Led by a blossoming Max Smith at quarterback, the Wildcats bought themselves — and their coach some much needed breathing room last week.
Well, it’s been a much more peaceful week among Wildcat faithful, free of all the handwringing and prophecies of doom that circulated around the football program after the opening loss to Louisville. The problem is that since I wasn’t able to listen to (much less host) last week’s edition of First State Financial Sunday Morning Sports Talk (9 am-Noon Sundays on NewsRadio 630 WLAP), I have no idea if that’s due to apathy, Kentucky fans obsessing over a pair of bizarrely scheduled exhibition basketball games or if Kentucky’s win last Saturday over Kent State has bought the team – and head coach Joker Phillips a week’s worth of breathing room.
I hope it’s the latter. It SHOULD be the latter (although I honestly fear it’s the basketball game thing). Yes, the Kentucky win was only over Kent State — a lowly MAC team, but if you followed the (for entertainment purposes only) line and the overall mood of the Kentucky faithful, it was a big win for Kentucky. Picked by 7 points at home, Kentucky beat a MAC school the way you’d expect an SEC school to beat a MAC school – by 33.
Don’t get me wrong, the win didn’t eliminate questions about the Cats. They did still give up 409 total yards to that MAC team. That said the defense held the Golden Flashes scoreless for the last 22 minutes, something that seemed implausible regardless of the opponent after a Traiyon Durham touchdown run for Kent cut the UK lead to 17-14 in the third quarter. So did the defense figure something out or did Kent wear down? If the defense did figure something out, will it stay figured out this week? If Kentucky has had one major issue consistently over the last five or so years, it seems like it has been carrying momentum over from one week to the next. They’ll have to do that today against Western Kentucky.
Last week Western didn’t have a single three and out series against Alabama; and, well, Alabama. That said, they also didn’t score. This isn’t the same Western offense that featured Bobby Rainey at running back a year ago. And while Kentucky clearly isn’t Alabama defensively, I think we all believe they are a fair amount better than the Austin Peay team (from the Football Championship Subdivision) that Western ran over in week one.
I don’t have questions about the UK offense. Max Smith is developing into a star. Don’t take my word for it. Ask former Kentucky quarterback and current graduate assistant coach Andre Woodson, who raved about Smith this week. He’s completing 73% percent of his passes (up from just over 50% last year) and has already thrown for 634 yards. The only thing you’d like to see Smith do better at this point is hit a deep route. He’s oh-for-the-season in that department. He throws the ball too well for that statistic to last.
The running game found some form last week behind big runs from Raymond Sanders, finishing with 185 yards as a team. Was some of that the Kent defense getting worn down? Maybe, but the yards count just the same.
Bud Dupree and the Kentucky defense stabilized in the second half against Kent.
Beyond that the offense, which was near the bottom of the national statistics in plays of over 20 yards last year, scored from more than 30 yards out three times a week ago.
Even with the win over Kent State and the relative peace in Wildcatland, the dynamic for Kentucky – especially for its coach is no different than it was a week ago. Watching this Kentucky team play – especially on offense – it is clear that the Cats have some outstanding young players. If Joker Phillips wants to be around to coach them, he needs to win games like today’s against the Hilltoppers. At its best Kentucky has very little margin for error in an average football season. The Cats have to win non-conference games and hope they can get two wins in conference to go to a bowl. With the loss to Louisville, that math only gets them to five wins, which depending on how Kentucky competes with its SEC opponents may be enough to keep Phillips around another year (and it should). A loss puts the season into panic mode.
Finally, I hope Joker and the staff played the “they supposed to be SEC” clip from last year’s broadcast on a constant loop this week – in the weight room, in the training room, in the study hall, at team meals. Even though they eked out a win last year against Western, Kentucky players should see that and be embarrassed. If you hope to play football with the big boys, you can’t be getting legitimately smack-talked by a Sun Belt team. Not even a good one.
If the Cats have made the progress I think they have in the last two weeks it shouldn’t be an issue tonight at Commonwealth.
Cats by 13.
