BIG EAST baseball dance-off

apparently this was a result of a five-hour rain delay. seriously?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aazG7dMhE7I

spotted in south miami

twitter

i refuse to join twitter for fear that i will become addicted to it as much as sportscenter has. i have to admit that i'm intrigued, but ... i have not yet given in to the temptation to tweet out my thoughts, even though i guess i'm technically doing it on this blog ...

anyway, real quick - two things.

first, i'm wondering how athletes like shaq, dwight howard and TO have time to tweet. i mean, shaq is sitting at home not playing postseason ball so that gives him some free time to comment on how "no one works harder than the syracuse lacrosse team" (whatever - GO DUKE), but i'd say the other two are relatively involved in their prospective sports right now. for example, dwight howard commented on the magic's game one win over the cavs just hours after the fact on his twitter page. i guess it has to do with appealing to the fans, but it does make you wonder a little bit if he was on the bus to the hotel thinking, "great win. let me tweet about this before i go to bed tonight ... if i can see my keyboard over my ginormous arms." in regards to TO: i don't really need to say anything because him commenting on comments that two specific teammates caused his release from the cowboys does not in any way surprise me.

second, who in Bristol spends all day browsing athletes' twitter pages to see what they're talking about? and can i get that job? that's pretty much like facebooking all day which i'm sure i could easily succeed at.

hot & cold

You change your mind
Like a girl changes clothes
Yeah you, PMS
Like a bitch
I would know

And you over think
Always speak
Crypticly

I should know
That you're no good for me

Cause you're hot then you're cold
You're yes then you're no
You're in then you're out
You're up then you're down
You're wrong when it's right
It's black and it's white
We fight, we break up
We kiss, we make up

You don't really want to stay, no
But you don't really want to go
You're hot then you're cold
You're yes then you're no
You're in and you're out
You're up and you're down

We used to be
Just like twins
So in sync
The same energy
Now's a dead battery
Used to laugh bout nothing
Now your plain boring

I should know that
You're not gonna change

Cause you're hot then you're cold
You're yes then you're no
You're in then you're out
You're up then you're down
You're wrong when it's right
It's black and it's white
We fight, we break up
We kiss, we make up

You don't really want to stay, no
But you don't really want to go
You're hot then you're cold
You're yes then you're no
You're in and you're out
You're up and you're down

Someone call the doctor
Got a case of a love bi-polar
Stuck on a roller coaster
Can't get off this ride

You change your mind
Like a girl changes clothes

only YOU can prevent forest fires

today, i dragged (drug? yeah, i was a journalism major) kiki to two different malls in search of the perfect dress for my birthday outing. we decided that we aren't fans of fashion right now for the following reasons: bows, flowers and zebra prints. it seems as though i need to choose between the bridesmaid look, the blair waldorf look, and the cougar look. i refuse and probably will just end up wearing the shirt that i wear as a dress from express.

and what's up with dressing rooms these days? most don't have doors, they have curtains which hardly stay closed. good thing kiki was there to stick her foot out the bottom of the curtain so that all of forever XII wouldn't see my goods. (also a good thing kiki was there to pull off a dress with a broken zipper for me, but that's another story)

either way, i guess i support the curtains seeing as how the only dressing room with an actual door that i went into, found its way to my forehead and i now have a bump the size of a golf ball above my right eyebrow. fml.

on the upside of coming out of two malls with only a bump on my head to show for it, the only cash spent was a combined $5 at starbucks. and the REAL adventure came as we were leaving ...

in a shocking turn of events, i'm yelling at some idiot driver for somehow not noticing the bright yellow sign that reads "incoming mall traffic does not stop," when kiki says, "um, is something on fire?" (see above photo)

we obviously are way too nosy to let this go so we decide to make like helen hunt in twister and start driving around during rush hour trying to find where this big cloud of smoke is coming from. we see one firetruck heading towards it and i'm thinking, you're probably gonna need more than one truck for that mess. then we see three cops hanging out outside the mall ... you might want to check out that big, dark cloud over there and discuss how to be a mall cop later. anyway, it was just a forest fire so i guess it's not that big of a deal, seeing as we also saw cops and firetrucks heading away from the action.

all in all, a solid afternoon shopping and chasing fires with kiki. smokey the bear would be proud.

GNO

(that's "girls night out" for those keeping track).

after missing a golden opportunity for a blog photo of a woman walking down lincoln road with one of HER girls out, i had to blog about last night's GNO turned "AJ and maegan are all of a sudden much more think than you drunk i am."

pick up AJ downtown, head to lincoln road to meet up with KC and DK at finnegan's. move the party to books and books cafe for some non-bar food (wow, we're really growing up folks!) and sangria. fab. discussions: AJ has been picked for jury duty; KC is going on a date with a lawyer; KC and i recall the first drunken night we hung out which turned into waking up next to her in my underwear (typical); DK says, "i want another pitcher, so if you guys don't, i'll just drink the whole thing (we all clearly have this drinking thing in common).

dinner over, head back to finnegan's for some drinks. random dudes follow us into the bar and have to leave because one can't legally be there. thank God. DK orders what we think is a non-alcoholic beer which turns into a google-it-on-your-blackberry party. no worries; Becks' does have booze in it. whew.

