So apparently Reggie Bush broke the rules. He took some money he shouldn't have from some people he shouldn't have been talking to. Now he's probably going to be stripped of his 2005 Heisman Trophy. This is all in addition to Southern California being forced to forfeit 14 wins - including a BCS National Championship - and being banned from participating in any bowls for the next two years.
Many writers much more influential and significant than myself are championing the NCAA's decision to crack down on USC. Punish the cheaters, they cry! Make them into an example! Well, that's all hogwash. We don't need to crack down on liars and cheaters - we need to embrace them. Cheaters are the backbone of sports; without them, we wouldn't have enough players to field teams, coaches to scream at them or executives to run the whole thing. I'm sick of reading articles that praise good guys and fair players; those guys aren't what American athletics is all about - they should just all pick up hockey sticks and move to Canada, where their accountability, geniality and responsibility will be appreciated. We need to start honoring the tricksters and the liars, the ones we cheer for, pay money to go see and are willing to turn a blind eye toward as long as they keep scoring touchdowns and hitting home runs. Win at all costs - that's the American way. Cheaters and liars are just the people who want to win more than anything - aren't those the type of athletes we should be writing about?
I want more stories about how Bush and the entire Trojan athletic department blatantly disobeyed NCAA rules. So Bush took some money. Who cares? Did that money help him gain 2,611 all-purpose yards and 18 total touchdowns during his three seasons? Did that money help him push Matt Leinart into the end zone at Notre Dame that helped seal yet another BCS Bowl berth? What about last season's star tailback, Joe McKnight? Sure, he was driving a Land Rover when most of his contemporaries are driving 1999 Hyundais, but did that supposed gift from a booster help him rush for more than 1,000 yards and eight touchdowns? So he took a car. I bet no one at USC cared, as long as they kept singing "Fight On" after each win. Oh, and I don't just want to hear about Trojan football either - keep telling me about how basketball coach Tim Floyd was accused of paying money to ensure star O.J. Mayo would take his talents to Los Angeles and lead the Trojans to the NCAA Tournament. Who needs morals when you can have championships instead?
Those are the guys I want to hear about. I don't care about kids like Zach Nash, a 14-year-old Wisconsin golfer who disqualified himself after winning a tournament. Nash accidentally played the round with a friend's club still in his bag from their hang-out the night before. After another friend pointed out the violation, Nash disqualified himself and sent back the winner's medal. Listen up, idiot: If you want to make it in American sports, this stuff ain't gonna fly. You gotta be selfish and place winning above everything else. Nash should have just paid off the guy who noticed the violation and gone right on his way to the next tournament. Come on, kid, don't you know Nike only gives sponsorships to the golfers who win, not the honest ones?
Are you angry at all the steroid-users in Major League Baseball? Stop whining and embrace them. Without steroids, the past decade of baseball might not even have existed. Baseball would have been ruined after the 1994 strike if not for the steroid-aided home run chase in 1998. Look up and down your team's roster: Chances are, there are quite a few users hidden among those names. Didn't we all cheer when players like Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez and Rafael Palmeiro were hitting home runs? These guys are our heroes! Moveover, Babe and Hank, our generation of sluggers makes you look like the No. 9 hitter on the Roxbury Little League team. I don't want to hide these players under some asterisk or black mark; I want them back on the front pages, just like they were during their glory days. These guys were winners, and they deserve to be praised. Among the three of them alone, there are 10 MVPs and 8,608 hits. They sacrificed their own bodies and the sanctity of the game to set records, win games, bring fans to the park and make money. What's more important than that?
The public needs to stop being so self-righteous. It needs to stop living in the past. John Wooden might have been a great coach and an even better man, but he wouldn't last a day in modern athletics. This is a guy who once turned down his dream job as coach of University of Minnesota because he gave them a deadline to contact him that the school didn't reach. The reason they didn't reach it? A snowstorm had knocked out the school's power. Still, Wooden refused to break his promise to UCLA and left his dream job on the table. In today's sports, we have guys like Nick Saban and Lane Kiffin. Coaches who promise that they're in for the long haul and then leave before you can refresh ESPN.com. These coaches left losing teams to run top 25-ranked college programs. Trade in mediocre finishes for bowl games and millions of dollars? Heck, Kiffin even has a couple of recruiting violations on his r
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