Nothing But Iron: White Washed October 28, 2005 by Steven R. Lagman, M.D., C.A.S.W. Yes, the Badgers beat a beleaguered Purdue, and did it with this new-fangled thing called Defense, but that is not the story of the week. True, BCS computers spit out Texas as the latest greatest team in college football, but that’s not it either. That the White Sox are World Series champs is newsworthy, but Chicagoland’s first title–sorry Cubs fans–in 80-some years is not the news. No, this week’s big news was that Houston fielded the first World Series team since 1953 without a single black player on the roster. The article was written by AP baseball writer Ben Walker and printed prominently in the sports section of the Wisconsin State Journal. Not one to just believe everything I read, I went to the Astros web site and looked at the player photos. Sure enough, except for a number of dark-skinned guys from places like Venezuela and the Dominican Republic, the team was pretty much baseball’s equivalent of a freshly-painted picket fence. At first I thought Walker’s effort was just another small-minded intolerance-enhancing exercise in racial sensationalism. After further deliberation, a little research and a couple beers, I realized that the piece might have actually contained some legitimate sportswriting. I say legitimate because it turns out that the Astros are not the only team without black players, which is mounting evidence of a conspiracy. Conspiracies, overt, implied or just plain manufactured, are fair game for sports articles. Besides that, I thrive on sarcasm. Equally shocking is that the problem doesn’t even end with baseball. NASCAR is simply awful. I could find internet evidence of just one black driver in all of NASCAR. If I were a black race car driver, instead of an off-brown minivan driver, I would be at least as upset as Joe Morgan is about baseball. I also learned, after checking with my relatives in Manilla, that the Filipino national soccer team has no black players either, or at least none with African descendants. Team officials there said they had "a good reason" for the lack of black representation, so I did not pursue it further. Don’t get me started on polo or bocce. My knee jerk assumption was that Houston has no black players because the Astros organization doesn’t like black people, which, I suppose doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, given the emphasis on winning these days. Said another way, it would be hard to imagine the Astros not signing just about anyone, even an orange-skinned hermaphrodite with six arms, if that player would have helped them reach Game 5. Walker did allude to another plausible explanation for the phenomenon: black kids are just not interested in baseball anymore, so the pool of eligible players is smaller. If that’s true, this may not about racism, but sportsism–blatant discrimination against baseball by black children, who openly eschew our nation’s beloved pastime for flashier, faster-paced, swoosh-laden (some would say more fun) sports like basketball, football, track and field and, who knows, probably even dodge ball (where not prohibited by schools for liability reasons), la crosse or ultimate Frisbee. It appears that conspiracy itself may wear the mask of diversity. On the other hand, having once languished in right field as the grass grew outlines around my idle feet, and having recently been a youth baseball spectator, suffering through half-innings lasting thirty minutes, two batting orders and a unit of blood pilfered by insatiable mosquitoes, I can see the conspirators’ side of it. Let’s not forget that one of the games in this World Series ended about the time kids of many different skin colors had to get up for school. My own kids, one dark-skinned and one light-skinned, have played entire basketball tournaments in that span of time. By the way, how controversial, or at least privately amusing, would it have been if the White Sox had been the team without a black player? In any case, I do hope to see more sports articles where skin color is a central theme. If we should ever disregard the many trivial ways in which people are different, we could suddenly find ourselves emphasizing our many similarities, and that would lead to . . . well, harmony, I suppose. I don’t think the world is ready for that. Speaking of color, could the Green and Gold be any more Black and Blue? It’s hard to imagine, isn’t it. You have probably given up on Green Bay, but I say the loss to the scandal-laden Vikings on a last-second 900-yard field goal marks the beginning of one of the NFL’s most stunning turnarounds and the crowning glory of a suddenly shrewd Ted Thompson. Weeks from now, we will scratch