Sports Ethics

[Thomas]

This is a true story.

Recently, two baseball teams comprised of nine-year-olds were competing for their championship. One team was ahead by one run in the bottom of the ninth, and the opposing team had a man on third base with two outs.

The team's star player player comes up to bat, and the pitcher walks him. Now, the tying run is on 3rd, and the winning run is on 1st.

The next batter up is a kid who has recently overcome brain cancer and has to wear a stint in his brain. The pitcher proceeds to strike him out.

This has caused a firestorm, as many people view the manager walking the star to get to the kid who's coming back from cancer to be very distasteful. On the other hand, some say that the kid is playing because he wants to be like everyone else, so he shouldn't be treated any differently.

As a side note, the kid who struck out told his father the next day that he was going to practice even harder, because by next season he wanted to be the kid who the other teams walked.

What do you think?

[Lewis]

The kid with cancer shouldn't have been treated any different by the opposing team. Not playing your best, regardless of who your opponent is or what their situation, is by definition poor sportsmanship. Suppose the kid was just small, or couldn't hit, or didn't run very fast? No one would have a problem with him being struck out then.

I have nothing buy sympathy for a sick kid, but the fundamental rule of good sportsmanship applies here. Based on your post, it seems like the boy with cancer understood that.

[Thomas]

I agree, more or less. This was a big topic a few days ago on sports radio, and many of the callers brought up the point that if the kid had not been coming back from cancer, nobody would have even talked about the story.

Obviously, we'd all like to see the kid get up there and hit the game winning homer, but life doesn't always work like a movie. In reality, people often blow it in the clutch and then regret it for years to come. This was one of those cases. At least the kid seems to have the right attitude. He didn't whine about what happened. Instead, he resolved to get better for the next season. At it's best, those are the kind of positive values which sports can instill.

Of course, then you have the group of people who are opposed to competitive sports in the first place. They think every child should get a trophy and teams shouldn't even keep score. If these events didn't somehow prepare kids for things later in life, then that would be fine. But if this country gets to the point where all competition is squashed in favor of nobody getting their feelings hurt, then we are truly in trouble. If people aren't challenged or pushed, then how do we expect individuals to excel? This pansy way of thinking would trickle down into all career fields, as an entire generation of youth would be taught that everyone wins.

In the real world, everyone doesn't win. In fact, most of them fail. But then again, these folks are no more obnoxious than the drunk dad sitting in the stands and berating his 4-year-old for sucking at T-Ball.

[Straight_Up_Pimpin]

Yeah, these obnoxious parents really tick me off. I had a cousin of mine who got thrown in jail for attacking the opposing coach during his kid's little league baseball game. What a moron.

As for the brain cancer kid, sounds like he knows what he's doin. The media should just back off and leave him alone.