In surveying the sports arenas of today, you're more likely to come across displays of the latter two

By Bob Duffy, Globe Staff, 12/28/01

t matters not if you won or lost. As long as you won.

Granted, that isn't exactly what Grantland Rice wrote more than a half-century ago. But he was chronicling recreational events from a perspective of relative naivete, before the invention of the home run stare, the leg whip, the high stick, the throat-slash gesture, media saturation of the sensational, and youth league parents.

As for the revered sportswriter's maxim that it's "how you played the game" that counts in heaven . . . well, that may be true, but it appears there's little room for such considerations on planet Earth.

In mortal life, athletics are a realm of winners and losers. Despite Rice's reverie, they don't keep score down here according to conduct. It's results that matter. And the biggest loser in today's world of sports may be sportsmanship.

You can find the term "sportsman" in the dictionary -- "a person who is fair, generous, and a good loser, and a graceful winner," writes Webster -- but how about in competition?

Certainly, Webster didn't have these interpretations of virtue in mind: Richard Grant trying to embrace the fighter he had just beaten, James Butler, in good will -- and getting decked, without gloves, by Butler; several Loveland (Colo.) High football players smearing nonstick cooking spray on their jerseys, the better to slip through their opponents' grasp; the victorious Chelsea Pop Warner football team being accused of dirty tactics by opponent San Francisco after the national final, nearly turning the comradely handshakes into hand-to-hand combat; the Padres' Rickey Henderson stealing a base late in a game with his team seven runs ahead, prompting Brewers manager Davey Lopes -- who performed similar feats of theft during his playing days -- to threaten Henderson publicly with knockdown retaliation.

And that's just a bare exploration of the landscape for recent months, never mind the recent centuries since Webster laid out the lexicon.

Dan Doyle, founder of the Institute for International Sport at the University of Rhode Island, offers a more practical corollary to Rice and Webster's idealism -- what a sportsman isn't: "Someone who dishonors the game either by intentionally violating the rules or displaying a bad attitude toward players, coaches, or officials before, during, or after a game."

Evidence Doyle has gathered for his forthcoming book, "The Encyclopedia of Sports Parenting," supports such pessimism. In results from a survey of youth, high school, and college parents and coaches, the overwhelming sentiment is that sportsmanship has deteriorated or disappeared. High school coaches are the most optimistic; 54 percent believe sportsmanship is endangered. The other demographic dismissals range from 70 percent to 90 percent.

Why, you ask? Consider . . .

(Non)sticky situation

Nothing was going to stop gung-ho Loveland from beating football rival Greeley Central. By any means available.

The players' use of cooking spray before the Oct. 26 game wasn't their idea, and it wasn't a new wrinkle. It had become something of a Loveland tradition for four years, either with the tacit approval of assistant coaches who advised players there was nothing wrong with the practice or with the explicit endorsement of other assistants who purchased the material. Sure enough, as usual, they eluded their foes, 21-12.

But this time they didn't get away with the equipment enhancement. They were caught in an uproar that reverberated to state scholastic sports headquarters after Greeley complained.

Loveland coach Steve Poovey claimed it was an honest mistake, as he was under the impression there was no stipulation against the slick trick, though he didn't condone it. He was egregiously in error. It was, in fact, a violation -- so serious that the Colorado High School Activities Association banned Loveland from the playoffs. The three-time state champion was reinstated, eventually losing in the semifinals, only after disgusted Loveland principal Douglas Deason suspended Poovey for the season.

Poovey recalls protesting the use of cooking spray by opponents three times in 1995-96 and being told by game officials its use was within the rules. "I looked at the rulebook," says Poovey, "and I missed it." Finally, assistant coach Devin Anderson, now the school's athletic director, told the players, "Quit whining. Other teams use it. There's no rule against it, so if you want to use it, go ahead."

The Loveland players did, only to discover eventually that there is a rule against it. It's just so esoteric that CHSAA associate commissioner Bill Reader concedes, "I'm not sure the game officials would know enough to flag it."

In fact, they didn't when Greeley coach Steve Burch brought the matter to their attention in the first half. But they consulted the book and presented the documentation to Poovey at halftime. In the third quarter, the offenders -- estimates range from four to eight -- wore different, dry jerseys.

While not even the CHSAA contends there was a concerted effort to cheat, Poovey expresses mortification: "I didn't say anything against it, so in a sense, I authorized it. I am not blameless."

