RealClearSports: Michael Vick Will Be Back

By Art Spander

He will be back. Whether we like it or not, Michael Vick again will be in the NFL, again playing football, again making a big salary, again being chased by linebackers and by autograph seekers. Success trumps morality.

These are the words and phrases too frequently heard and seen the last few days: He has paid his debt to society. Everyone deserves a second chance. He has learned his lesson.The question is, have we learned our lesson? And will we ever learn it?

Do attributes such as being able to throw a football or shoot a basketball take precedent over a value system? When do we stop giving in to our urge to be champions? When do we judge an individual on the way he or she treats others, or treats animals, rather than simply on athletic talent?

Losing is the great American sin. John Tunis wrote that. He was a Harvard grad, a journalist and then, before and after World War II, an author of juvenile sporting fiction. But that’s no childhood hypothesis from Tunis.

We will do virtually anything, and use virtually anyone, to win.

The way the St. Louis Rams used Leonard Little after he was convicted of manslaughter when, his blood level far above that of intoxication, Little crashed his SUV into and killed Susan Gutweiler in 1998.

He got 90 days in jail, four years probation and a spot in the starting lineup for a Super Bowl. Six years later he was acquitted of driving while intoxicated.

Leonard Little killed an innocent victim, if unintentionally. Michael Vick killed innocent dogs, and it was intentional. He was sent to prison. As we are well aware from television coverage worthy of the appearance of a head of state, Vick has been released to home confinement.

The commissioner of the NFL, Roger Goodell, told us, “Michael’s going to have to demonstrate to myself and the general public and to a lot of people, did he learn anything from this experience? Does he regret what happened…”

I regret what happened. I have two dogs. Bless the beasts and children. Vick and his cronies tortured the beasts. That’s not nearly as terrible as what Leonard Little did. Or is it?

The disturbing part of Vick’s over-publicized release from Leavenworth Prison to home confinement was the way it was analyzed. Not in how he should be judged as a person but only as a football player. “Four teams could use him,” was one of the reports.

He’ll play. Goodell, wisely, will refrain from making a decision on allowing Vick to rejoin the league, waiting while Vick offers contrition, while groups such as the SPCA or Humane Society monitor his supposed progress.

Eventually Michael Vick will return as much because he might help some team win a title as because we are a forgiving nation.

Two viewpoints on Vick’s possible reinstatement were in Sporting News today. “Let me put it this way,” said Paul Hornung, the onetime all-pro for the Packers and a Heisman Trophy winner. “I love dogs. If I was commissioner I’d be a lot tougher on these guys … I just don’t think he should get in.”

That Hornung was suspended the 1963 season for gambling is an issue that may or may not be relevant.

Ted Hendricks, a linebacker who along with Hornung is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, said of Vick, “He’s paid his debt to society, so I think he should be reinstated. I’m sure he’ll be an asset to whoever signs him.”

Of course. Or no one would sign him.

If Michael Vick were an ordinary player, all this would be moot. Except for the dog fighting, which is both despicable and illegal. But Vick was the first player taken in the 2001 draft, a quarterback who can run as well as pass, a quarterback who can make a difference.

Vick is special. That with his talent, fame and wealth he needed to find enjoyment from an activity in which helpless animals are set upon each other is beyond the understanding of most of us.

Humans make mistakes. That we do comprehend. Yet there’s difference in going 50 mph in a 35 zone and in operating a dog-fighting network over a period of five years.

Michael Vick will be back. He’ll say the correct things and do the correct things. Roger Goodell will approve reinstatement and some team that figures all it needs is Michael Vick to get to the Super Bowl will sign him.

I’ll grit my teeth and wish him well.

As a reporter since 1960, Art Spander is a living treasure of sports history. A recipient of the Dick McCann Memorial Award -- given for his long and distinguished career covering professional football -- he has earned himself a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And he has recently been honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the PGA of America for 2009.

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http://www.realclearsports.com/articles/2009/05/michael-vick-will-be-back.html
© RealClearSports 2009

RealClearSports: A Collision, Not a Dance

By Art Spander

The game is portrayed as one of elegance and grace, ballet in Nikes. In truth, pro basketball is a contact sport, with huge men crashing into each other, shoving and pushing. They’d just as soon knock down an opponent as they would knock down a jumper.

We weren’t sure what to expect when the Lakers met the Denver Nuggets on Tuesday night. Other than there would be a lot of fouls. Oh, and that the Nuggets would try to intimidate a Laker team that had everyone bewildered. Including the Lakers themselves.

A few weeks ago, in our usual rush to judgment, and with our monumental impatience, the NBA finalists had been decided, at least by people who have nothing better to do than express opinions.

