“Erin Andrews-Dollar Value on Trauma”

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It was hard to watch, hard to imagine, hard to understand. It must have been hard in the Jury room too.

We know how hard it has been on Erin Andrews, the NFL-College Football sideline reporter at Fox Sports, the former ESPN-star, whose life has been bared on video, a naked video, on the internet, by a voyeur in a hotel room in Nashville.

Andrews was awarded 55M-dollars by a 12-member jury for the emotional trauma caused by a stalker, Michael Barrett, who travelled, trying to catch up with her, meet her, and did photograph her, undressed, in what she thought was the privacy of her hotel room, while on a road trip.

She testified, she wept, she created an aura of having been violated, by this stranger, allowed by hotel officials, to find out what room she was staying in, so he could rent the room next door.

What followed was the stunning revelation that he tampered with a peep hole window in a door, and was able to insert a camera photographing Andrews in her room. And he put it on the internet.

He has already served nearly 3-years in prison. She has been in an emotional prison, wondering what people thought, those who recognized her, in hotels, in restaurants, in stadiums, in public places. What happened was not a one time incident. That video has been viewed 17M times on the internet.

She did not need a slick lawyer to pain a picture for the jury, she did herself. They saw the video in the courtroom. They heard of her anguish, saw her tears, felt some compassion, for a young woman violated, not physically, but emotionally.

It raises all types of question. She was damaged, but aside from money, what was to be gained by dredging all this up in public again, putting herself on the stand, pulling all the hurt out in full view of the media and people?. Did she need to do this? Does it really help the healing process? What did she gain, aside from money she hopes to collect?

And what of the people who run You Tube? Is there no way to block that video, take it off the web, so it cannot be seen ever again?

For the hotel chain, a nightmare of a security breach, and now a price to be paid by that hotel, though Marriott International was removed from the case for being ‘not at fault’.

Barrett has no resources. He ruined his life, in emotionally ruining hers. And how about his lawyers, trying to short-sell the damage to Andrews by pointing out her career has taken off, going from ESPN to Fox, questioning how much ‘she really has suffered’ in all this. Slime-ball stuff from a lawyer representing a slime-ball person.

The jurors, who did speak out after the verdict, spoke with emotion, their heart-felt feelings over the hurt the sports reporter suffered. Next will be appeals, and the fact the judgment will possibly be reduced.

But how do you ever put on a price tag on the wrong that was done to Erin Andrews?

It was a sexual rape of the mind of this woman sports reporter, almost as bad as if she have been physically raped. A sad story, with a final chapter that has not been written yet.

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We didn’t really know what we were doing when we were kids growing up out on Long Island..

Those people who were cleaning that attic out, in that house in South Carolina, didn’t know what they were doing either.

All we knew was that we were baseball fans. There were some games on TV back in the day, the Yankees, the Dodgers, the Giants, then the Yankees and the Mets, as I grew up on Eastern Long Island. We also had the ‘Game of the Week’ on network TV.

We read the newspaper, we read the box scores, I was given a subscription to the Sporting News, and I collected baseball cards for a group of years. I’m not sure if everyone was as fanatical a fan as I was, but having grown up in a baseball family, you know what my roots were.

Dad pitched in the Philadelphia A’s minor league system. Uncle was a beat writer covering the Dodgers for the Brooklyn Eagle. They loved the game, so it was handed off to me too.

 
I collected cards at a very young age, maybe 8. The Topps Company put out cards, 5-to a pack,plus a thin slab of bubblegum too. I liked the cards, the artwork, the bio info on the background, the colors, and the smell of Bazooka.gum . A nickel a pack, and I’d buy 5-packs each week, using my paper route money to fund my hobby. And being the entrepreneur in waiting, I’d sell the slabs of bubble gum to the kid next door for a nickel.

But we really didn’t know what we were doing back in the day. We’d play games in the school yard, flipping cards, if they both game up picture side up, you won the other guys card. If they didn’t he got yours. We had contests who could throw the cardboard backed cards the farthest, much like a game of frisbee, before anyone developed frisbee.

We swapped them, always playing the general manager. Would you trade me your Whitey Ford card for my Cal McLish card? How many cards do I give up for your Ted Williams card, since you have five of them? Of course there was no dollar value attached to the cards, because, we didn’t know what we were doing.

We attached the baseball cards to the spokes of our bikes, and rode around, as if it were making a motorcycle sound.

We ran afoul of the law too, not me, but others in my Catholic school elementary class. Two kids sitting in the back of the room, during Catechism, swapping cards, till Sister Jean found out. Oh the discipline was going to be harsh. No not with the paddle, not with a ruler nor a pointer.

Up to the front of the room, sit in those chairs.l Here is the waste basket. Bring those baseball cards up. Rip them up into four pieces. The horror of seeing a Brooks Robinson rookie card, or the Duke Snider card go into the waste basket. They each had 200-cards when they came to school that day. They left without them, and with a waste basket full of Mantle, Mays, Newcombe, and Norm Zauchin, Ellis Kinder and Bill Consolo too.