our heads and talk about our team using phrases like smoke and mirrors and diamonds in the rough. Andrae Thurman will become a household name like Brett Favre and Clorox. Even if I don’t really believe all that, I do believe the Packers will win again. Maybe not this week against Cincinnati, or even next week hosting the Steelers, when I take my friend Brent Feller to his first-ever Lambeau game, but some time, somewhere, the Packers will win again. And when they do? They will have two wins. Many of you will tell me that the steep price of the Lambeau tiramisu (not sold in stores) entitles me to boo my team, but I would no sooner boo even a woeful bunch of Packers, as I would my aunt, Granny Mae Parker. Granny Mae was once strong and proud, until, at the age of 89, she was nearly killed competing in a skateboarding tournament. Now she is frail, meek and tentative on the board. When I visit her, I show gratitude for the many times she thrilled and inspired us with her half-pipe heroics, not to mention appreciation that she never did anything illegal or immoral on a cruise boat. I never once chided her for being a shell of her former potent self. It is my believe that Granny Mae will rise again. And so it will be with our Packers. I am embarrassed to admit another prediction failure–a grossly-miscalculated vision of the UW-Purdue game. Like everyone else, including those of you who won’t admit it, I bought into the strength-on-weakness method of prognostication, popularized by BCS computer nerds and ESPN television analysts, which yielded 123 points for the over-under. I failed to take into account the unpredictable nature of large college kids. I got over my ineptitude, as well as the UW defense’s propensity to allow yardage and third-down conversions, quickly enough as I cheered for Roderick Rogers and Jack Ikegwuonu as they took turns returning interceptions for touchdowns. Somewhat troubling were the struggles of the Badgers offense against one of the most statistically retarded defenses in the country. I would like to predict that this Saturday’s Illini will be the perfect antidote to that, but I had better refrain. I’ll comment on the booing of Barry Alvarez’s decision to run out the clock at the end of the first half, with the score tied. My comment is: Duh. Not duh to Alvarez, but duh to the 10's of thousands of disgruntled fans–teachers, plumbers, doctors, lawyers, refuse collectors, students majoring in botany, landscapers, restauranteurs, retirees, police officers and the like, who thought they new better the best coach in UW football history. At the time the Boilermakers were collecting first downs like special prosecutors collect Republicans, and the UW offense was in the midst of its worst half of the conference season. In this case patience was a virtue. O.K. I lied. The real big news of the week was that Kelly officially turned 40 on Thursday, but she doesn’t want to dwell on that, since this occasion has been recognized at least a dozen different times since September, the most creative of which was a series of phone calls from her older sister Erin, who, on Kelly’s birthday, called, laughed and hung up. Kelly’s friends treated her to a surprise celebration at the Smiths & Co. tailgate. (They had hoped to reserve a cruise boat on Lake Mendota, but "guests" from Las Vegas could not get timely flights into town.) Monique Scher designed and distributed tie-dye shirts bearing the Lagman 40™ logo. Mary Jo Tillquist brought a delicious Who-Doesn’t-Like Ice Cream Cake™ adorned with a fire-marshal’s citation worth of candles, which Kelly extinguished in a single breath, save for three recalcitrant flames, which succumbed quietly to a secondary puff. With that many candles, Hurricane Wilma might not have faired any better. As a seasoned veteran of 40-something birthdays, I have this advice for Kelly: 1) It’s only a number. Substantial number, yes, but only a number. 2) The people who tease you do so because they think you are just as old as they are now. You are not. They will always be older. 3) In six years Erin will be 50. I’m guessing you will recognize that milestone with a laugh or three. 4) Good friends, loving family and older husbands, make you feel younger. ______________ Nothing But Iron is an amateur sports column. This issue is dedicated to Kelly during her birthday month. The author thanks Kelly’s friends for planning her celebration; he appreciates the Badgers for winning in her honor; and he admires readers who are strong-minded enough to not be offended by his satirical treatment of worthless sportswriting like that of Ben Walker, who can’t possibly be that hard up for material. ©2005 DrTM Enterprises. All rights reserved.