It would be the Cleveland Cavaliers against the Lakers. It would be LeBron James against Kobe Bryant. It still might be, although we are less sure. And to hear Kobe talk after the Lakers staggered past the Nuggets, 105-103, in the opener of the Western Conference finals, maybe the Lakers also were less sure.

Although the win, which seemingly halted the problems and the doubts created when the Lakers at times lacked direction and maybe lacked a little heart, probably changed everything.

Had the Nuggets been up 1-0 after a game on the Lakers’ home floor, they would be in control. Jack Nicholson and the other swells in the $2,500 courtside seats would be distraught. But it’s the Lakers up 1-0, winning a game of floor burns and bruised bodies, if not of bruised egos.

“They outplayed us,” said Lakers coach Phil Jackson, “and we won the game.”

Unlike a couple of those miserable performances against the Houston Rockets in the last series, when the Lakers needed the entire seven games to beat a team without its two main men, Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming.

The Lakers won because they have Kobe Bryant, who scored 40 points, 18 in the fourth quarter. And because they have Trevor Ariza, who in the closing seconds made a steal that showed anticipation as well as agility.

They won despite Carmelo Anthony, who scored 39 for the Nuggets.

This is what you expect from the big ones, your best players at their best. And so it was with Kobe and Carmelo. One would score. Then the other. Bryant courageously tried to stop Anthony on defense.

“He’s a bull,” Bryant would say in interviews carried on ESPNEWS.

A few days ago, after they had beaten the Rockets by 40 at home, the Lakers lost to the Rockets by 15 on the road. The probable matchup against the Cavs and LeBron seemed as far away as Mars. The sharp knives were out, wielded by critics who justifiably thought the Lakers caved in.

Even Kobe on Tuesday night felt compelled to use the word “capitulated,” indicating he was no less disgusted than the rest of us.

There was no capitulation against the Nuggets, who, while a lesser team than the Lakers, have the paranoia necessary to want to succeed. Denver is out to show something. The Lakers, on the other hand, are mostly worried about showtime.

The Lakers are more than L.A.’s team, they are L.A.’s focus. There’s no pro football franchise, if you don’t count USC, albeit many people do. There are only the Dodgers, Manny-less at the moment but still winning, and the Lakers, a team of stars and of the Hollywood stars. Along with Nicholson, Denzel Washington, Drew Barrymore and Justin Timberlake were in attendance.

Every time the Lakers are on the court, especially postseason, it’s less an athletic contest than a production number. You think the reviews were tough for “Angels & Demons,” check them out after the Lakers have a bad night. The water cooler talk about Tom Hanks is no less catty than it is about Kobe or Pau Gasol.

Kobe is The Man. As opposed to The Manny. Bryant had his own troubles six years ago, but those are a distant memory. Now Kobe is an MVP. Now Kobe is a savior.

“I could score 35 a night if I want, but that’s not something I’m concerned with,” he said without bragging. “I want to win a championship. Tonight, it was something we needed, but that’s not my goal.”

Jackson, the Lakers coach, agreed. “We had very little else going for us besides Kobe,” he insisted. “And at the end when we needed a basket he muscled his way through.”

In pro basketball, you get physical or you get beat.

As a reporter since 1960, Art Spander is a living treasure of sports history. A recipient of the Dick McCann Memorial Award -- given for his long and distinguished career covering professional football -- he has earned himself a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And he has recently been honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the PGA of America for 2009.

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http://www.realclearsports.com/articles/2009/05/lakers-nuggets-collision-not-dance.html
© RealClearSports 2009

SF Examiner: Niners’ season could hinge on QB decision

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

SAN FRANCISCO — In May, we ask about September, about the 49ers, about the most important of positions, about  the quarterback. In May, we wonder who will be starting when the season is starting.

That’s the issue as the Niners hold a minicamp, or what in NFL newspeak is labeled an “OTA” (organized team activity).

That’s the issue, who plays quarterback for the franchise of quarterbacks, the franchise of Frankie Albert, John Brodie, Joe Montana, Steve Young and Jeff Garcia.

Mike Singletary is a defensive guy, a Hall of Fame linebacker.

Singletary is a slug-it-out guy, who played for the Chicago Bears, a slug-it-out team.

“We will go out and hit people in the mouth,” Singletary promised in October after his first game as the then interim coach.

Maybe that works here by the Bay, maybe not.

We’re used to passes, short or long. We’re used to offense. We’re used to a quarterback who does more than hand-off.

So who’s that quarterback? Shaun Hill, the undrafted overachiever who doesn’t so much win games as he does from keeping the Niners from losing them?

Or from off the scrapheap, Alex Smith, the first man taken in the ’05 draft who for various reasons — injuries, coaching switches — has done almost nothing?

Does Hill, who we’re told is more caretaker than offensive innovator, become Singletary’s choice to keep the game under control?

