enough of the snooping already

Just read this article at ESPN.com about how the private lives of sports stars are exposed and followed more than ever these days. In effect, they're becoming celebrities in that their entire lives, not just their sports exploits, are somehow of interest to throngs of people. Players of old, like Babe Ruth and Joe Namath, could get away with basically ignoring the press unless they wanted the publicity. Their hard-living styles were known to some extent, but they didn't have to constantly answer questions about every person they were seen with or every party they went to. Today's players don't have that privilege, though, and so they must watch their every move lest some Peeping Tom somewhere snap a picture of them that could become the next huge gossip story.

What a bunch of bullbleep, I say. Who cares who Larry Eustacy hangs out with on his own time? So what if Roethlisberger gets sloshed at parties every so often? What does it matter to us? It's sad that there are enough pathetic Americans out there who care about this useless crap to make it worth publishing to some geek with nothing better to do. It's as if the sort of muck that was once reserved for only the most gullible idiots of society is now being peddled as important news that means more than squat to some civilized person somewhere in the world. I guess the incredibly-stupid-but-scary snooping phenomenon is creeping into the sports world as well as every other part of society.

Okay, if it's obvious there are laws being broken -- I mean real laws, not driving violations and measly fines and crap -- and people getting hurt, then maybe we should care. And then only maybe, depending on whether or not we could do anything about it anyway (likely not) or use the example to discourage such behavior, or if it could remove said star from our sportscasts for a length of time. If some dude goes Ray Lewis and kills a guy, we ought to know so we can stop cheering for a murderer. If another dude goes Michael Pittman and makes a daily habit out of beating his wife, we should know so we can condemn such abuse and not support the guy. If a team wants to emulate the maidens of Northwestern's soccer program and put new players, willing or unwilling, through hell and back just so they can play sports, that sort of hazing should be made known and prevented from recurring.

But if somebody is doing something that's not unusual for people of that age and not clearly illegal in any way then it's none of our business. And that's especially true if it's something we might even do ourselves from time to time, or at least used to when we were in their demographic. Why not just assume they're normal human beings like the rest of us when they're not on the field and move on? Isn't that fair?

Oh, okay, off-field actions can affect on-field performance. Agreed. So let the team deal with that when on-field performance isn't up to par. Take Babe Ruth, for example. If he can live that crazy lifestyle and still be the best player to ever step foot on a baseball diamond, more power to him. We don't have to endorse the way they live off the field, and there's room for encouraging a player to set a good example, but we shouldn't harass them and ridicule minor actions regardless of our purpose.

Look, let's love (and hate) and follow sports stars for their on-field achievements, not for their off-field lives. Sure, it's cool to hear when such heroes give back their money and time, and we need to hear about those who use their status to get around the law or harm others, but spare us the useless details. I mean, is it necessary for anyone -- anyone -- to know that Matt Leinart was seen shopping with Paris Hilton? What the hell difference does it make who he spends his down time with? Nonsense, y'all. Plus, if we want to gawk at the juicy and bizarre habits of stars when they're not being stars, Hollyweird has a much wackier cast of freaks by which we can be entertained. Let's leave the sports to the athletes and leave the worthless entertainment to the worthless entertainers.

UPDATE: Mark Cuban has a related post here that addresses the media feeding frenzy over the everyday side of sports stars, Ozzie Guillen in particular. It seems these guys no longer have the right to be themselves and say what they want. Or at least that's what the media mongers would have us believe.