Fab Five

Speaking of videos that are two years old, ESPN's 30 for 30 crew produced a documentary that aired two years ago on the the Fab Five--Michigan five freshmen who started together, went all the way to the national championship game (twice) and started new trends in shorts, socks and on-court demeanor.  I hadn't shown the video to any class until last week.

It was interesting to see reactions to the video, especially mine.  I figured my students would enjoy a story about a group of brash young trash talkers, who turned out to be nice guys.  What I didn't expect is that I would gain an appreciation for the group.

The Fab Five arrived in Ann Arbor in the fall of 1991, the same semester I went off to college, so we're all the same age.  And I liked to follow the careers of people who were the same age as me, like Marshall Faulk.  The Fab Five were an anathema to me, though, for all of the reasons my students today liked them--baggy shorts and the trash talking...especially the trash talking.  I was overjoyed to see them lose to Duke and UNC in the tournament (and I now know I would never root for those two schools in that manner again).

Why the change? I'm not sure.  Maybe I'm more tolerant of self-expression.  Maybe we all grew up.  In any case, it was an entertaining tale all the way around.

March Money Madness

Watch Money and March Madness on PBS. See more from FRONTLINE.

This PBS Frontline video is nearly two years old, but much of it still rings true today.  The Ed O'Bannon lawsuit against the NCAA is still making news, and UConn's low graduation rate kept it out of the Big East and NCAA tournaments this month.  Still, it's only two years old.

I used to be dead-set against players making any kind of money off their athletic prowess in college.  College sports started with the same intent that high school sports did, to offer young men a worthy athletic pursuit in the midst of their academics.  Of course, that model's been dead for a long time now--the first cheating I heard of happened in the '40s when World War II vets came home and given cash to play for one school instead of another.

What really turned me into a recent concert of compensation for players is the warp speed in which conferences are re-aligning, and how schools are leaving behind decades of tradition for a few more million dollars of a more recently negotiated television deal (looking at you, Texas A&M and Maryland). It's gotten to the point that my students look at a conference map and can't understand how schools from such different part of the country can be part of the same association.  And they're right, it doesn't make sense.

I don't support paying college players while they're in school--they still get a scholarship, and everyone not getting a 'ship bemoans the high cost of higher ed. I do think they are entitled to some post-school compensation for their likeness being used in video games (see the O'Bannon case) and a cut of jerseys sold with their number on them.

The odds of any of this happening.  Well, it depends on the lawsuit, I believe.  Looking at the video, I don't see the NCAA changing its mind in the near future.

Guilty

I showed my students reports from CNN on the Steubenville rape case.  As I suspected, several kids thought the girl should get in trouble for being drunk.  Well, guess what--they were all drunk.  As I preached about knowing your limits and the bad decision-making of most 16-year-olds, I wondered if anything would sink in to the minds that needed it the most.

It did make my day to get an e-mail from a parent the next day, thanking me for bringing this up in class.  Her son was among those who blamed the victim, and they had a chance to talk about it.  At least someone is listening.

Another David to ESPN's Goliath

CBS and NBC have upgraded their cable offerings to offer a slight alternative to ESPN.  Now Fox is in the game with Fox Sports 1.  I like to complain about ESPN as much as the next guy; shows like First Take, SportsNation and PTI are not my thing.  SportsCenter was a great show, but has become too over-the-top with catchphrases and obsessions with celebrity-athletes, like Danica and Tebow.

I'm not sure that the other nets can get me out of my addiction to ESPN, though.  I did watch the CNN/SI channel back in the '90s, but I haven't switched to NBCSports or CBSSports yet.  Will FoxSports1 be worth checking out in August?  I hope so.

Old School

 This isn't the newest video--I showed it to my classes last year.  But it gives great insight to a successful person and what it takes to get to and stay at the top.  Get 'em, coach!

This

Thank you, local paper, for publishing a clear-headed article behind the discipline numbers in our system.

For the last two years, our administration has trumpeted the decrease in suspensions in our school system.  I think a lot of that decrease was in response to an NAACP complaint that led to a federal Office of Civil Rights investigation of why black males were being written up in a greater proportion to their percentage of the total population of students.

Well, it's easy for suspension numbers to go down...when students aren't written up.  It got to the point last year that I had to keep my own records of students I had written up.  I didn't trust my principals to follow through on suspending kids that I thought needed it, and I was right.  I'm glad to see that I'm not the only teacher that sees this.

Will Justice Be Served?

I showed this Outside The Lines video to two of my classes last week.  It's about the two high school football players accused to raping an unconscious partygoer last fall.

Sadly, the responses most of my students had were predictable:  it's her fault, she drank too much, she shouldn't have gotten drunk, etc.

I worry about the total lack of empathy most of these kids have. The mentality is, I'll get mine and the hell with anyone else.  How wonderful!