Kick Out the Sports!
by Bob Cook
Bob Cook's weekly ruminations on sports appear Mondays in Flak.
I am the only sports columnist in America who is not going to write about Terrell Owens.
I will not discuss his contract dispute with the Philadelphia Eagles. I
will not take a stand on whether he has a right to hold out of camp one
year after signing a six-year, $42 million contract. I will not surmise
whether he was wise to fire his agent and retain the notorious Drew
Rosenhaus, considered by NFL general managers to be the evil incarnate of player representatives because he appears to be the agent for every player griping about his deal.
I will not blast Owens for his incredible ego. I will not rip his preening, his boasting, his showing off or his Sharpie. I will not ask who, other than Owens, spends his off-time lifting weights in his driveway, so the media can see. I will not bring up the incident when, as a San Francisco 49er, he celebrated a touchdown at Dallas by running to midfield, then stomping and spinning the football on the Cowboys' star. I will not consider it justice that Cowboys defensive back George Teague then decked him.
I will not call Owens a bad teammate. I will not declare that Owens has taken his quarterback, Donovan McNabb, and thrown him under the bus by referring to him as a "hypocrite," by saying he could never work with him again, by saying he'll never talk to him. I will not talk about Owens throwing any other teammates under the bus, because I hate that cliché.
I will not slap my forehead at Rush Limbaugh's declaration that he, the guy who lost his ESPN football gig because of racially tinged comments regarding McNabb, could be the one to settle the players' differences.
I will not call Owens a distraction. I will not wonder slack-jawed how Owens could stand apart from his teammates while they sweat and hit during the dog days of training camp. I will not celebrate Eagles coach Andy Reid for tossing Owens out of camp for a week because of his behavior. I will not contrast him with Hines Ward, the Pittsburgh Steelers receiver who also wanted to rip up his contract and start over, held out and then came back to camp after a heart-to-heart chat with his coach. I will not tell the Eagles that this day was coming the moment they signed him from San Francisco — after he weaseled out of a trade to Baltimore.
I will not state how Owens is emblematic of today's spoiled, pampered players. I will not rip today's players for their selfishness, nor will I praise those players who play the right way, because I hate that cliché, too. I will not point out that players have been selfish for years, with good reason, what with diabolical team owners ready to punt them for someone younger and cheaper at the first opportunity.
I will not aver that Owens is taking a principled stand. I will not point out that NFL contracts are not guaranteed, so that the first year's signing bonus is really the only money that matters. I will not demand that the Eagles redo his contract, given the risk he took by playing in last season's Super Bowl on an injured right ankle that only a month before required two screws and a
plate to hold it together. I will not chuckle that, on one good foot,
he was the best Eagles player in that game.
I will not rip the media for getting Owens wrong. I will not praise them for getting him right. I will not speculate as to why media on either side of the issue break with journalistic style and call him "T.O.," rather than his last name. I will not play on Owens' "T.O." sobriquet, coming up with hack witticisms like "to T.O.," which looks like "to to," and isn't that funny? I will not define "to T.O." as "to attract an unbelievable amount of attention in proportion to one's importance."
I will not decry the round-the-clock coverage of all things Owens as a sign of modern media's obsession with scandal and celebrity. I will not wonder why media organizations that somehow can't come up with money for hard-hitting news can cut a check for a helicopter to circle over his home.
And I most certainly will not write some sort of meta-column examining the whole Owens saga through some sort of ironic detachment.
No, you won't get a peep out of me about Owens. I'm staying out of this one. Not one word, no sir.
E-mail Bob Cook at bobc@flakmag.com.
