Death, sports and contradictions

The Sports Guy's basketball blog recently contained the following e-mail from a reader, which Simmons agreed with:

"(Speaking of postgame beers, I couldn't agree more with this e-mail from Ed in Dallas: "Does the coverage of the Josh Hancock accident perfectly illustrate the double standard we have with different sports? If a tattooed, cornrowed NBA player had been been in a fatal, single-car accident with a BAC level twice the legal limit, allegedly on the phone with a woman arranging a hookup and with a stash of weed in the car -- he'd be posterized as everything that's wrong with the NBA. Since it's a clean-cut white guy, he's being treated like Barbaro.")

Lest you think I am using the news of this tragic event in bad taste, let's not forget what columnists Jemele Hill, Gregg Easterbrook and others did when violence took the life of Denver Broncos' cornerback Darrent Williams.  That right: Easterbrook used Williams' death as a comentary on the ills of the modern young person (or, in Hill's case, a commentary on the problems within modern young athlete culture).  

Let me first say that I disagree with the notion that Hancock is being treated 'like Barbaro'.  At the same time, I think the media would not have been as gentle if, say, NBA nice-guy Jermaine O'Neal's name took the place of Josh Hancock's name in this story.  Or even if it had been NBA white-guy Josh Pollard.  The media really has a beef with NBA and NFL athletes for some reason...and I can't help thinking that the racial and social makeup of the majority of people who play those sports has a lot to do with the way the different sports are treated by sportswriters.   

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