Looking Ahead
How many times will John L. Smith make this face this season?
Before the season started, I mentioned on the show that there was a chance that by the time Kentucky saw highly touted Arkansas in Week 7 (Oct. 13) that the Hogs could be in complete disarray and ripe for the picking. Is there any doubt that’s the case after last week? Arkansas lost its starting quarterback (at least for the time being) and eventually lost the game to Louisiana-Monroe (we all know how that feels, right?). And while ULM may be a good team (as of this writing they are hanging with Auburn), they still shouldn’t match up with an Arkansas team player-for-player. If we learned anything at Louisville, it’s that following Bobby Petrino and coaching a team he recruited isn’t the easiest thing in the world to do. And current Arkansas head coach John L. Smith didn’t even change the offense. This could be an issue Arkansas has all year long.
Programming Note
Win or (God forbid) lose; join me, Larry Vaught and Anthony White tomorrow on First State Financial Sunday Morning Sports Talk from 9 am-Noon on NewsRadio 630 WLAP and wlap.com. We’ll talk all about the game and what’s next for the Wildcats. We’d love to have you join us.
I think I only watched</> Castaway because there was a ball in it. I got confused and thought it was sports.
As I mentioned a couple of months ago, I’m terrified of flying. It’s why I don’t watch TV shows about plane crashes or movies that involve plane crashes (although I did watch Cast Away. I have no explanation for this.). I figure if I convince myself that I’ve never seen one happen, I can pretend that they don’t exist, get on the plane, believe in telekinesis and get where I need to be.
After early afternoon football viewing, I’m afraid I may have to extend my “no plane crash shows” rule to a “no teams Kentucky plays” rule.
I entered this season – and last week’s game against Louisville – with a great deal optimism. I gave Kentucky a chance for somewhere between five wins and seven with seven on the VERY optimistic side. That said three of those wins (even to get to five) were against Louisville (already lost), Western Kentucky (next week’s opponent) and Mississippi State.
It’s Mississippi State that has caused today’s consternation. I watched almost their entire game this afternoon, and either Auburn is really bad, or Kentucky is in big trouble on October 6. I’m REALLY hoping it’s that Auburn is awful.
The Bulldogs’ offense honestly isn’t anything to write home about, but they gashed the Auburn defense on simple runs many times. Unless Auburn’s defense is worse than what Kentucky showed against Louisville (and that hardly seems possible), Miss State could feast on the ground against UK.
The Bulldog defense was just as impressive in holding Auburn to just 216 total yards, but that may be because Auburn quarterback Kiel Frazier kept throwing the ball right to them.
That brings us to Western Kentucky. Sure, they’re getting housed by Alabama today, but they did gain 15 yards on one play at one point. Even as good as the UK offense looked at times last week, how many times did they gain 15 on a play…and, you know, Alabama. (By the way, being in Bowling Green at game time and watching WKU fans flood restaurants decked out in Hilltoppers gear to gather to watch their team get drubbed was borderline inspirational. I hope it’s like this when my beloved NKU Norse tip off their first Division I basketball season later this year.)
The truth is it may not matter for the Cats by October 6 when Mississippi State gets to town, or next week against Western for that matter. If Kentucky doesn’t win and win big tonight against Kent State, the howls for head coach Joker Phillips’ job will be deafening. I shudder to think what it would be like should UK lose. A lot of people (me included on First State Financial Sunday Morning Sports Talk) said that last week was maybe the most important game of the Phillips era. I no longer believe that, only because in the situation Phillips finds himself in, whatever game he’s playing immediately becomes the most important.
Joker Phillips may need his team to make the kind of surge that Rich Brooks’ 2006 team made it Phillips hopes to coach here in 2013.