Or does Smith, healthy again, get the opportunity to show the reason he was selected ahead of every other player then available?

“We’re all communicating,” Singletary said of players and staff. “They’re going to tell us when that decision needs to be made. They’re going to compete.”

The Niners brought in free-agent Kurt Warner for a visit after the Super Bowl, even after Singletary fired offensive coordinator Mike Martz, who years ago with the St. Louis Rams built the offense, the “Greatest Show on Turf,” which made Warner a star.

Warner never was going to join the 49ers. He re-signed with the Arizona Cardinals, the NFC champions.

So do the Niners believe in Hill or in Smith? Or in neither? Do the Niners, with their seventh offensive coordinator in seven years,Jimmy Raye, feel confident Hill, who spent seasons on the Vikings’ bench or Smith, who got trashed by former coach Mike Nolan, can make a losing team a winner?

“They’re competing not so much against each other,” Singletary said in one of those coaching comments that bewilders more than it explains, “but against the best quarterbacks in the league.”

Not until one of them is named starter. Not until the games begin.

“Coach Singletary is a fiery guy,” Hill said about the coach’s displeasure with the way both he and Smith performed in the first day’s workout, “and he obviously holds the quarterbacks to a high standard.”

A standard maybe neither QB reaches, although one of them will be reaching for the football from behind center.

“At the end of the day,” Singletary said, “we’ll know when that decision needs to be made, and we’ll do it.”

And we’ll hope they’ve done it correctly.

Art Spander has been covering Bay Area sports since 1965 and also writes on www.artspander.com andwww.realclearsports.com. E-mail him at typoes@aol.com.

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http://www.sfexaminer.com/sports/Spander-Niners-season-could-hinge-on-QB-decision-45456527.html
Copyright 2009 SF Newspaper Company 

Giants needed a win against the Mets and got one

SAN FRANCISCO – The Giants needed to win it. Nothing could have been more obvious. We didn’t need the observation from manager Bruce Bochy on that necessity, although we had it.

“Some games are bigger than others,’’ said Bochy, defying the baseball axiom that 162 times a season nothing varies, “and we needed to win this ballgame.’’

Which they did win. Showing poise. Showing skill. Showing the rest of us, the doubters, that while they’re not going to be winning any championships, as long as the Dodgers keep scoring runs in bunches, the Giants will be a presence. Four in a row they had lost, one to the Washington Nationals and then, through various methods, the first three of a four-game series against the New York Mets.

Four in a row, and Bochy sighing, “The last thing you want to do is get swept at home.’’

And because of Matt Cain, and a couple of double plays, one with nobody out and the bases loaded in the second inning that went first baseman Travis Ishikawa to catcher Bengie Molina to Ishikawa, it would be the last thing.

Against a team that had scored 24 runs in the previous three games, against a team that starting back in 2008 had beaten them eight consecutive times, the Giants on Sunday evening stopped the Mets, 2-0, before a third straight sellout crowd, this announced at 43,012.

They tell us you never know what you’ll see at the old ballgame. What we saw was the Mets getting no runs while their pitcher Mike Pelfrey got called for three balks, the most by any pitcher in the big leagues in 15 years. The first two balks were in no small part responsible for each of the Giants’ runs.

“That was a break for us,’’ said Bochy.

So for two consecutive weeks, the Giants have been at .500 or above. That wouldn’t have been the situation with another loss. They were 18-18 before the first pitch. Now they’re 19-18. Now closer Brian Wilson’s nightmares are squelched. Now the Giants once more can believe in the pitching upon which they must rely. Or haven’t you seen the batting averages?

Yes, Pablo Sandoval, who had a first inning single, was balked to second and scored on Bengie Molina’s single, is at .314. And Molina, the rock, is hitting .304. But Eugenio Velez, who led off and played second, is at .111. And Nate Schierholtz is .217. And Ishikawa is .236. And Aaron Rowand .248. And Randy Winn .255.

If it is to be done, it will be done by pitching, and so Sunday, when the game-time temperature was 76 degrees and ESPN was carrying the telecast, it was done by pitching.

Mostly by Cain. Then Bob Howry. Then Jeremy Affeldt, who stopped a possible eighth inning rally by striking out Gary Sheffield and forcing pinch hitter Angel Pagan to hit into a double play. Then, at last, by Wilson, who after disintegrating on Thursday and Friday had a perfect ninth.

“We dodged a couple of bullets,’’ agreed Bochy. “Couple of huge double plays saved us. We played well defensively. Matt worked hard the first couple of innings, and he got through it. He kept his composure and made pitches. I wasn’t sure in the second we were going to get six out of him.’’

In the second, you couldn’t be sure you were going to get two out of Cain. He walked the bases loaded with nobody out. Then the double play. Then a groundout by Pelfrey. Then a sigh of relief.