DK and KC head home but AJ and i are determined to stay and make the most of the $10 that AJ put in the parking meter, which by the way JUST ran out at 12:30 today.

watching the magic/celtics game, sippin on some goose and soda, after accidentally ordering tonic the first time and choking it down. AJ going with the classic goose and cran. the magic takes a shot with 50 seconds left and as the ball is in mid-air, the freaking power goes out on all but one tv. of course, as luck would have it, the rest of the power goes out with five seconds remaining in the game. LAME. thank God for the ESPN mobile app for blackberries, and also for EK keeping me updated via text with the play-by-play.

finnegan's is tired, heading elsewhere in search of some hip-hop which is hard to come by on a tuesday night in south beach apparently. we wander all the way to playwright and immediately decide that we'll definitely be getting a cab back to our car after that walk.

music is better at playwright, but creepy locals are still very much in full effect. it appears that tuesday nights are their night to go out. post-many vodka/sodas, i really don't care and am content with rocking out in my chair and BBM'ing and texting everyone in my phone. upset that we can't find the juke box and realizing that we need water instead of vodka immediately if not sooner, we decide that it would be best for us to call it a night.

a $5 cab ride to the car, a BBM that should not have been sent even though i still don't know what was said, and a kelly clarkson rock-out sesh later, home sweet home. a successful GNO.

and i did wake up in my underwear today, just in my own bed instead of DK's this time.

around the horn with yours truly.

sitting around watching ESPN's around the horn. many things i'd like to comment on, starting with the fact that this is the most civil (read: boring) episode of this show in recent memory. no one is fighting. it may as well be an episode of sportscenter seeing as how sportscenter has basically turned into E! news these days.

anyway, leading off with mark cuban. the guy just LOOKS like your average middle-aged, obnoxious white man that you would find hammered at a bar at 3 p.m. on a monday, yelling at everyone who walks by and getting in fights with strangers about nothing. in fact, he may have been at finnegan's last night. but seriously - talking smack on an opposing player's MOM? wilmer valderama might have an opening on his mtv show titled, "yo mama," if you'd like to sign up. idiot. i like that cuban is so involved with the mavs and kudos for blog-ogizing but this guy seems to spend a lot of time stirring up trouble and then apologizing for it. he's like the lindsay lohan of the nba. here's a thought: grow up. then blog about it.

more apologies, this time from big baby and this time, unnecessary (but cute). the guy got excited after making the shot of his life, and some father wants an apology because this "animal" ran into his 12-year-old son while celebrating. pretty sure if you're sitting ON the court, you have enough money to buy an apology and a band-aid. your son is a wimp and his classmates probably already know that. i'm sure he thanks you for making it worse.

i think this lady just kicked HERSELF off the show? woody paige would never allow this ...

horse racing. i care to speak about that sport about as much as i care to hear even more about brett favre and his fake retirements.

the cavs are ridiculous. i'd like to touch lebron james' arms.

hockey. not my thing. nice right hook, though.

roger clemens: another guy who should just make like the black eyed peas and shut up, just shut up, shut up. not only is he stirring this up himself by promoting a book that no one even knew was coming out, he is trying to say that he would never take harmful drugs because his family, including his stepfather, has a history of heart disease. "it would be like suicide." i didn't go to med school but from what i learned from a family tree experiment in the second grade, your stepfather's genes have nothing to do with yours.

road rage

as an official resident of florida (which by the way cost me $200 - you can't tell me an aluminum rectangle with three numbers, three letters and an orange on it costs that much to make), i feel as though i am allowed to address the following concerns regarding driving in miami:

issue number 1: the left lane.
it seems as though people think that when there are more than two lanes on an expressway, you are OUT of the way when you're in the far left lane. this is not the case - in fact you are very much IN the way and need to move your culo to the appropriate lane for your speed. the following are examples of who should never be in the far left lane: those big honkin trucks that load shit onto ships at port of miami; duck tours or any other type of slow-moving vehicle carrying tourists; handicapped people who probably shouldn't be driving to begin with; anyone who has ever received a ticket for going too slow on the expressway; those gawking at the airplanes and cruise ships.

