The Guardian is wondering...

“Why is Colin Kaepernick still unsigned?”

That's not hard to answer. He engaged in political grandstanding while on the job and wearing the uniform of his employers. That's not a legally protected form of freedom of speech. If you choose to do that sort of thing, there are likely to be consequences. I know that if I did something like that I would have been sacked on the spot and quite correctly. This has nothing to do with the correctness (or lack thereof) of the message he was trying to communicate. It has to do with respect for your employers and maintaining a professional deportment when you are on the clock and wearing the company uniform. If you want to protest something, you do it on your own time and in your own clothes.

From here.

Athletes and their private lives

Christopher Johnson over at MCJ has noted that a certain college football player, and presumptive candidate for the NFL draft, has gotten into the news after confirming some rumors about his personal life. My take...

Whatever. I suppose there is valid a reason for making a public statement. There were rumors floating around and he didn’t want the National Enquirer staking out his apartment with photographers. I can understand that. But now that it’s on the record, any further mention of this young man in the press or media should be solely with regard to his abilities and activities on the gridiron.

Quote of the day... (from a Seahawks fan)

Here in the land of gentle whale watchers, granola-eating earthy crunchies, metrosexual jammie clad health care discussers, soppy gay wedding sentimentalists, intense Janeane Garofalo lookalikes in hornrim glasses, passionate advocates for polymorphous perversities, fanatical recyclers, Unitarians in blocky African wooden jewelry and Birkenstocks leading bake sales to fund the library, chainsaw artists, bicyclists filled with snooty contempt for petrochemical consumers, New Age crystal gazers with 35,000 year old spirit guides helping them with their investment decisions in aromatherapy corporations, Pike Place fishmongers, gritty Indie bands, hipsters conducting their entire romances by tweeting partners of indeterminate gender from two tables away at the Starbucks on Aurora and 220th, Prius dealers offering cars with the Obama sticker pre-applied, parents placing their three year olds in high-intensity courses to groom them for executive positions at Microsoft and Nintendo, damp and dispirited Metro riders waiting patiently for winter rain to turn to spring rain like cattle waiting for nothing in particular… well, we appeared to the scions of cowpokes and painted ladies to be…. soft.

Read the rest here.
HT: Deacon Greg

Texas cheerleaders fight for biblical banners at football games

A group of Texas high school cheerleaders is at the center of a spat over religious speech after the school district told them they had to stop using Christian-themed banners at school football games.

The large signs, carried onto the field at Kountze High School, included messages such as "I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me" and "But thanks be to God which gives us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ," according to a report by NBC Dallas-Fort Worth.

Kevin Weldon, superintendent of the Kountze school district, about 85 miles northeast of Houston, informed the cheerleaders’ parents Tuesday that the religious banners would not be allowed, the station reported.

Read the rest here.

George Orwell and the N.C.A.A.

On Monday, the National Collegiate Athletic Association made a remarkable — and disturbing — decision. As one of the sanctions against Pennsylvania State University, it determined that all of Penn State’s football victories from 1998 to 2011 were to be “vacated.” Whoosh! As a result, Joe Paterno no longer holds the major college coaching record for career wins. Someone else now has that honor. George Orwell would be amused.

In his magnificent dystopia, “1984,” Orwell understood well the dangers of “history clerks.” Those given authority to write history can change the past. Those sweat-and-mud victories of the Nittany Lions — more points on the scoreboard — no longer exist. The winners are now the losers.

One might wonder whether the N.C.A.A.’s rush to judgment — a rush that ignored its own procedures of examining each case through the sanctions committee — was truly necessary. And one might question a set of sanctions whose human victims were not involved in the crimes. But let us put aside these niceties. Surely Penn State the institution deserves sanctions for the deplorable actions of authorities. Sometimes organizations are treated as people.

The more significant question is whether rewriting history is the proper answer. And while this is not the first time that game outcomes have been vacated, changing 14 seasons of football history is a unique and disquieting response. We learn bad things about people all the time, but should we change our history? Should we, like Orwell’s totalitarian Oceania, have a Ministry of Truth that has the authority to scrub the past? Should our newspapers have to change their back files? And how far should we go? Should we review Babe Ruth’s records? Or O. J. Simpson’s? Should a disgraced senator have her votes vacated? Perhaps we should claim that Joe McCarthy actually lost his elections. Or give victory to John Edwards’s opponent?

Read the rest here.

NCAA Slams Penn State With Crippling Sanctions

The NCAA on Monday announced a series of unprecedented sanctions against the Penn State football program for its involvement in the sexual abuse scandal that centered on former coach Jerry Sandusky.

The penalties include a $60 million fine, a four-year postseason ban, an annual reduction of 10 scholarships over a four-year period and five years of probation.

Read the rest here.

NCAA Prepared To Impose Severe Sanctions On Penn State

It looks like the NCAA is getting ready to come down hard on Penn State in the wake of the child molestation scandal. IMHO it would have been better if Penn State showed some class and voluntarily shut down their football program for a few years while they get their priorities straight. On a positive note though, at least one prime symbol of Penn State's idolatry has come down.

Conflicting reports on Joe Paterno's health

There are several reports that long time Penn State football coach Joe Paterno has died of lung cancer.  Other sources are reporting that while he has taken a sharp turn for the worse he is still alive...