Like all things, as you grow up you lose interest in one thing, gain interest in some other hobby. The constant refrain I always hear, ‘Mom threw out my cards when I went away to college’. Happened to lots of my friends, not to me though. My collection of cards, maybe 2,000, is in a box, in the family closet. They range from cards I traded for in the 1940s to the early 60s.

And we now know, thanks to the memorabilia dealers, the cards of superstars have great dollar values.

And now the story out of South Carolina, a family cleaning out the attic of their late great-grandfather, found a paper bag in a dresser, that contained 8-vintage, mint-condition baseball cards. 7-Ty Cobb cards from 1909 and a 1905 Honus Wagner card. The value on them, over 1-million dollars in the collectors industry.

Where are your cards? Do you still have them, do you still wish you had them? What happened to them?.

Lucky for those kids, they didn’t get caught in class with the Cobb cards, or use the Wagner card to make a cool sound on their bikes, or lose them all, flipping them with a neighbor, or tearing them up in front of a nun.

 
Big memories when I think of my baseball cards. Big money possibly too, unless you have a pile of Lou Berberet, Joe Ginsberg, Valmy Thomas cards from the 50s and 60s.

Collecting baseball cards, finding stuff in the closet, the garage, the attic. Still part of the historical lure of baseball, even in a house in South Carolina, or for a kid from Long Island.

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“Greatness from Day One”\\
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I was there the first day, the first game, the first pass he ever threw.

 
Peyton Manning has retired after a brilliant career, leading the Indianapolis Colts to respectability and a Super Bowl ring, and returning the Denver Broncos to greatness, with another drive for a ring.

 
I was there the day he debuted and I won’t forget it.

 
This after all the things he did at Tennessee in the Southeastern Conference, leading the Volunteers to greatness, electing to stay an extra year rather than grabbing the big money and the brass ring.

 
The expectations were amazing right from the get-go and he answered the challenge that very first moment.

 
We will never see him direct traffic at the line of scrimmage again. We will forever hear the echo of that famous call “Omaha-Omaha”. We will remember the no huddle attack. His ability to read defenses. His signature short passes to all parts of the field.

 
He arrived in Indianapolis as they rebuilt the down trodden Colts, the franchise that gave us Jeff George, (1-13) seasons, and some bad head coaches.

 
He made everybody around him more dangerous, whether it was journeyman wide receivers, little known tight ends, after thought running backs.

 
He played for a franchise that I really felt let him down. In Indy, they didn’t draft great talent around him. His offensive line was suspect. His defense undersized, but he kept them in the playoff hunt yearly, and got them a Super Bowl ring.

 
In Denver, coming off neck surgeries, he brought the Broncos back. He was the bridge till they built a great defense to go with his offensive leadership.

 
And though he wanted to throw all the time, and he would go no-huddle at the drop of a hat, he refined his game to fit what the new coach wanted. Somehow, as his skills slipped away, he reinvented his personality to be a game manager.

 
His battles were amazing. The gunslinger duels with Philip Rivers. The post season wars with Tom Brady. The battles with the brilliance of New England’s Bill Belicheck..

 
He had just 9-TDs and 17-picks trying to make Gary Kubiak’s run first, throw second offense work. And finally, he got it done, surviving a foot injury, to rally the team, save the season, and get them to Super Bowl Sunday.

 
My favorite story was his first coach, Jim Mora-Senior telling me about their first meeting at the NFL combines. The Colts were to interview him, but it was Manning who did the interview, walking in with a notebook full of questions about the offense, the coaches, the organization, the city, the state.

 
And I was there that first day, first moment, first game.

 
I was the Voice of the Seahawks, doing my first game, in the preseason of 1998. Manning was making his first start for the Colts at the Kingdome in Seattle.

 
1st down at his own 12-yard line after the opening kickoff. The building rocking, anticipation everywhere. How good would he be? Could he carry this awful franchise on his right arm?.

 
Shotgun, deep drop, 88-yard TD pass on a deep post to Marvin Harrison.

 
The rest is history…..nearly 72,000-passing yards, a career record of (200-92), 539-TD passes, and those rings.

 
I have seen greatness at quarterback over the years doing NFL play-by-play, from the final year of Dan Fouts, to the gun-slinger that was Brett Favre, to the genius era of John Elway.

 
Peyton Manning was all that and more. Superb player-superb person.

 
The first play I ever saw was a calling card of so many other great plays over all those years. A memory of a lifetime.

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The end of the road came quickly for the Houston Texans running back. A promising career snuffed out by a series of injuries that took him off the track three straight seasons.

 
A tough finish for what was such a promising start for Arian Foster. An amazing story. Recruited out of Mission Bay High School, he goes to Tennessee, and has an amazing two seasons, then gets hurt as a senior. A guy many thought could be a first rounder, never got a call on draft day.

He does not get drafted, and instead signs as a street free agent with Houston. The rest is history, a short history, but an impressive one. In a 3-year span, Fosters runs wild, rushing for 41-touchdowns, catching 5-more scoring passes, 46-TDs. His rushing totals and workload were staggering, 1616,1224, and 1424-yards rushing in that 3-year window. Add on another 159-receptions, and he was the Texans offense.

