Like most Americans, I have never seen one bit of live Tour de France coverage, and I figured interest for the Tour this year would have to be its lowest since the pre-Lance era, given Floyd Landis' incredible fall from grace and his perpetual state of denial over his obvious cheating en route to victory last year. Well, there still seems to be a decent amount of interest for the Tour in this country, but it's for all the wrong reasons. Cycling team Rabobank pulled Tour leader Michael Rasmussen from the race after he "was linked to 'incorrect' information that Rasmussen gave to the team's sports director over his whereabouts last month. Rasmussen missed random drug tests May 8 and June 28, saying he was in Mexico. But a former rider, Davide Cassani, told Denmark's Danmarks Radio on Wednesday that he had seen Rasmussen in Italy in mid-June." I was thinking real hard to make a joke about Danish people going to Italy, but there's nothing really funny about that, unfortunately. It's a shame Denmark can't be like, you know, an actual country. They're a poor man's Sweden when you factor in the Scandanavian roots.
Before I ramble too much, let me get to the point: the team, not the governing body of professional cycling (be it the International Cycling Union or whomever), dismissed its best rider on the very good chance that he was cheating, and did so while he was just days away from the finale in Paris. That's incredible! I almost wonder this kind of action is unprecendated--probably not in Europe, but most likely in this country. (Although I suppose T.O. being dismissed from the Eagles would count, but that wasn't for steroids, it was, you know, for being himself.)
Rick from Deadspin made a great observation about the breaking news under the "About Last Night" column, saying that kicking Rasmussen off the team is "kind of like suspending Bonds while he's rounding the bases." You know what? That is a fantastic idea. Picture the scenario: moments after Bonds hits #756, word reaches the Giants clubhouse that the slugger will be indicted the next day, and he is indefinitely suspended from baseball until a verdict is reached.
The problem is, Bud Selig would never, EVER have the cahoneys to pull that off. It's his critical flaw: whereas David Stern may come off as too aggressive, Selig seems about as indecisive and passive as you could get as an executive leader in the public eye (and he'd look much worse if not for Gary Bettmann). The 2002 All-Star Game was a perfect metaphor for Selig's inability to make strong and clear decisions on major issues throughout his tenure: unable to take a stand against Donald Fehr, unable to speak out clearly on steroids in the game (until the federal government intervened), unable to decide whether he should show up to see Bonds break the home run record.
Another news bit making the Internet rounds this morning is this LA Times article in which Bonds calls Bob Costas a "midget" as a result of Costas interviewing Curt Schilling and "the clear" chemist Patrick Arnold. As you can guess, Schill and Arnold don't say the most pleasant things about Barry. Then again, no one has nice things to say about Barry anymore.
Bud Selig, do the right, decisive thing: make like Hank Aaron and blow off Barry. Fox already did a great job lionizing him during this year's All-Star Game (and boy was that disgusting), and there's no need to do it again.
Who knows? Maybe after this whole mess is finished, Bonds will fade into the same limbo where Mark McGwire presently dwells. We certainly won't miss him.
No comments:
Post a Comment