Alas, the Virginia football team ... or what's left of the hamstrung hodgepodge after Dan Ellis' right leg crumpled beneath him, has the week off.
So the way I figure it, so too does this lowly columnist proudly bearing the moniker "big-money sport tycoon" across his chest. Somewhere along the line, somebody pronounced that if a sport doesn't have Carl Smith's financial backing or a squadron of scantily clad cheerleaders, then I'm not watching it.
They're right.
So, with Ellis reclining in the sauna all week, visions of Florida State's ravenous defense dancing in his head, I too am taking the next few days off - at least from attempting to string coherent phrases together. But that doesn't mean I can't scattershoot with the best of them. Dallas columnist Blackie Sherrod randomly hithers and yons in his weekly rant, The Washington Post's Tony Kornheiser radiates the attention span of a 4-year-old caffeine addict, so why can't I?
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Therefore, without further ado, I present to you the following sporting nuggets that have me scratching my head and staring blankly at my pen for the right words. Ever notice that:
1) Virginia quarterbacks are never rightly appreciated until they're trying to land a job in NFL Europe.
When Tim Sherman piloted the club in 1997, all you heard about was a brash, mega-athletic kid named Aaron Brooks. Then, with Brooks at the helm a year later, the rumored genius of Ellis had fickle Cavalier crazies counting the days until Brooks' graduation.
Now that Ellis controls the Virginia machine, whispers of Matt Schaub and Bryson Spinner, two precocious hotshots reported to dwarf Ellis in talent and potential, have detracted from another stellar campaign by Virginia's unquestioned signal caller. Schaub and Spinner are a lot like small-market DJs: Sure, they have their sporadic flashes of brilliance, but in the end, they're just not ready for the big time. At least not yet.
2) Kickers never miss field goals wide left.
From Buffalo's Scott Norwood in Super Bowl XXV to Virginia's Todd Braverman in the 1998 Peach Bowl to Florida State/Miami three times over, why can't kickers hook one the other way? Are they allergic to the left upright? Does the obnoxious heckler in every crowd always position himself just inches right of the target?
It's prejudice, I tell you.
3) Maurice Green, Jon Drummond, Brian Lewis and Bernard Williams looked like the Olympic village idiots as they sauntered and swaggered around the Olympic stadium after capturing the 4x100-meter relay.
The fastest man in the world and his band of ignominious harlequins looked more like Captain America and the Avengers than Olympic champions.
They treated the American flag and all it symbolizes as shamelessly and recklessly as Allen Iverson treats life, using it as a doo-rag, cape, frat-party toga and muscle shirt, among other fashion statements.
Ah ... God bless America.
4) And speaking of "The Answer," ever notice how little Iverson looks like, but how much he sounds like, John Rocker?
In his soon-to-be-released compact disc, Iverson demeans gays, lesbians and women while counseling youngsters that if they are "man enough to pull a gun, be man enough to squeeze it."
Thursday, after an uproar from virtually every group in the free world, Iverson issued a canned apology to those he patently offended. Memo to Iverson: If you're "man enough" to say you're sorry, then be "man enough" to pull your disc off the music store shelves before every 8- to 18-year-old boy sporting your jersey scoops it up.
How perfectly fitting that Iverson titled his CD "Non Fiction"; in Iverson's quasi-real world, making money at the expense of others' pain is the hip-hop thing to do.
And finally, from the world of "I haven't been to the gym since the Reagan administration," why do all these masculine magazines - Men's Health, Men's Journal, ad infinitum - all promise great abs, healthy meals and unbeatable sex everyday for the rest of your life and never deliver?
Unlike Iverson's tirade, these assurances are pure fiction.
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