Unsportsmanlike Conduct?

Issue: Are you talking about the influx of penalties in the NFL?

Short Answer: I wish.

Reasoning: There is nothing more I hate than unsportsmanlike conduct penalties in the NFL, especially when it deals with celebrating.  The penalty can cost teams field position, points, and sometimes, games.  All this, because players want to make sure everyone out there knows it was ME, ME, ME that made that play.  I hate celebrations so much that I wish referees would flag players when they jump up and give the "first down" sign.  Hey, buddy, I watch football all the time, if you cross that imaginary line, I know it's a first down, I don't you need to tell me so.  Flag.  15 yards for being stupid.  Thanks.

Just two weeks ago in the Buffalo Bills Stevie Johnson caught a go-ahead touchdown against the New York Jets.  But, instead of being genuinely excited, he wanted to make sure everyone knew it was he who caught that touchdown.  So, he feigned shooting himself in the leg, a rather distasteful dig at Plaxico Burress.  Distasteful, but still, kind of funny.  But, Stevie wasn't done.  He then turned himself into an airplane, which flew a bit, and then crashed into the ground.  Maybe Stevie Johnson was absent the day they taught the rules at Buffalo Bills camp, but going to the ground in celebration is an automatic 15-yard penalty.  That meant the Bills had to kick off from the 20-yard line, which gave the Jets a short field.  Guess what?  The Jets drove, scored, and won.  Afterward, Johnson told reporters that he cost his team a chance to win.  Duh.  And it had nothing to do with a fumble or a dropped pass (although he did drop a potential game winner in the waning seconds of the game), it had to do with a selfish act that was blatantly against the rules.  Idiot.

I bring this up because, unless a player goes to the ground, there is some discretion involved in calling unsportsmanlike penalties.  There is a difference between "unsportsmanlike" and "raw human emotion".  Scoring a touchdown is an exciting moment, and when a player genuinely celebrates scoring, I have no problem with it at all.  When the Packers score and the players do the "Lambeau Leap", I love it.  That is true excitement for all, and it doesn't show-up the other team.  Occasionally the NFL gets the calls wrong, but they generally do a fantastic job at policing celebrations.  I can't say the same for Massachusetts high school football referees.  Wait.  What?  Massachusetts high school football has been more diligent in removing celebrations from their game.  They have a sportsmanship rule "that prohibits players from celebratory or taunting behavior while scoring a touchdown."  Fair enough.  I love it, in fact.  However, there has to be a line drawn somewhere.  You cannot expect a high school kid, who is breaking free to the end zone, in a state championship game, to not be excited about it.

Here is the scenario: Cathedral High School was trailing Blue Hills Regional Technical School 16-14 late in the fourth quarter of the Massachusetts 4A High School state championship game.  Cathedral quarterback Matthew Owens ran an option-keeper, which he broke for 56 yards and a touchdown.  He knew he was about to win a state championship, as he knew no one could catch him.  He raised his arm in celebration on the way into the end zone.  True, human emotion.  A ref threw a flag.  He invoked the "no celebration" rule, negated the touchdown, and, Cathedral ended up losing the game.  Cathedral's athletic director James Lynch summed it up perfectly: "I just give people the analogy: imagine a basketball player making a clutch three-pointer right at the end of the game, and he turns around and he just kind of shakes his fist in the air kind of thing...[a]nd it was simply just that and it was nothing else … I don’t think it was anything further than just excitement on the player’s behalf."  But, is there anyway we can make a decision about the egregiousness of the call without actually seeing it?  I'm glad you asked.  Cue the video!

One of the worst calls I have ever seen in my life, on one of the biggest stages.  This cost the team a state championship.  It will be almost impossible to overturn.  You can't now take away the championship from Blue Hills.  But, I would love to hear, from someone in a position of power in Massachusetts high school sports, that this was the wrong call, or at least a misinterpretation of the rule.  To top it all off, it seems as if the athletic director from Blue Hills, Ed Catabia, is a complete d-bag. When asked about the flag being thrown, Catabia responded that it was "a great call, the right call."  No.  It wasn't.  The fact that the call benefited your school with a cheap, tarnished state championship, doesn't make it the right call.  Dick.

Girls vs. Jesus

Issue: Do girls or Jesus cause more controversy?

Short Answer: Apparently Jesus does...

