The wild world of sports has been exactly that: completely wild and wacky.

This past week, I saw Shaquille O’Neal literally almost kill Brad Miller of the Bulls. Shaq and Co. are very lucky that his roundhouse right did not connect, or else Shaq may be making a new movie from jail. I certainly understand that this man takes a beating every night because nobody can stop him unless they wrap their arms around him and hold on for dear life. But he finally snapped, as he said he always would.

However, I am disappointed in the NBA’s punishment. Marcus Camby of the New York Knicks threw a punch last year that accidentally left his coach with stitches. Camby swung once and had to sit out the next five games because of it. But Shaq threw two punches, or good night thunder-boppers, and sits out only three games. Is the league that starved for superstars that the NBA won’t put a proper punishment on a Shaq? This doesn’t surprise me. Punishments for NBA superstars never seem to make sense and Shaq’s outburst just falls into the same file. Had Shaq’s first blow connected, we might be looking at a different story. But who knows? The NBA may have given him ten games, or taken the proper role and suspended him for the season.

That’s how the NHL treats players who lose control on the ice, and it works. A guy crosses a certain line, justifiably or not, and he’s out five or ten games with no questions asked. He does something even worse, and he sits out the season. They have set a precedent that players cannot get away with losing control and putting other players in danger. Shaq obviously did that, but the caretakers of the NBA are willing to forgive and forget. Losing money because fans have no other reason to go to the game than to see certain players seems like a probable reason for not suspending him longer, doesn’t it? (I say this because the actual games aren’t very good because nobody plays like a team)

Anyhow, after Shaq’s suspension, Kobe Bryant decided to take over. And take over he did. Kobe scored 56 points in three quarters. That’s ridiculous. But Allen Iverson decided he would two-up Kobe the next night, pouring in 58 points. Wow!

In other news, the Red Sox finally got sold, to an owner who now owns three teams. Yep that’s right. John Henry still owns the Marlins and owns a small percentage of the Yankees. The what? The new owner of the Boston Red Sox owns a piece of their most hated team, the dreaded Yanks. But it gets worse. What’s even more sickening about this whole deal is how it was done. They called this an open bid. Highest bidder gets the team. That’s a load of B.S. Major League baseball and the Red Sox brass decided long ago who would own this team now. Bud Selig has Henry and his mate Tom Werner eating out of his pocket. Contraction he asks. “Sure.” Revenue sharing. “Of course.” It’s a joke.

Charles Dolan put up over $700 million for this team and was denied because he and Selig don’t get along. I don’t agree that MLB should be involved in the sale of team that is supposed to be open bid. Tell the public that this is who you want and appoint them. Be honest. Baseball has enough problems and when they’re going behind the fans backs on sales and contracts and all this other shit, it just doesn’t make sense. Alright, now I’m mad. I’m signing off. My advice: befriend Bud Selig. Maybe you too can be an owner.

contact Dr. Z at [email protected]

Popularity: 1% [?]

 Print This Post

This entry was posted on Friday, January 18th, 2002 at 12:00 pm and is filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.