That's what rankles Deason. He doesn't accept benign neglect as an alibi. "Even if it were not illegal, it violates the spirit of the game," he says. "We're adults and we should know better. Common sense should tell you it's wrong. There's too much of this attitude: 'Let's go as far as we can and get away with as much as we can.' "

Even those who don't adhere to that principle -- or lack of it -- tread a minefield of murky morals.

For instance . . .

No small mistake

Cleveland Stroud knew the rules but didn't know he'd broken any. The Rockdale County (Ga.) basketball coach was still exulting over the team's first state title a month later while making a routine check of applicants for spring football in 1987. One of the names grabbed his attention. The gridder, Stroud vaguely recalled, had been a member of the basketball junior varsity, and his grades showed he was ineligible.

Stroud had used some junior varsity players during the tournament. Had this kid been one of them? Stroud couldn't remember. So he conducted an exhaustive review of his scorebooks and discovered the student in question indeed had played. For the last 45 seconds of a 23-point first-round regional blowout. That was it.

But that was too much. Stroud notified state administrators, and Rockdale was stripped of its crown.

The coach had agonized about how to proceed after discovering the infraction on a Friday. Throughout the weekend, he debated with himself: Should he jeopardize the achievement of a lifetime for more than a dozen players because of a petty transgression?

Once he determined his course, Stroud was amazed at the reaction. "The kids took it better than I did," he says. "And the citizens thought it was the greatest thing since sliced bread because, in a way, what we did was more special than the championship."

For a while, anyway. Stroud was fired as coach in 1998 after several losing seasons. "How quickly they forget," he says, sighing.

Plenty of evidence

It may not be a matter of forgetting as much as forgoing.

Even limiting the discussion to the games -- disregarding spinoff criminal acts such as Mike Tyson biting heavyweight boxing champion Evander Holyfield's ears during a fight in 1997, and one youth hockey father, Thomas Junta, punching another, Michael Costin, to death after an argument over an informal stick practice at Reading's Burbank Arena in 2000 -- does not diminish the sense of negativity:

• Bruins enforcer Marty McSorley tried to provoke Canucks counterpart Donald Brashear into a last-second fight in 2000, aiming his stick at the Vancouver player's shoulder but instead losing control, striking Brashear in the helmet, and knocking him to the ice with a severe head injury.

• In one of this year's Wimbledon men's semifinals, Andre Agassi protested vociferously a couple of line calls that had gone against him, was penalized a point for an audible obscenity, and, after squandering the five-set match to Patrick Rafter, almost struck with a backhand blast a lineswoman who had incurred his wrath.

• The National Football League ordered all players to view a video emphasizing sportsmanship, which included an admonishment from union executive director Gene Upshaw that his constituents should be mindful that youngsters emulate them. But Patriots linebacker Bryan Cox still proclaims, "For me, there is no sportsmanship in football," and he received a dose of his own frontier justice when he suffered a broken leg Oct. 28 as the target of an illegal block by Denver's Dan Neil.

• Lefthander Danny Almonte of the Bronx, N.Y., became a celebrity by firing a perfect game and a one-hitter in this year's Little League World Series, then a pariah when it was discovered that as a 14-year-old who had spent most of the season in his native Dominican Republic, he was ineligible according to maximum age and minimum residency requirements.

• In this year's Winston Cup stock car finale, the New Hampshire 300, series champion Jeff Gordon rammed eventual race winner Robby Gordon from behind on a caution lap after Robby did likewise to him before the yellow flag was waved. Jeff's justification after he was penalized a lap that cost him a chance at victory: "What I did wasn't sportsmanlike, but what he did wasn't sportsmanlike, either."

That doesn't mean chivalry is dead. Doyle says he has noticed "far less fighting, perhaps because the penalties are more severe." Plus, he says, "I don't think the good old days were necessarily that good. When I was a kid in Worcester, there were things I heard in the gym of a racist and ethnic nature. And there was more fighting."

Still, inspiring examples seem to be the exception:

• Esther Kim saw her best friend, Kay Poe, suffer a debilitating knee injury before their bout for a berth on the 2000 US Olympic taekwondo team. Unwilling to exploit the weakness for certain victory, Kim forfeited the match, and the trip to Sydney, to Poe.

• After their Wimbledon duel, Rafter said he wouldn't have griped if the calls had gone Agassi's way and didn't think his opponent should have been punished for verbally venting his frustration at a critical juncture.

• The Jupiter, Fla., youth sports association, concerned about incidents that threatened to escalate to violence, mandated that parents attend a meeting at which strict standards of conduct were delineated. The number of disciplinary hearings before the board was reduced from a dozen regarding major infractions in 1999 to one involving a minor complaint in 2000.