Reasoning: For those of you who did not, or do not, attend St. Xavier High School in Cincinnati, well, you are heathens.  I kid (sort of).  Seriously though, St. Xavier is a Jesuit, all-boys high school in the Queen City, which I attended many (many) years ago.  When I was in high school there, we sucked at football.  Now, St. X is a legitimate national power.  They have won two state championships since 2005, and sit at 3-0 this year.  St. X often finds themselves ranked nationally, right now sitting in the #16 slot (side note: Moeller High School is ranked #26, meaning the Greater Catholic League, a league with only 4 teams (Elder and LaSalle are the other two) has two of them ranked in the top 26 in the country, and all four schools are ranked in the top 9 in the state.  Not bad.).  So, Cincinnati was abuzz last Friday when the then #25 St. X Bombers (a private school) travelled to play the nationally ranked #22 Colerain Cardinals (a public school) in what turned out to be a phenomenal game.  What happened after the game, unfortunately, is what has been reported on more than the game itself.

Here is how the game ended: With St. X up 17-14, Colerain drove down to the St. X 28-yard line.  Colerain then set up to attempt a 45-yard field goal, which, for a high school kicker is not an easy kick.  But Colerain's kicker is one of the best in the city, so him making it was not even close to out of the realm of possibility.  Steve Specht, St. X's head coach, had a few tricks up his sleeve, however.  Right before Colerain snapped the ball for the field goal attempt, Specht called timeout.  When Colerain lined up again for the attempt, Specht called another timeout.  Colerain lined up, again, to attempt the field goal, and Specht called St. X's final timeout.  No use taking timeouts to the locker room, right?  Finally, after three straight timeouts, Colerain lined up for the kick, and missed.  St. X wins.  You can imagine how upset the Colerain players, coaches, and fans probably felt at that very moment.  The Colerain student section then decided they didn't like to lose, and let the St. X students know that "WE'VE GOT GIRLS!!!"  In retaliation to that, the St. X student section let loose with "WE'VE GOT JESUS!!!"  Colerain head coach Tom Bolden didn't like that too much, broke out of the team huddle, and proceeded to chastise the St. X student section.  My question is: Why?

Let's take a look at both chants.  "WE'VE GOT GIRLS," is unoriginal at best.  Chants like this were going on when I was in high school and probably decades before that.  Opposing schools lock on to the one thing that is clearly different about St. X, and go with it.  The implication here is that if you go to school with all boys, then you are clearly a homosexual.  Which, when we are talking about high-schoolers, seems like an awful thing to be chanting about at a football game.  There are all-girls schools in Cincinnati too; do you think they hear chants like "WE'VE GOT BOYS!!!" at their sporting events?  I should think not.  However, as a St. X student, you understand why opposing schools chant what they chant, and you deal with it.  The problem is, St. X students are not allowed to chant things that make fun of other schools (e.g., "THAT'S ALRIGHT, THAT'S OK, YOU'RE GONNA WORK FOR US SOMEDAY!!!"), as the administration will not allow it.  So, the St. X students chanted "WE'VE GOT JESUS!!!"  This chant is clearly original, and, well, clearly funny.  I'm assuming the implication here is, since "we have Jesus," that you, i.e., Colerain, does not have Jesus.  Or, at least that would explain Tom Bolden's reaction.  But, I believe there is more too it than that.  St. X kids are too smart for that (at least I think - St. X kids are sometimes the dumbest smart kids I know).  The St. X student body doesn't defend going to school with all boys.  We understand how that looks to a bunch of teenagers who go to co-ed schools.  If they allowed girls at St. X, not one kid there would complain.  So, we roll with it.  Colerain chants "WE'VE GOT GIRLS!!!" so the St. X body says "well, you've got us there," but, at least "WE'VE GOT JESUS!!!"  See what I mean?

This is basically a non-issue.  I've in fact been informed that the two coaches have talked, and both realize this has been sensationalized by the media.  And, the fact that the game involved two teams ranked in the top 25 in the country, means it has reached the national media.  Don't believe me?  Check this out.  It's a shame such a good game has turned into talks about teenagers chanting after the game.  Although, to be fair, St. X snapped Colerain's 61-game home winning streak, so perhaps they forgot how to be gracious losers.

#16 St. X takes on #3 Louisville Trinity at St. X High School this Friday.  Let's hope the two teams leave girls and Jesus out of it, and just play some football.  Go Bombers!!