And now they are all gone. His quarterback Matt Schaub woke up injured and saw his career evaporate. Andre Johnson, the huge wide receiver, was cut loose a year ago, father time collecting tolls on him, and Foster pink-slipped in a salary cap move on Thursday..

For Foster it was devastating. A different major injury each of the last three seasons. A sports hernia, a hamstring, and then a torn Achilles. Each time he came back, but his durability and his paycheck (6.5M) became the big issues. Once upon a time as heavy duty as there was, he missed 23-games over the last 3-years.

 
Modern day history shows two types of running backs. The heavy duty guys, who never seem to get hurt, Adrian Peterson, LaDainian Tomlinson, Emmitt Smith amongst others. Smith had (4,924) touches, running and receiving with the Cowboys, and had 1-neck injury. Tomlinson had a remarkable (3,803) carries and receptions, and suffered just a bruised knee. Peterson has over (2,300) carries in Minnesota and is still going.

History also shows us how quickly it ends, Foster, no different that potential Hall of Famer Terrell Davis of Denver, a brilliant career cut short by injuries.

He might get a chance somewhere else. Yes he is at the 30-age threshold, where running backs are no longer productive. But to look at him in that three year window, powerful, a glider, great cutbacks, and explosion at the second level, it just stuns you, it can be over so quickly.

As the NFL says, you’re just 1-play away from going all the way on a score, or going home with a career ending injury.

 
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“Where Do You Go-When Not Wanted?”

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These have been hard years for the two schools. And now they are no longer wanted, have no home, and are at a crossroads of where they should go.

 
Such is the case when your ego, your alumni, get in the way of decision making

 
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Idaho and New Mexico State haven’t had many winning seasons in the last couple of decades. And now the losing, and their geographical location has let them out in the cold, with no home.

 
The Sun Belt Conferece dropped them as conference members, effective after the 2017 season. Too far to travel. Too costly. Not much of a program. Little TV interest.

 
Idaho has had 1-winning season since 2000, and has a composite (41-129) record in that span. Not too many fun Saturday’s in the Kibbie Dome.

 
It’s even worse at New Mexico State, a barren landscape worse than the desert landscape of the Tex-Mex border. The Aggies had have just 2-winning seasons in 25-years, and dating back to 1979, they have had 38-losing seasons in 41-falls. A combined record of (75-205) in that span. Coach Warren Woodson was a long, long, long time ago.

 
Idaho was a power in Division 1AA football in the Big Sky Conference. New Mexico State’s good seasons have been few and far between. Both decided to try to move up to Division 1-status, where it took 85-scholarships to compete.

 
Idaho never won trying to play as an independent with the big boys. New Mexico State could hardly compete at 1AA and has become a coaching graveyard since going true Division 1. Name a conference, they’ve tried it PCAA, WAC,. Big West.

Even being in the Sun Belt was not a solution. They combined to go (21-99) in conference play in that league. The Vandals say they might consider dropping down. Big Sky officials are ready to welcome them with open arms to allow them to come back to renew rivalries with Idaho State-Montana-Montans State-Weber State. They spent 30-years in that conference, had some great years, great quarterbacks, led by John Friesz, who went to the NFL.

For the Aggies, names like Pervis Atkins, Charley Johnson, Bobby Gaither and Roy Gerela and others come flooding back when you think of the program they used to be, but that was more than 50-yearsago.

Conference affiliations were always a problem. Ever since the old WAC folded up football operations, they were between a rock and a hard place.. And being in small markets, without much tradition, quality recruits were seldom attracted to Moscow and Las Cruces. There were hardly any blue-chip players in their own state, and if they wanted to stay home, chance are they wound up at Boise State and New Mexico, not with the Vandals and Aggies.

 
The Mountain West won’t look at them, for they bring little. If the Mountain West ever decides to push the expansion button, it must include BYU and Tulsa more than anyone else, but the Big 12-is rumored also to be interested in those schools.

 
Swallow your ego, get rid of the red-ink P&L statements, and play wheree you belong. Go to 65-scholarships and then compete in the Big Sky. There are all types of implications though, Title IX women’s programs, a dropoff in conference revenues, in addition to prestige. Each school has at least 5-payday games scheduled for the future. Auburn, LSU and the likes will cancel the contracts if they drop to 1AA.

 
The Big Sky conference has survived the loss of Boise State and others over the years. Everbody throws the ball in that league, they draw on-campus, and they have a playoff you can qualify for. And yes, they’re elite players wind up in NFL camps on a year by year basis.

 
Some pretty good coaches lost their reputations at Idaho and New Mexico State, notably Tom Cable, who wound up in the NFL, and once regarded DeWayne Walker, a great coordinator at UCLA.

 
The shakeup five years ago, when conferences raided other conferences, rocked some big time traditions. Big East football is gone. There are some strange people now in the Big 10, and even stranger road trips involving the ACC. Tell me West Virginia fits in the Big 12. And look who was added in the PAC-12.

 
The little guys were impacted too. Just ask any Vandal alum or Aggies backer how it all worked out for their schools. The next decision better be the right decision, or it might lead to a final decision, to drop football.

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