• Jack Nicklaus conceded a 2-foot putt to Tony Jacklin, thus guaranteeing a halve of their match and the 1969 Ryder Cup between the United States and Great Britain.

All these instances, good and bad, have a common denominator: repeated exposure. Because with the communications explosion mushrooming, there are no more vacuums. And that could have a direct impact on sportsmanship.

There for all to see

As Upshaw observes on the NFL video, the public uses big-time sports as its model. And with the glut of cable television channels and radio talk shows devoted to the genre -- overkilling everything, it seems, this side of professional jump-roping -- there's no escaping big-time sports.

"You've got all these shows, and they need something to talk about and put on camera or the airwaves," says National Hockey League executive vice president of hockey operations Colin Campbell, the league disciplinarian. "You see it and hear it over and over."

The Loveland football and Rockdale County basketball teams are textbook illustrations.

In the media's more restrained days, Loveland's notoriety might not have extended even to Denver. Instead, it became a transcontinental cause celebre, cited in Sports Illustrated as "A Sign of the Apocalypse."

"This wasn't what we had in mind for gaining our 15 minutes of fame," says principal Deason ruefully.

Likewise, Stroud's strict ethics in relinquishing the Georgia basketball title, an internal matter in prehistoric technological times, attracted national interest, all the way to The New York Times and the networks. One reason his players embraced his decision, says Stroud, "was that they loved seeing their names in the paper and their pictures on TV."

That can prove a fatal romance, according to former National Basketball Association player Bob Bigelow, now a youth consultant and coauthor, with Tom Moroney and Linda Hall, of "Just Let The Kids Play."

"What is allowed or seen on TV reaches all young kids," says Bigelow. "One of the best questions I've ever gotten in one of my talks is, 'How do I explain Dennis Rodman to my kids?' ESPN was the first to put cameras under the basket so guys could dunk, then grab their crotch and beat their chest. At the high school level, they're doing the same things. There are no cameras, but they imagine there is."

ESPN vice president/director of news Vince Doria is sensitive to the potential monster. Most recently, it reared its head with the Grant-Butler pleasantries.

Cue the replays!

Doria concedes that had it not been for Butler's bad-boy act, ESPN probably wouldn't have shown the video. But he points out that in the immediate aftermath, the cable network displayed its top 10 examples of bad and then good sportsmanship, "which obviously was done to give that some balance."

"Some things we look at and try not to exploit," adds Doria. "But when these things happen on TV -- fortunately or unfortunately -- we're going to show it. In an age where everyone has access via satellite, it ratchets up the interest. We'd have our heads in the sand if we didn't show it. The hard thing to do is draw rules on what's news and what's exploitation. There's a fine line to becoming a sort of morality cop. We try not to get into areas where we're making moral judgments."

Newspapers are hardly immune to glorifying the graphic, which Doria observes with expertise as former Boston Globe assistant managing editor for sports. "They try to get stories that are catchy, grabby," he says.

Doria also wonders whether outrageous conduct is inevitable, regardless of the forum, for those predisposed to it. "Turn on the cameras and people will perform," he says. "But we don't try to encourage that. Does it instigate inappropriate behavior? I don't know. I think people inclined to act inappropriately are going to do it, no matter what."

Stains everywhere

Intensified scrutiny is one reason the team sports are trying to emphasize their athletes must be exemplars. The four major entities -- Major League Baseball, the NFL, the NBA, and the NHL -- have entered into a partnership with high schools called Good Citizenship Through Sports, which promotes professionals as role models. But paragons can be tough to find. Each sport seems to develop its own code of conduct, and that can create murky moral situations.

Individual, noncontact endeavors such as figure skating and golf seem to be the most civilized. And yet . . .

"Figure skating sportsmanship is very good," says Nancy Kerrigan, a two-time Olympic medalist from Stoneham. "Other skaters generally are very helpful. You try your hardest, and if someone is better than you that day, good for you, great."

That's why she found the off-ice attack by Tonya Harding's associates -- who assaulted her with a lead pipe across a knee after a practice session for the 1994 US Championships -- unfathomable. "We were roommates at a competition once," says Kerrigan. "When we were on tour, we'd invite her and her husband out to dinner. I never had had any problems with her. It's unthinkable. Did she consider me that much of a threat?"

Golf, too, has its breaches, though it is a game based on self-policing. "It's born out of a sense of honor for your opponent," says Ben Crenshaw.