Mark Story of the Lexington Herald-Leader wrote a great column early this week talking about how Joker likely needs a 2006 Rich Brooks-level rally to maintain his job. That year I remember calling Ryan Lemond on what is now Big Blue Insider on NewsRadio 630 WLAP (before I worked for the station) before the third game of the season (Ole Miss) that if Kentucky didn’t win that game, Brooks was as good as gone. Kentucky won that one two weeks after getting dominated by Louisville in the opener (sound familiar) and went on to beat South Carolina, Georgia and Vanderbilt to reach the Music City Bowl, starting a run of five straight Kentucky bowl appearances and making Rich Brooks a legend in Lexington.
The problem for Joker is that with this defense, I just don’t think this team has that kind of run in it. It’s shockingly hard to win if you can’t stop anybody. After the debacle at Louisville, coaches talked about the defensive problems being alignment and assignment issues. The undercurrent being that they were problems that could be corrected. I think to a certain extent, I’d rather have them say Kentucky got physically whipped. Sure it’s unlikely to get better, but it doesn’t paint a picture of a team that doesn’t know what to do when it hits the field.
I am a big Joker Phillips fan. He’s a UK alum and his love of the university and the football program are undisputable. After seeing Max Smith and the offense last week, I’d be inclined to bring him back next year regardless of outcome if it were my decision to make. However, he’s paying the price for the well-documented vanishing recruiting class of 2009 that has left Kentucky thin at important positions (yes, I know he was the recruiting coordinator then. Calm down). Unfortunately, without big results when they are “expected” – starting with tonight against Kent – and some surprises down the road, that may not be possible. And having seen one of those “surprise win” teams play today, I am much less optimistic about the Cat’s chances as the season goes on.
Programming Note:
I am in Bowling Green for the Special Olympics Kentucky State Softball Tournament, so Ryan will be sitting in with Anthony White on Sunday Morning Sports Talk tomorrow. If you’re interested in seeing what Special Olympics is all about, I will be calling two games on the Special Olympics Kentucky On-Line SOKY TV outlet.
I like to think that as a Kentucky man and a former Louisville coach Howard Schnellenberger can understand how I feel.
I have a confession to make. It turns out that even I can only manage so much sports hate, and it seems that I don’t actually hate Louisville, at least not unconditionally.
Maybe it’s my age, but since my college fandom pre-dates any meetings between Kentucky and Louisville, I don’t have the same animosity for the Cardinals that I have for, say, the Michigan Wolverines and for professional teams like the Cleveland Browns, Pittsburgh Steelers, Baltimore Ravens (old Browns — hahahahahahahahahaha) and the Los Angeles Dodgers (the Reds’ rivals of my childhood). In fact, my first college football game wasn’t a Kentucky game, but a Louisville game at Cincinnati’s Nippert Stadium. I cheered for Howard Schnellenberger and Browning Nagle against Alabama in the Fiesta Bowl. I really liked Denny Crum’s basketball teams through the 80s.
And it’s not like I’m not capable of finding hate in my little sports heart for a new rival. Since Major League Baseball pissed away decades of history and realigned into three ludicrous divisions (not to mention adding interleague play) and separated my beloved Reds from the sub-human Dodgers, I have learned to hate the St. Louis Cardinals just as vehemently as I ever hated Ron Cey, Davey Lopes and Steve Garvey (as a catcher Yeager was exempt from all hate and I try not remember that current Reds manager Dusty Baker was on those teams).
I just can’t seem to work up a good, solid, consistent, hate-filled lather for Louisville.
Oh, there have been (and continue to be) times when I have hated Louisville football and basketball, and I’m sure there will be more in the future. It’s just that my hatred of the college Cardinals is more personality-driven. I can’t stand Louisville basketball now — not because I dislike them in general, but because I can’t stand Rick Pitino, and not because he left Kentucky and went to Louisville. I honestly couldn’t wait for him to leave Kentucky when he was in Lexington, both for the way he handled Rod Rhodes (a move he has repeated endlessly at Louisville) and for his constant denial of NBA interest like everybody in Central Kentucky was stupid.
If you didn’t like the 1980s-era Louisville basketball teams, you don’t like basketball. Just stop watching.
