Say anything

Some athletes will ... and we lap up every ridiculous word

I don't mind telling you: It didn't bother me that Jeremy Shockey called Bill Parcells a "homo." Nor did it really concern me that Mark Cuban touted the Kobe Bryant trial as being "great for the NBA."

That's not to say I endorse homophobic slurs or the marketing of a rape trial. Far from it. But when it comes to who says what, I simply consider the source. And I happen to know that if you put a microphone in front of a rooster, he's going to crow. It's not worth getting angry or offended, it's just a rooster being a rooster.

Oh, but we love our roosters. We love our dunderheads and our blowhards, our bigmouths, windbags and braggarts. We run right up to them with our recorders running and we beg them to say something stupid. Then we spend the better part of a week or a month squawking like Captain Louis in Casablanca saying, "I am shocked, shocked!"

We love jocks who get misquoted in their own autobiographies and who read written apologies without actually ever using the word "apologize." We love news conferences called to say somebody isn't talking. We love jocks who talk out of their rears so often that they need a proctologist to translate. We may like Barry Bonds when he hits 70 home runs, but we love him even more when he opens his mouth just long enough to get into a spitting contest with Babe Ruth … who's been dead for more than 50 years.

As much as they may offend the faint of heart, lunatics and loose cannons make the sports world go 'round.

But sometimes we need to remind NOW and the ACLU and all those worthwhile acronyms out there that some battles just aren't worth the effort. When quoting a John McEnroe or a David Wells, newspapers should be legally obligated to run the disclaimer: Novelty. For entertainment purposes only. These quotes are not intended to be interpreted with any real social relevance.

Instead we blow them out with 70-point headlines that send news anchors scrambling down The Batpole looking for "the big picture."

We love McEnroe for his unshaven brat routine, but it's not worth a senate hearing every time he makes a boorish comment about women's tennis.

McEnroe slams Serena! Tonight we examine the volatile battle of the sexes in professional tennis with Billie Jean King, Martha Burk, Gloria Steinem, Maya Angelou, Hillary Rodham Clinton and the guy who played 'Larry' on Three's Company!

We love Wells as a blue-collar, beer-drinkin' big galoot ... but nobody should be turning to him to examine the conscience of baseball in a tell-all book that seemed to mostly tell on himself.

Andrew Bernstein/Getty Images Mark Cuban: Blah blah blah blah. Jeremy Shockey: Yap yap yap yap. Ezra Shaw/Getty Images

And now there's Shockey, whose very name is custom-made for headline writers. One year in the NFL and he's making more covers than Gisele and making more waves than Roseanne off the high board. His "slur" about Parcells -- inappropriate in any setting – should just be disregarded as the meaningless yapping of a big puppy who is off the chain and out of the backyard. A few more whacks on the rump by the New York tabloids and he'll grow up a little. Maybe. In the meantime, enjoy his spasmodic celebrations and just try to remember to turn the volume down when it comes time for the postgame interview.

Children should be seen, not heard, after all.

Cuban is no kid. He's a dork with money. And money may not buy you love, but it'll buy you a voice.

Love Cuban for his rebellious relationship with the NBA and the high-tech way in which he runs his basketball team … but don't go looking for the meaning of life in his TV news magazine prognostications. Just understand that Cuban and Pat O'Brien are satisfying a codependent relationship: O'Brien needs Cuban to provide provocative sound bites; Cuban needs O'Brien to make it seem credible.

That's why we love Charles Barkley, who is probably on CNN at this very moment making unfounded statements about world events of which he has no real knowledge. Every time a scientist discovers a new gas on the surface of Jupiter, CNN has Barkley in its panel discussion saying, "I don't know what that gas is made of, but it can't smell any worse than Ernie Johnson's gym bag."

Barkley is the undisputed captain of our Asinine All-Stars because he has achieved the rarest of feats in American society: carte blanche to say whatever he wants about anybody or anything with virtual impunity. Had it been Barkley in that issue of SI instead of John Rocker, we all would have doubled over in laughter and said, "Charles will make a helluva governor someday."

And that's why we love Pete Rose, who has managed to maintain a kind of unconditional love from his fans in spite of the way he speaks in tongues about gambling, lost livelihood and conspiracy theories. You can't believe a word Rose says, yet every time he speaks it's front-page news.

Rose's convoluted arguments make O.J. Simpson's rambling explanations look as simple as the directions on the back of a shampoo bottle.

Digress. Babble. Repeat.

There are plenty of opinions worth heeding around sports, plenty of issues to get fired up about, and plenty of grownups who make sense when they speak. Sometimes they're even heard. You've just got to know when to listen.

David Vecsey's Voice of Reason column appears weekly on SI.com.

Comments? To e-mail Vecsey, click here.

 

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