issue number 2: cops.
it is noted that cops can pretty much do whatever they want and that is a perk of being one. today, i passed three cops with their lights flashing on the causeway, blocking a lane. one would think something was wrong, but, this trio of idiots was just standing around shooting the shit, smiling and laughing. blocking traffic, FOR WHAT? this was especially annoying to me today, seeing as how i had just passed a girl that had been hit while riding a bike. apparently catching up on stories about what an asshole you've been that day and comparing notes on how to be a dick, is more important than tending to a woman lying in the middle of alton road. (sidebar: while we're on the subject, cops should not park in actual parking spots when in a crowded area. you're a freaking cop, and can park wherever you want. think about that donut you had earlier and walk it off, or, if you must, park on the sidewalk or curb. because you're not writing yourself a ticket.)

duke lax & a-rod

http://www.kansascity.com/sports/columnists/jason_whitlock/story/1175681.html


Posted on Sat, May. 02, 2009 10:15 PM
JASON WHITLOCK COMMENTARY

Roberts’ book on A-Rod should be questioned

Not long ago, sports writer Selena Roberts compared the Duke lacrosse players to gang members and career criminals.

She claimed that the players’ unwillingness to confess to or snitch about a rape (that did not happen) was the equivalent of drug dealers and gang members promoting antisnitching campaigns.

When since-disgraced district attorney Mike Nifong whipped up a media posse to rain justice on the drunken, male college students, Roberts jumped on the fastest, most influential horse, using her New York Times column to convict the players and the culture of privilege that created them.

Proven inaccurate, Roberts never wrote a retraction for the columns that contributed to the public lynching of Reade Seligmann, Colin Finnerty and David Evans.

Instead, she moved on to Sports Illustrated, a seat on ESPN’s “The Sports Reporters” and a new target, baseball slugger Alex Rodriguez.

Last week, the New York Daily News and The New York Times acquired “leaked” copies of Roberts’ soon-to-be-released biography, “A-Rod.” In it, according to the two New York newspapers, Roberts paints a highly unflattering picture of Rodriguez as a human being and, among other things, speculates that Rodriguez used steroids in high school.

Roberts’ speculative opinions are deemed as so credible by ESPN and others that the Worldwide Leader ran all-day updates stating that Selena Roberts believes that it’s “irrefutable” that Rodriguez used performance-enhancing drugs while a teenager.

At no point did ESPN’s TV anchors or radio broadcasters mention that Roberts was the same person who led the media charge against the Duke lacrosse players. I listened to Roberts’ interview on Dan Patrick’s radio show. Patrick never asked her about Duke lacrosse or why we should trust her reporting.

In its news story about her book, The New York Times failed to allude to her position on the Duke lacrosse case. I’ll give the Times credit for including one sentence of clarification in its news story:

“Some of the accusations in the book are based on anonymous sources, and others are simply presented as knowledge the author has without an explanation of how the information was obtained.”

Translation: the majority of the stuff written in her book is information the National Enquirer might reject.

The national media anti-snitching campaign is twice as pervasive and effective as anything put together by the Bloods, Crips and LAPD. For the most part, we refuse to squeal on each other.
Roberts’ book is a long-winded blog. Why it’s being treated as an unimpeachable piece of journalism can only be explained by the cushy position she’s been handed by The New York Times, ESPN and Sports Illustrated and the unchallenged institutional bias found within the elite sports media institutions.

Like the Duke lacrosse players, the elite media have decided that Alex Rodriguez is fair game for abuse. Rules of fairness do not apply.

In a rush to prove its racial even-handedness, the media initially chose to swallow the accusations of a black stripper over white college students. Roberts and others made fools of themselves. They were given the leeway to do so only because lacrosse players aren’t part of the NCAA money-making machine and unlikely to be future subjects of high-profile stories.
The players were convenient, vulnerable targets.

So is Rodriguez. Like Barry Bonds, A-Rod is a threat to surpass Babe Ruth (and Hank Aaron) on the home run chart. A-Rod, a Dominican, is the dominant player in a sport that is almost solely analyzed and defined by white American sports writers and broadcasters.

It is not a coincidence that Bonds and Rodriguez have been portrayed as the worst teammates in the history of professional sports while Rogers Clemens’ and Mark McGwire’s teammate shortcomings were largely overlooked. When Clemens skipped games and road trips it was because he was a dedicated family man rather than a bad teammate.

I am not asserting a nationwide racial conspiracy against minority baseball players. I’m in no way stating that Roberts’ pursuit of Rodriguez is motivated by race. I’m asserting that the media’s unwillingness to publicly and aggressively challenge itself breeds unequal and unfair coverage.

We all have biases that must be contested. We’re all capable of getting swept up in the biases of our peers and friends.

The allegations in Roberts’ book might very well be true. But I’m not going to trust her, not without some on-the-record reporting, not after what she wrote about the Duke lacrosse players.


To reach Jason Whitlock, call 816-234-4869 or send e-mail to jwhitlock@kcstar.com. For previous columns, go to KansasCity.com.