And oh how I hated Louisville football during the Bobby Petrino era. And I don’t just now think he’s a jerk after his flameout at Arkansas. I sort of feel sports hipsterish about my Petrino loathing. The first time I ran across him (at a press conference for a Governor’s Cup Classic golf outing) he just oozed jerkishness. It wasn’t Elliot Uzelac-level jerkishness to be sure. I mean, he never yelled at me, but it was jerkishness just the same. When Petrino left (under cover of darkness or whatever), my Louisville hatred waned (because hating a Steve Kragthorpe-coached Cardinals team would be like hating puppies or some other harmless thing).
Here’s the thing. Just because I don’t spend all my time obsessing over how much I “hate” Louisville, it doesn’t mean I don’t desperately want Kentucky to win Sunday’s football game. I do. And I really believe that they can. I explained why last week in my post relaying my increasing optimism about this season. If anything’s changed since then, I have only gotten to be more hopeful about the upcoming campaign. Here’s a quick recap.
1) Maxwell Smith: He was the better Kentucky quarterback last year and he’s a year farther along in the program now. If you aren’t excited by everything you hear about him out of the UK camp – from both players and coaches – then you don’t want to be excited.
2) The receiving corps: Embarrassed by last year’s performance and joined by some players of the playmaker caliber they lacked a season ago, expect them to be greatly improved.
3) The offensive line: Healthy
4) Overhyped opponents: I don’t buy that Louisville and Vanderbilt have somehow gotten so far ahead of Kentucky that those aren’t games Kentucky can win. I watched most of the South Carolina-Vanderbilt game. Nothing either of those teams did – other than one hit that drew a penalty – was all that impressive.
I can’t wait to see what happens Sunday.
Look how many people it takes to hold that damn thing up.
Me and the Governor’s Cup
Believe it or not, I actually know what it feels like to lift the Governor’s Cup. Once upon a time I was one of the first people to lift the trophy. During my years working for Host Communications (now IMG College, which runs the Big Blue Network) I was one of about four people to help carry the trophy into a photo shoot for the cover of the first Governor’s Cup game program. It was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. Imagine dropping that bad boy a month before the game. Plus it is danged heavy. An old Trivial Pursuit question claimed that the Davis Cup was the heaviest trophy in sports. I have to believe that was written before the Governor’s Cup came into existence.
Saturday night one of the aging heroes of American sports showed off his arm. No, I’m not talking about Roger Clemens. I’m referring to defending Sprint Cup champion Tony Stewart’s epic helmet toss after being involved in a wreck with Matt Kenseth at Bristol Motor Speedway.
The incident was reminiscent of a similar altercation between Robby Gordon and Michael Waltrip several years ago at New Hampshire.
So, the question is, who threw it better? Take a look:
Tony Stewart:
Robby Gordon:
What do you think?
One the toast of the cycling world and the media, Lance Armstrong has now been embattled for as long as he dominated
Photo by Getty Images
So Lance Armstrong has given up his fight against the US Anti-Doping Agency regarding alleged use of performance enhancers during his seven-year run as the Tour de France champion. In his statement following his decision not to go to arbitration with the USADA Armstrong continued to proclaim his innocence, branded the investigation a witch hunt, invoked his hundreds of negative drug tests and insisted his decision to discontinue the battle was based solely on fatigue from years of fighting.
There are plenty of questions about what’s going on with the USADA. And while Armstrong has clearly made some powerful (as well as pathetic – I’m looking at you Floyd Landis and Tyler Hamilton) enemies over the years, he maintains some powerful supporters – namely the international and US cycling federations, who both backed Armstrong in his Federal lawsuit against USADA that was recently thrown out, although the judge in the case expressed some sympathy for Armstrong’s predicament.
Regardless the end result will be that the USADA will declare Armstrong guilty and it is likely that his Tour titles will be officially stripped, although no matter what you have read to this point that hasn’t happened yet. The USADA – regardless of what it says – lacks that authority. The International Cycling Union (UCI) will have to do that, and to this point UCI chief Pat McQuaid has backed Armstrong.
