What is it with sports columnists? Columnists in general have a powerful tendency to get all moral on you over the oddest things, but this trait is near universal in the subspecies that covers sports. I could throw out some theories on this, having spent perhaps too much time reading columnists over the years, but it’ll be more fun to pick apart an example.
Today’s topic is a Folio Weekly column by one A.G. Gancarski in which the collective rap sheet of the University of Florida football team is lamented. I can’t find it online so I’ll deal with just a few snippets, because I damn sure ain’t going to type the whole tedious thing.
The column focuses on Gator Chris Rainey, who sent a text to a former girlfriend: “Time to die, bitch.” There’s some dispute about whether the “bitch” was in there, but let’s pretend it was. It allows me to imagine Gancarski fuming or sputtering or whatever he did to produce the column. Let’s go:
A few years back, when Ron Zook was the head football coach down in Gainesville, there were daily calls for his dismissal. His crime? Not winning enough.
You are correct, O scribe. Mr. Zook proved himself seriously deficient in leading his team to victories against other football teams.
Gators fans expected perpetual inclusion among the nation’s college football elite.
Yep, those Gator fans are pretty demanding. Win win win or else. I’m going to guess, based on the column’s subhead that mentions Urban Meyer’s “shameful legacy,” that you’re getting ready to set up some sort of comparison between Zook and Meyer and call for Meyer’s firing because of the 27,000 arrests of Gator footballers under his watch.
People occasionally text and say things they couldn’t possibly mean. Right? There are those who wonder when Rainey will be allowed back on the squad. When would be a good time to bring Mr. Time To Die back? How about never?
Mr. Time To Die? Really? I’m now rooting for Meyer (or “Urb,” as Gancarski calls him at one point) to reinstate Rainey simply on the remote chance that the TV announcers read this column and start calling Rainey Mr. Time To Die.
These guys get arrested for all kinds of crap – guns, drugs and whatever else they can get into, And we’re to assume these guys are clean, with regard to their performances on the field, given how many of them have serious ethical issues?
Hmm. My prediction that this will be a call for Meyer’s scalp isn’t looking good. But really, that’s where it seemed to be going. And as hacky and tired as that would have been, it’s better than throwing in, non-sequitur like, an insinuation that Gator players are using steroids.
If Mr. Time To Die
Again? You know, it’s starting to grow on me. It will be effing hilarious the third time.
is capable of sending that kind of text, of what else is he capable? Is he more likely to spend time in lockdown for assault or menacing, or to follow the steps of Tebow and Wuerffel? The answer may be obvious. Less obvious, though, is how good Gator fans feel about cheering for people like Rainey on a week-in/week-out basis.
Um, no. The second part is probably more obvious: Gator fans (good and evil) have no trouble cheering for their thugs. I know this because I’m the treasurer for the Good Gators Fans fan club (fans not included). We spend a lot of time feeding the homeless and reading to the blind to balance our karma, so we’re cool.
Time to die? Seriously.
Nope, even less funny the third time around. Also, why is he no longer a Mr., you rude bastard?
It’s time our culture of venerating or absolving scumbags because they wear our favorite team’s Chinese-made jerseys comes to an end.
This is just weird. Who gives a fuck where the jerseys come from? Or is Gancarski about to unleash some wickedly clever point tying together his earlier, now-neglected reference to Meyer, thuggish players and the rising Chinese threat?
But that studio gangsta bluster? That’s straight-up UF, as native to Alachua County as Gatorade and preachers on the make.
No, of course not: what was I thinking? This guy’s a sports columnist. So instead he makes a ridiculous point about gangsta bluster being in the Alachua County water, or something.
It’s all downhill for the Gators, even if no one wants to admit it yet.
(Hastily checking the current college football rankings.) Hmm, maybe ol’ A.G. is a seer. Florida is undefeated and ranked No. 7. Pretty sure no one wants to admit it yet.
No comments:
Post a Comment