Profiles In Sportsmanship
Published by Al Adomite on June 20th, 2008
In the past two months, I’ve run across two starkly different stories about sportsmanship. The first, a wonderful - now legendary - story about how two Central Washington womens softball players carried Western Oregon senior Sara Tucholsky around the bases after she blew a knee in between first and second in a game that Central Washington would eventually lose. ESPN documented the story in this video “Touching Them All“.
Well, that’s the good side of sportsmanship. Unfortunately, ESPN’s Rick Reilly writes about the bad side today, courtesy of a Georgia High School State Championship Game:
So now it’s the bottom of the fourth, with Ethan playing short and Cody on the mound. The catcher is Matt Hill. There are no outs. The count is 0-1. Cody winds up and flings a very high, very hard fastball. Hill comes out of his squat, puts his glove up to catch it, then does a very funny thing.
He doesn’t.
Instead, the YouTube video will show, he drops to his knees before the ball gets to him. Doesn’t even try to catch it. Just flops to his knees, with his head looking down at the plate. Never looks up or back. The ball, meanwhile, conks umpire Jeff Scott square in the face mask. Rocks him back. Then squirts up the third-base line.
Pitchers beaning umpires is a dangerous instance that you only hope doesn’t get mimicked. Read the full story and you can only hope the consequences for the catcher show that no one found the point funny.
Two very opposite stories about sportsmanship, respect for the game, and hard work rewarded and thrown away.
Filed under Breaking News
June 20th, 2008 at 9:29 am
It is amazing what some idiots will do for a moment of attention.