Penn State Sacks Paterno and Spanier

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. - Penn State trustees fired football coach Joe Paterno and university president Graham Spanier amid the growing furor over how the school handled sex abuse allegations against an assistant coach.

The massive shakeup Wednesday night came hours after Paterno announced that he planned to retire at the end of his 46th season.

But the outcry following the arrest of former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky on molestation charges proved too much for the board to ignore.

One key question has been why Paterno and other top school officials didn't go to police in 2002 after being told a graduate assistant saw Sandusky assaulting a boy in a school shower.

Source 

(Note: This is breaking news and the text at the linked site is likely to change.)

Late, but at least they did it.

Penn State: Paterno to retire at the end of the season

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. - Joe Paterno, the Penn State football coach who preached success with honor for half a century but whose legend was shattered by a child sex abuse scandal, said Wednesday he will retire at the end of this season.

Paterno said he was "absolutely devastated" by the case, in which his one-time heir apparent, Jerry Sandusky, has been charged with molesting eight boys over 15 years, including at the Penn State football complex.

He said he hoped the team could finish its season with "dignity and determination."

The trustees could still force him to leave immediately. It also could take action against the university president, Graham Spanier. Spanier will either resign or be voted out by the end of the day, the Express-Times of Lehigh Valley reported.

Paterno said the school's Board of Trustees, which had been considering his fate, should "not spend a single minute discussing my status" and has more important matters to address.

Read the rest here.

NFL Owners Bank on Players' Profligacy

When NFL owners read the opposing defense, they see an obvious soft spot in the line: the free-spending, high-living ways of more than 20 percent of the league’s players.

Though a lockout has been threatened for years — and despite an apparent rise in the number of football stars safeguarding their millions — roughly 380 of the NFL's near 1,700 players still live paycheck to paycheck, according to financial experts familiar with the league.

“Therein lies the leverage these owners have to potentially use as an excuse to force the Players Association … to sneeze first,” said Reggie Wilkes, a 10-year NFL linebacker and now a financial adviser who preaches “lifestyle management” to more than 20 NFL clients. “If (union chief) DeMaurice Smith doesn’t have guys saving their money, it’s going to be difficult for them to withstand a potential lockout.”

Many players are "going to be hurting," agreed New York Jets linebacker Bart Scott, 30, a Wilkes client. Scott, who stands to earn, or lose, $6 million next season, is frugal by NFL standards, driving his 2002 Lincoln Navigator “into the ground” and purchasing a $700,000 home — relatively modest by football star standards. Scott said some “young guys” in his locker room “see what the older guys have, and they’re not there yet. They’re trying to catch up and keep up with the Joneses” by buying $2 million mansions.

Read the rest here.

Another great story about Troy Polamalu

The most famous Orthodox Christian in Pittsburgh, if not the nation, has a greeting for his fellow believers today:

"Kala Christougena!" said Steelers safety Troy Polamalu. That's Greek for "Merry Christmas!"

Mr. Polamalu and his wife, Theodora, actually celebrated Christmas 13 days ago, but they keep the same Orthodox traditions as those who observe today. Most Orthodox celebrate on Dec. 25, but many Slavic churches tie liturgy to the old Julian calendar, which is 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar. The Greek Orthodox Church and some others have adopted the Gregorian calendar -- except at Easter.

"We all celebrate Easter on the same day," said Mr. Polamalu, 29. Orthodoxy is the Eastern wing of the earliest Christian church, which split into the Orthodox and Catholic churches in 1054.

He and Theodora converted to Orthodoxy about five years ago. His background was Catholic and Protestant, hers Muslim and Protestant. They were Christians in search of a deeper, more consistent experience of God.

"Orthodoxy is like an abyss of beauty that's just endless," he said. "I have read the Bible many times. But after fasting, and being baptized Orthodox, it's like reading a whole new Bible. You see the depth behind the words so much more clearly."

Read the rest here.

A Defensive Anchor Walks a Spiritual Path

PITTSBURGH — Steelers safety Troy Polamalu opened his red leather-bound playbook to a dog-eared page. “The life of a man hangs by a hair,” he began reading in a voice as soft as falling snow. “At every step our life hangs in the balance.”

It was three days before the Steelers’ A.F.C. divisional playoff game against the Baltimore Ravens, a matchup in which the Super Bowl aspirations of two worthy contenders hang in the balance, and Polamalu was getting himself centered.

“How many millions of people woke up in the morning, never to see the evening?” Polamalu read. And then: “The life of a man is a dream. In a dream, one sees things that do not exist; he might see that he is crowned a king, but when he wakes up, he sees that in reality he is just a pauper.”

The book in Polamalu’s hands, “Counsels From the Holy Mountain,” guides him in football and in life. It contains the letters and homilies of a Greek Orthodox monk, Elder Ephraim, whom Polamalu described as his spiritual doctor.

Polamalu, 29, sought out the octogenarian monk, who resides in a monastery in southern Arizona, a few years ago, a meeting that led Polamalu to the place he described as “heaven on earth.” It is a summit of sorts. But not the Super Bowl, though Polamalu won two championship rings in his first seven seasons with the Steelers. Neither of those journeys shaped him as profoundly as the pilgrimage he made to Mount Athos, a Greek Orthodox spiritual center in Greece.

Read the rest here.