Updated:
May 24, 2000
TOP
OF THE WEEK MARTINA IS BACK
She's 43 and has won more titles than any female tennis player in history. So one wouldn't expect Martina Navratilova to have the jitters.
``I was nerve-wracked. ... I expected to have more fun than I did,'' Navratilova said Tuesday after she and South Africa's Mariaan de Swardt won their opening-round doubles match in the Madrid Open in straight sets. It was Navratilova's first competition in 5 1/2 as she gears up for Wimbledon.
Navratilova told the Associated Press she has given up playing singles for good.
``That's too much work,'' she said. ``This is fun for a couple of months and then I'll go back to (ice) hockey.''
BOTTOM OF THE WEEK
HOME RUN DERBY
We like a slugfest in baseball as much as the next guy. But when scores of 10-9, 12-7 and 11-7 are routine it takes some luster from the game and cheapens the most dramatic play in the sport: the home run.
Through Tuesday 40 players in the majors are on pace to hit 40 home runs, a ridiculously high number. Blame it all on weakened pitching (Randy Johnson and Pedro Martinez excepted) caused by expansion, a juiced baseball and new stadiums with playing fields not much bigger than your average Wal Mart. Let's hope the heat and humidity of summer slow things down a bit.
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WEEK
LESBIANS IN
SPORTS: STILL A TABOO
``Real Sports,'' HBO's terrific monthly look at all aspects of sports, devotes a segment this month to gays in sports, specifically lesbians on the LPGA tour.
The show was very well done but mostly a downer for anyone hoping the climate has changed for pro athletes to come out. The segment's reporter, Armen Keteyian, said producers had talked to about 100 athletes, hoping to get an out lesbian to talk. But no such luck.
The two publicly out lesbian pro golfer, Hall of Famer Patty Sheehan and Muffin Spencer-Devlin, both declined to be interviewed.
An agent for a top lesbian athlete (no sport was mentioned) agreed to be interviewed only if his face wasn't shown. He said that his client, who had been out, has recently resorted to hiring male escorts to be seen at public functions. The athlete, who wants to be publicly out, is playing the beard game to keep endorsements. The agent estimated that his client's sexual orientation has cost her $500,000 to $600,000 in lost endorsements.
The segment juxtaposed the icy silence surrounding the LPGA with the public celebration that takes place in Palm Springs each spring the same weekend as the Nabsico Classic (formerly the Dinah Shore Tournament). While Palm Springs businesses welcome the lesbian party-goers with open arms, the tour keeps them at arms length, virtually denying their existence.
The white bread, married-with-two-kids LPGA commissioner, Ty M. Votaw, could barely contain his smirk while being questioned by
Keteyian. He would not discuss the lesbian angle, saying people have the right to their own private lives. He blamed straight male reporters for being fascinated with the issue, the typical head-in-the-sand approach from some corporate functionary.
Pat Griffin, author of several books and articles dealing with lesbians in sports, was dead-on when she noted a huge difference between someone keeping things private out of choice, and someone who leads a double life out of fear that exposure could
derail a career.
What surprised Keteyian the most, he told host Bryant Gumbel, was that even younger players on the tour were uncomfortable discussing the issue. He termed the
culture one of paranoia.
Keteyian also took note of how mainstream corporations are more and more targeting the gay community and interviewed a member of American Airlines' ``Rainbow Team.'' Even this woman, though, said she wouldn't use an out and proud athlete in commercials, neatly avoiding the issue by saying that American was happy with the direction of its current campaign.
At a time when gays and lesbians are competing in sports leagues and teams and the Gay Games attract more registered athletes than the Summer Olympics, the HBO show sadly, but accurately showed that pro sports remains the final closet.
NFL
Big, fat, conservative political talk show host Rush Limbaugh finally got his shot. He has been lobbying hard on his radio show the last couple of months for an audition as the replacement for Boomer Esiason on ABC's Monday Night Football. On Monday he traveled to Los Angeles to call a pre-recorded game with long-time MNF host Al Michaels. ABC will be making its final decision on Esiason's replacement in June.
Whether he is calling the games for ABC or watching them from his sofa, one player he won't see next season is Dallas Cowboys' WR Michael Irvin. Doctors advised Irvin on Tuesday that he should not return to play in the NFL. Irvin, one of the regulars at the infamous White House party hotspot of the Cowboys in the mid-90s, is expected to heed the advice and retire.
NBA
If ever there was a dominatrix relationship in the NBA, it's the one that exists between the New York Knicks and the Miami Heat. For the last three seasons, these two teams have met in the playoffs. Each year, the Heat were favored to win. And, each year the Knicks beat them in the last game of the series, twice in Miami.
Of course, after the game the Heat players, Jamal Mashburn in particular, whined about the officiating in the final game.
"They had three officials in their pocket," Mashburn said.
Waaaa waaaa waaaa. You gave up a 15-point lead in Game 6 and gave up a six-point lead with five minutes left in Game 7 on your home court. Shut up, go home, and practice your free throws - your team hit 52% in your Game 7 loss.
COLLEGE
BASKETBALL
The saga continues. A week after Indiana University decided to retain Bobby Knight as their head coach and issued sanctions against him, more accusations are coming out.
Former Indiana player Chris Lawson, who played for Bobby Knight from 1989-91, said he saw Knight punch a player in the head at halftime of a game against Iowa State.
Indiana University has decided to not pursue any further investigation. They're still too busy kissing Knight's ass.