This whole long, sordid episode ends in two competing realities. The first is that Armstrong – despite his protests – likely is guilty. The second is that doesn’t matter if he is.
Look, I get that he’s never tested positive –the standard acclamation of the most fervent Armstrong supporters. He could test negative 500 more times and I wouldn’t care. To believe that Armstrong wasn’t involved in blood doping is to believe in the Tooth Fairy. Armstrong was the most unbeatable competitor in the world’s dirtiest sport over a seven year span. To accept that he wasn’t involved in the filth is to believe that Sammy Sosa could go from a skinny, speedy gap hitter to one of the greatest power hitters baseball has ever known merely by taking vitamins. It requires the same level of suspension of disbelief that was required to accept that Keanu Reeves was a nuclear physicist. Sorry, I can’t do it.
By 1998, the idea of Popeye-sized Sammy Sosa bunting was hysterical.
I just don’t care that he did. Cycling — especially road cycling to me – is different than baseball or even track. The route for the Tour and other major races changes every year. Nobody ever says, “(Insert cyclist name here) just completed the fastest Tour de France in history.” Why? Because the overall time isn’t linked to any significant historical marker. That’s a huge departure from baseball and track, where every player, every accomplishment is measured against not only those in that day’s game, but every other feat in the sport’s history. Sosa or Ben Johnson being dirty matters in the scheme of the greater history of the sports; not so with Armstrong.
The other reason is problematic for me as a parent. It centers on the “everybody was doing it” concept that I consistently tell my kids isn’t a good enough reason to so much as cross the street. But the reality is that everybody – or almost everybody – WAS doing it. So in the context of the seven Tours he won, Armstrong remains the greatest cyclist of both those races and of his era of domination. Among those “cheating” Armstrong was still the best trained, strongest cyclist with the best tactics. In a world where everybody was likely “cheating” Armstrong won his races in a way that amounts to fair and square.
But the well-documented Armstrong story goes far beyond the cycling. Whatever the USADA says, and whatever the UCI decides to do (and they will almost have to officially strip the titles), nobody can alter the Armstrong back story, nor should anybody try to. Armstrong’s personal defeat of a devastating cancer will always be real. The inspiration he’s provided to countless other cancer patients will always be of both great comfort and value to those his experience inspired through their own fights.
I’m no huge Armstrong fan (although I admittedly did get caught up in his Tour run). Other than his appearance in Dodgeball, he doesn’t come off as a very endearing figure and is usually described as kind of a jerk. But in the end, both on the bike and off, the question of did he or didn’t he – which will likely never truly be answered – doesn’t matter in the least.
Reds rookie Todd Frazier — in line to get cheated out of Rookie of the Year honors by Bryce Harper — has kept the Reds in first place and caused a wave of optimism to sweep over me — well, except as it pertains to the Rookie of the Year race.
By nature, I’m not prone to fits of optimism. If you’ve spent more than three minutes listening to First State Financial Sunday Morning Sports Talk (9 am-Noon on NewsRadio 630 WLAP in Lexington) or spent more than 10 seconds around me, this will come as no surprise to you. So you can imagine my surprise when I woke up this past Sunday feeling good about three of my favorite — and largely downtrodden — teams.
Maybe it’s been spurred by this year’s resurgence of my first true love – the Cincinnati Reds. The Reds are having their best season since 1999. Since a knee injury sidelined All-Star first baseman Joey Votto threatened to derail the season, the Reds are 27-11, have the best record since the break and are a game and a half from having best record in the majors.
My euphoria at seeing my long-struggling Reds make a run at the World Series seems to have spilled over into my football fandom, as I head toward the first week of September with more hope than I would have imagined for both the Cincinnati Bengals and the Kentucky Wildcats.
The Bengals are coming off a rare playoff appearance (still without a playoff win in the Mike Brown era) and return a solid defense along with quarterback Andy Dalton who only made the Pro Bowl (even if it is a joke) as a rookie. He can only get better, right? I’d love to have had a little more stability on offense between last year and this year, but it didn’t happen and the Bengals will have to make the best of it.