Cain had thrown 49 pitches by the time the inning closed. “But he’s a horse,’’ said Bochy.

Rachel Alexandra? Mine That Bird? This was Cain’s Derby and Preakness. If he couldn’t go wire-to-wire, he could go 119 pitches, go through six innings, go far enough and strongly enough to improve his record to 4-1 with a 2.65 earned run average.

“This game was huge for our team,’’ said Affeldt. “Matt did everything. His pitching kept us in the game, and he had a big hit.’’

That came in the fifth. Rowand was on third after a single, Pelfrey’s second balk and a groundout by Ishikawa. Bochy, knowing Cain is good bunter, called the suicide squeeze. Rowand took off, but Pelfrey’s pitch dove so severely that Cain could just knock the ball foul.

With the count 3 and 2, Cain had to swing, not bunt. He swung and lined a single to left, bringing in Rowand.

“Matt Cain doesn’t panic,’’ said Affeldt. “When you needed what we needed, he gave it to us.’’

Cain said he tried to keep his emotions in check. “When you get into the situations I put myself in,’’ he said, “you have to stay calm. It worked out great.’’

After four straight losses, it was about time.

Newsday: Sheff leads Mets' hit parade to support Santana

BY ART SPANDER
Special to Newsday

SAN FRANCISCO -- The story keeps getting better, for Gary Sheffield, for the Mets. The man who was unwanted the first day of April now is described as the man who has given character to a team criticized the previous two years for lacking it.

Three in a row for the Mets over San Francisco. Yesterday, when the fog was absent and the temperature reached the high 70s by the bay, the Mets pounded the Giants, 9-6, before another sellout of 41,336 at AT&T Park.

Three in a row, 11 out of 13, and Mets manager Jerry Manuel talking not about what but how, about the "little things,'' primarily from Sheffield.

"Our biggest at-bat'' is what Manuel said of Sheffield at the plate in the first. There already were two runs in, Carlos Beltran having doubled home Luis Castillo and Alex Cora.

"Sheff gives himself up,'' Manuel said. "He went the other way, to the right side. He got a base hit anyway, but I thought that set the tone for us for the whole game.

"If we're able to play that type of game and run and have occasional power, then we can be a pretty tough team.''

They've been a problem team for the Giants, taking eight straight from San Francisco dating to 2008.

This one was supposed to be a battle between historic lefthanded pitchers: the Mets' Johan Santana and the Giants' 45-year-old Randy Johnson, with his 298 wins. "It was special to go against him,'' said Santana (5-2, 1.36 ERA), who finally allowed an earned run after 221/3 innings.

For the Mets - who had 16 hits, 11 off Johnson (3-4) in four-plus innings - it was special the way they went after the 6-10 lefthander.

With Carlos Delgado on the disabled list and Jose Reyes still nursing a sore calf, the rest of the Mets finally gave Santana some support. Beltran had three hits and three RBIs. David Wright had three hits and three RBIs. And Sheffield, who was released by the Detroit Tigers on March 31 and joined the Mets on April 3, had three hits.

"Leadership?'' Manuel asked rhetorically after someone tossed in Sheffield's name. "When he does what he did today, when he's the number four hitter and sacrifices himself, that's what you're looking for in leadership.

"I think this is where he's been all his life, handling responsibility. But the thing I have to be careful of - he's kind of in the evening of his career, so to speak - is to give him days off, make sure he's fresh. That's going to be a big key for us.''

Wright has nine RBIs in the series, which ends Sunday. He said he's getting good pitches to hit. That's because of the guy who precedes him in the lineup: Gary Sheffield.

"He's got some huge hits for us,'' said Wright, who has 27 RBIs, one fewer than Beltran. "He provides a presence in the middle of the lineup, provides a presence against lefthanded pitchers - and righthanders, too. One swing of the bat if the pitcher makes a mistake, and he knows the ball is going to leave the yard.''

Through a career that has taken him to Milwaukee, San Diego, Florida, the Los Angeles Dodgers, Atlanta, the Yankees, Detroit and now the Mets, the 40-year-old Sheffield has hit 501 home runs, two in 2009.

"But seeing a number four hitter, a future Hall of Famer, trying to advance a runner,'' Wright said, "makes us understand we should expect that type of play from everybody.''

The Mets, who have scored 24 runs in the series, led 3-0 after one inning. The Giants got an unearned run in the third and two runs, one of those unearned, in the fourth to tie. But 10 men batted for the Mets in a four-run fifth in which they had six hits, including an RBI double by Beltran, a two-run double by Wright and an RBI single by Ramon Castro. Castro had another RBI single in the ninth, and even Santana had a hit.

Said Manuel, "We've gotten everybody involved.''

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http://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/ny-spmets1712777030may16,0,641613.story
Copyright © 2009, Newsday Inc.