reach their mid-thigh.  Unfortunately, the enforcement extends to the cheerleading squad whose $300 uniforms have skirts shorter than the rules.  The solution that the administration has offered is that the girls wear sweat pants under their uniforms.  One cheerleader said that doing that was just plain “dorky” and I agree.

            We seem to get very worked up over sports issues.  We want our athletes and our teams to be pristine in their behavior, but they are not.  When sportscasters curse, it makes national news.  When fresh faced all-American cheerleaders show their behinds, it does, too. 

            But maybe we should have higher expectations of our sports heroes.  Maybe the standard has been set higher for them.  Maybe we have the right to be disappointed when they fail us.  Tiger Woods is a worthy example of that.  We put our faith and our hopes and our dreams on the stellar athlete we found in him and he turned around and disappointed us.  If the goal of the athlete is to win, then maybe it should be to win favor too.

            hmmm…..