Regardless, there are legitimate reasons for hope among Bengals fans, no matter how many times we’ve been tricked by hope in the past. I mean, we’re almost like that old Sam Kinison routine where love knocks on the door and says “I wouldn’t lie to you eight times in a row” (at the 3:24 mark) only to turn into a raging monster when the door is opened. I mean, it could happen again I guess. The Bengals could follow a playoff year with a 4-12 season (again), but here we are, expecting the best yet again and hoping that the team’s overwhelming Bengalness isn’t at the door when the team knocks on September 10.
It’s the budding optimism for the Wildcats that took me most by surprise. The Cats come off their worst season in the last seven, and they probably looked worse last year than their 5-7 record would indicate. And while that particular optimism may seem misguided, there are a couple of reasons that I feel better than I thought I would about the Cats as we head into 2012.
1) Max Smith: Did he struggle at times last year? Of course he did. He was a freshman. That’s sort of what they do. Struggles or no, he was more accurate than Morgan Newton last year, threw for more yards last year and had more yards per completion and attempt. And whether it’s true or not, it sure seemed like fewer of his passes hit the ground after they hit a receiver’s hands. Some of that is on the receivers, but (as Anthony White has mentioned on the show) some of it had to do with how easy the throws were to catch.
With another year under his belt, Maxwell Smith should lead an improvement in the Kentucky offense
I feel like we had seen the top of the Morgan Newton arc. Smith was better with less time in the program. With another full year in the Kentucky system he will only get better. Plus I believe he will have more help around him, which brings us to…
2) The receivers: There are a few of the same faces back from a receiving corps that didn’t distinguish itself last year until one of them played quarterback against Tennessee, but there are enough additions — as well as the possible reemergence of a key position — that I think there are reasons to be hopeful that the offense operates more smoothly this year. A more consistent Demarco Robinson, a healthy Daryl Collins and the reported emergence of freshman DeMarcus Sweat (and goodness knows this city loves its DeMarcuses) give the Wildcats playmakers they clearly lacked on the outside last year. Plus they may have pushed veterans E.J. Fields and LaRod King to step up their games.
I also liked what I saw from the tight ends during the Blue-White game this past spring. Tyler Robinson was probably the second most impressive player at the scrimmage (behind Demarco Robinson) in April and after putting a couple on the ground Ronnie Shields was also impressive. Robinson became my new favorite Wildcat between his work in the Spring Game and his post game interviews, and Shields is a freakishly gifted athlete who has the ability to pressure the defense deep from the tight end slot. Everybody that follows the Cats remembers what the offense looked like when tight end was a focus of the passing game here. It could be again this season.
3) The Schedule: No seriously. Are there games I would be drop-dead stunned if UK won? Of course. It’s still the SEC. A win over Florida would be a shocker (although this isn’t Steve Spurrier’s Florida) and a win over Steve Spurrier’s South Carolina Gamecocks would be an upset. But there are reasons for hope elsewhere. First, you are never going to convince me that a Louisville team that lost to Florida International a year ago and that struggled mightily against Kentucky last season before they were forced to bring in a quarterback and run an offense Kentucky had never seen has cruised past the Wildcats by as far as people seem to think they have. Kentucky was a fumble from tying that game. I’m supposed to believe that over the course of one offseason Louisville is suddenly light years ahead? Sorry, no sale. Arkansas should be good, but could be a mess. Kentucky should have beaten Mississippi State here last year. The Wildcats almost always play Georgia tough at Commonwealth. And James Franklin or no, I’m also just not buying that Vanderbilt should just roll out and beat Kentucky here.
So, we’re scared of Vanderbilt now? Really?
Could Kentucky go 3-9? Maybe, and part of me wouldn’t be surprised. But part of me also wouldn’t be surprised if they finished 7-5. I’m not sure what you’re used to, but around here that counts as a rosy outlook.