The ultimate beau geste in the sport was Nicklaus's at Royal Birkdale in England 32 years ago. On the last hole of the last Ryder Cup match, he and Jacklin -- a national hero since winning the British Open that summer -- were all even, as were the teams. Nicklaus sank his putt, which meant Jacklin would have to make his or the United States would prevail again. Instead, Nicklaus picked up Jacklin's marker, awarding him the putt and Great Britain the tie. "I think you would have made the putt," Nicklaus whispered to his friend, "but I wasn't going to give you the opportunity to miss under these circumstances."

More than three decades later, Jacklin remains touched by the generosity, which wasn't universally hailed. "There were a few mean-spirited individuals who weren't too pleased," says Jacklin. "Sam Snead [the US captain] wasn't exactly over the moon about it. But Jack was above all that."

In contrast were the actions of the 1999 US team, captained by Crenshaw. When Justin Leonard sank a 45-foot birdie putt to seemingly cement a stirring last-day rally past the Europeans in Brookline, the US golfers spontaneously rushed to hail him. But in the process, they trampled the line of Jose Maria Olazabal, whose 26-foot putt could have extended the match. Olazabal missed, but the 14-13 US win was tainted. "It was unbridled exuberance," Crenshaw says. "It shouldn't have happened. We lost our heads. It was something that leaked out."

Blood is what often leaks out in the more confrontational sports, and the McSorley-Brashear incident is perhaps the most extreme example. It had been foreshadowed by jousting between the two earlier in the game. With 20 seconds left, Bruins coach Pat Burns sent McSorley over the dasher to join Brashear on the ice. "I was out there to fight him, and everyone in the building knew I was out there to fight him," says McSorley. "But he wouldn't fight. There were three seconds left, and if I didn't fight him, I wasn't doing my job."

In trying to hasten the hostilities, McSorley left Brashear with a Grade 3 concussion, and though he publicly apologized, the Bruins veteran was convicted of assault in a British Columbia court and received the longest suspension -- one year -- in NHL history. He never played in the league again.

"I've had kids ask me about this," says McSorley. "I tell them you have to take responsibility. It's a sign you have to be careful out there. If you take risks, there are consequences you have to live with."

That's the message Campbell strives to deliver, and he did so by issuing the sentence to McSorley, his former Edmonton teammate. Having seen the league eliminate brawls -- there has been only one all-out altercation in the 14 seasons since it became mandatory for noncombatants to return to or stay at their bench area -- Campbell is on a mission to make cavalier stick-wielding similarly obsolete. "There's no manliness, no toughness in stickwork," he says.

The condemned are players who won't drop the gloves.

Cam Neely, the former Bruins 50-goal scorer, was known as a clean but rough player who wouldn't hesitate to fight when provoked. He had no use for those who wouldn't fight after doing the provoking, particularly former journeyman defenseman Ulf Samuelsson and current Phoenix Coyotes forward Claude Lemieux. "Both were big, strong players who knew they crossed the line," says Neely. "But they wouldn't back it up."

Lemieux takes umbrage at Neely's remarks, even while acknowledging his villainous reputation. "He's said a lot about me, but he doesn't know me," says Lemieux. "That's his choice. I didn't feel I needed to fight him to do my job. I tried to aggravate him and score goals."

In fact, Lemieux is prized as both a scorer and a scourge by his employers, and he's won Stanley Cups with three teams. But he sounds wistful about his job description. "Being criticized," he says, "that's when you wish, 'God, why didn't I get the skill level so I wouldn't have to shadow?' Guys who are always up for the Lady Byng [awarded for combining excellent performance with commendable comportment] -- that's not going to be me, because if I play like that, I'm out of hockey."

Leagues try, but . . .

MLB, the NFL, and the NBA have taken preemptive measures in the form of fines and suspensions to eliminate all forms of fighting. But it isn't always easy to achieve. Buccaneers general manager Rich McKay, cochairman of the NFL's Competition Committee, says, "Even the player reps said they felt sportsmanship was deteriorating. So we made it a priority to prevent late hits and taunting."

Yet McKay and his fellow watchdogs must deal with the mentality espoused by Cox and Patriots offensive lineman Grey Ruegamer, who draws the line at intent to injure but for whom anything else goes. "If you ain't cheatin', " Ruegamer says, "you ain't tryin'."

MLB has adopted much stricter rules since Frank Robinson took over as chief disciplinarian three years ago. Among his mandates was one to rid the game of dugout-clearing dust-ups. In that spirit, Lopes was suspended two games for the mere hypothesis of vengeance against Henderson.

