Font Size:

Michael Phelps smoked pot.  Alex Rodriguez and dozens of other baseball players juiced up.  Maybe we need to remember the advice of another sports figure from recent headlines, Charles Barkley, who said "I am not a role model."

Let's be honest, most of us are not boy scouts but the idea of breaking the law should draw outrage.  Professional athletes are probably just a microcosm of society.  There are hundreds of NFL, NHL, MLB and NBA players who do their job, go home and stay off the police blotter in their off-time.  We just don't hear much about them---and I know it's because the media doesn't cover that sort of thing with the same intensity we do a scandal.  That's another topic for another day.  Maybe it's time we stop asking about why our heroes are so prone to bad behavior and instead STOP making them our heroes.

My dad's hero was Mickey Mantle.  The all-american boy from Oklahoma who blasted homers and patrolled centerfield for the Yankees.  How many little boys grew up with "The Mick" as a role model?  We have long since learned of Mantle's off-field drinking binges and womanizing during his playing career.  The point is that the heroes of today are not all that different than those from decades past.  The unbelievable media scrutiny and insatiable appettite for scandal in society is the real change.  Baseball had a cocaine scandal in the late 70's and 80's and a gambling scandal that rocked the nation in 1919.  We should stop being surprised by the human failures of professional athletes or public figures, history clearly teaches us that lesson.

It sounds like a greeting card I know but kids need to look up to community leaders and their parents who work hard for modest wages and do the heavy lifting in society.  I'm going to do my best to allow my son to admire the athletic ability he sees and try and impress upon him the lesson learned from a sign I once saw on the wall of a fire house in Joplin, Missouri. 

It read: "Winners do what needs to be done which includes difficult, time consuming and lousy things that losers find excuses not to do."  Pretty straight forward right?  Working two jobs is hard.  Being a good parent to your child is challenging too.  I know it's a pipe dream but it would be great if we could somehow get kids to at least understand that the little, less celebrated things in life deserve as much admiration as a 500 foot grand slam and that nobody is perfect.