4) I bought season tickets again: I get regular e-mails on the show telling me that in just my second year as a season ticket holder that I have contract Season Ticketitis – a type of delusion that forces me to believe that Kentucky will be better than conventional wisdom allows. It’s apparently a defense mechanism to keep me from feeling like I had just lit a half of a trip to the beach on fire and watched it burn. Honestly, there may be something to that.
Sure there are questions about the defense (especially the secondary) and about the team’s youth, but until I see the team on the field – or at least until this next Sunday — I’m going to hold out hope.
This is the first thing I truly remember being terrified of.
What I remember most is the fear. I remember vividly the first thing I was ever conscious of being terrified of. It was a man in a mask on a balcony in Munich — not that I could have found Munich on a map. I think I was only vaguely aware that it was in then West Germany. In my defense, I was four.
The Olympic Games had been halted because Palestinian gunmen had sneaked into the Olympic Village and taken 11 Israeli athletes and coaches hostage, eventually killing them. When it was confirmed that all 11 were dead, late sportscasting giant Jim McKay, who was ABCs Olympics host, spoke the words that that he became as famous for as he was for the Wide World of Sports introduction, “They’re all gone.”
Odd, I guess, that I don’t remember the words. It’s the most famous line from the most infamous moment in Olympic history and it’s among the parts that don’t recall. Again, in my defense I was four.
I remember other things about those Olympics. I remember Mark Spitz getting Gold Medals, though I don’t remember any of the individual races. Then again, I was four. I remember being at the apartment of some friends of my parents after the Games had resumed. There was a boxing match on. I don’t remember the basketball controversy, though I know the story now.
But again, mostly I remember the fear. I remember being afraid of the guy in the mask. I remember being afraid of the guy in the hat. I remember looking around for them in different places, wondering if they would come get somebody else.
I also remember being afraid of gorillas for a long time. I blame McKay for that. Well, McKay and homophones, I guess. What can I say, I was four.
The fear left long ago, replaced with an understanding that those bad guys weren’t coming for me or anybody else. That and a fear of heights and clowns, but everybody should be afraid of clowns. Those things are creepy as hell.
Mark Spitz went on to win a then-record seven Gold Medals at a somber Olympic Games.
The guy in the mask stood on the balcony 40 years ago. The Olympics open Friday night for the tenth time since the tragedy in Munich and they’ll open without official mention of the incident. There will be no moment of silence hoped for by the families of the slain Israelis and called for by President Obama, Secretary of State Clinton and the German and Israeli governments.
International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge says that he doesn’t feel that the celebratory Opening Ceremonies are the appropriate venue for such a commemoration. He may have a point there. As somebody who has written a number of scripts for event openings, pre-games and the like, I can hardly disagree with him. Nothing takes the air out of the room like a moment of silence. After all, there will be other events. There will be a reception on August 6 in London and a memorial Rogge will attend at the airport where the hostages were killed on Sept. 5 – the actual 40th anniversary of the nightmare.
Another argument you hear against a moment of silence, or other recognition of the tragedy, is the cry not to politicize the Olympics. Never mind that a moment of silence would be to remember not so much a country as fellow Olympians – believers in the ideals of the Games who had come to compete in the Olympic Spirit. The “don’t politicize the Games” ship sailed ages ago. If not before, it definitely left the dock in Berlin in 1936. It sets off again each time a block of countries boycotts for one reason or another and each time that – like in 1936 – an oppressive regime is given the Games and uses them as an opportunity to tout its alleged softer side. Most of what made the Olympics a Cold War-era powerhouse was political – the seemingly never-ending conflict between the USA and its allies and the Soviet Bloc nations were must-see TV every four (and eventually every two) years until the Berlin Wall fell.
And then you get back to the fear. A moment of silence likely wouldn’t be well received by all in attendance, given the fact that one nation taking part has both called for the elimination of Israel and won’t allow its athletes to compete against Israelis.
Given the options, you would hope that the poor excuse of “it would ruin the party” really is the basis of denying the request for the moment of silence, because if that’s not it – if it really is about fear – then not much has changed in 40 years.
Here’s a fantastic video from Yahoo! Sports about the 1972 Munich Tragedy