That doesn't mean fellowship rules the game. It's doubtful MLB would promote the citizenship of former Red Sox prospect/problem Izzy Alcantara. During a minor league game with Pawtucket last summer, Alcantara felt Scranton's Blas Cedeno had imperiled him with a couple of pitches and raced to the mound -- but not before landing a karate kick on the mask of catcher Jeremy Salazar.

And Cubs prize Ben Christensen is no threat to win the Roberto Clemente Award for good deeds. At Wichita State, he unleashed a pitch that struck the left eye of Evansville leadoff batter Anthony Molina, who Christensen believed was timing his delivery in the on-deck area before a game. Molina wound up with a fractured skull, glaucoma, an impaired retina, and blind spots; his hopes for a baseball career ruined, he now works for a rental car agency. Christensen wound up with a $1 million signing bonus and is on Chicago's 40-man roster.

"It's outrageous," says Molina. "I think it's ridiculous for someone as good as he was in college to do something like that. It was totally uncalled for. I've never heard of anything like that. I wasn't even trying to time his delivery; I never believed that helped me. I was looking out at the right-field fence, then I turned and glanced at him. I wasn't even paying attention to him."

Nor did Molina pay particular attention when Christensen -- who eventually refused to discuss the incident -- conveyed token remorse. "He never called; I got a letter from him about six weeks later," says Molina. "But it looked pretty structured, like someone had told him what to write, like it was reviewed by somebody. I question the sincerity."

Still, sincere sportsmanship isn't extinct. The NHL features perhaps the most righteous ritual among team endeavors: the opponents' handshake parade, no matter how begrudging, after every Stanley Cup playoff series. That sentiment is embodied by Carolina center Ron Francis, who is in his 20th year in the NHL, during which he has emerged as one of the game's most admired ambassadors and a two-time Byng winner whose credo, he says, is to "prepare myself to go out and play as well as I can, compete as hard as anybody, and want to win as much as anybody, but within the rules."

One player the NBA doesn't have to monitor is Orlando All-Star forward Grant Hill, and not just because an ankle injury has curtailed his season for the second straight year. He is considered one of sports' leading citizens. Nonetheless, Hill bemoans the state of sportsmanship: "I think we live in a society that is 'win at all costs.' Our society has desensitized our values, and it carries over to sport. I think we need to make some improvements, and hopefully, the next generation will be better than we are."

Is that wishful thinking or realistic expectation?

Learn it young

Some consider youth sports a cesspool of parental intrusion, improper instruction, and misplaced values; witness Chelsea vs. San Francisco. Fred Engh, founder and president of the National Alliance for Youth Sports in West Palm Beach, Fla., and author of the book "Why Johnny Hates Sports," cautions, "Any time you have standings, trophies, all-star teams, and travel teams, there can be abuses."

There are those trying to do something to rectify that. Doyle reports encouraging feedback from his three-part sportsmanship seminars -- preseason, midseason, and postseason -- implemented at several colleges. And Engh's parental and coaching tutorials have succeeded in Jupiter, among other places. "We didn't teach the parents anything they didn't know in their hearts," says former Jupiter youth sports association president Jeff Leslie, who governed an amalgam of sports that attracted 6,000 youngsters. "But we made them realize, 'Hey, this is for the kids.' "

Even kids cheat, like Almonte. But it's instructive to hear his rivals' reaction to his fraudulence in Williamsport, Pa.

"Unless you live in those countries, it's not fair for us in the States to pass judgment," says manager Bob Brewer of the Apopka, Fla., team that was the victim of Almonte's perfect game before beating the Bronx in the US final. "We would never cheat to win a game. But I don't think [Almonte's family] saw it as just a game. I think they saw it as a way to a better life."

Brewer's 12-year-old son, Brandon, believes Almonte was merely obeying parental orders. "If my dad told me to do something," he says, "I'd do it instantly. I think they went just a bit too far. I don't think anything is that important to be cheating on a bunch of kids."

If any team would have reason to castigate Almonte, it's Oceanside, Calif., which was ousted when he pitched his one-hitter in the US semis. But 12-year-old utility player Wyland Szabo doesn't hold a grudge. "It wasn't Danny's fault," says Szabo, "because he's just a kid. It was his dad's fault. It didn't ruin anything for us. We still had fun."

Perhaps that's the hope Hill is expressing. Out of the mouths of babes . . . and into the consciences of adults? Would that transform sportsmanship from a concept into a general practice?