'RUSH' TO JUDGE
ESPN has hand in court-storming mayhem
IT’S EASY to blame ESPN for so much that has disfigured sports. That’s the problem — it’s too easy.
So, after five days of rationalized nonsense, let’s make a few things clear about Saturday’s latest news-making court-storming after Wake Forest defeated Duke.
1) Once again, ESPN cameras thoughtlessly invited a crowd to do its worst. ESPN rewarded every over-thetop, attention-starved “fan” it could find.
And in the minutes before the mob rush that injured Duke’s 7-foot Kyle Filipowski, ESPN three times provided a closeup of the same corpulent courtside “fan” who was happy to go berserk, as he knew what ESPN was looking for and he was more than happy to provide it on cue.
2) The actual storming was gratuitous and obligatory. Wake was up four with 1.8 seconds left when a timeout was called, followed by a commercial. So the “spontaneous” selfie-snapping combustion that followed was not spontaneous but rather performed in accordance with ritual.
3) The media fallout that followed was absurd. FS1’s bad-guess artist and self-history revisionist Colin Cowherd broadly asked, “What’s the big deal?” He concluded that some student half Filipowski’s size bumped into the Duke player, who should’ve tossed this kid back into the stands.
Cowherd unsurprisingly missed the largest point: All it takes was for one courtstormer to have fallen, creating a pileup of humans. All it takes is one in 1,000 to fall to place dozens in immediate peril. Besides, when did matters of indisputable common sense become debatable?
Des Moines Register columnist Randy Peterson’s leg was broken in a courtstorming after Iowa State, at home, beat Iowa. It happened on ESPN.
Joe Kay — a brilliant, 6-foot-6 student headed to Stanford on an athletic scholarship — was left brain-damaged in a courtstorming after his Arizona high school team won a tournament.
Gerry Plunkett, wife of Stanford and NFL quarterback Jim Plunkett, was in her seat at an Arizona-Stanford game when she was caught from behind in a court-storming. She was left battered, bruised, traumatized.
Will Privette, a North Carolina State student, was knocked out of his wheelchair during a storming. He was rescued before he could be trampled.
A court-storming led to a brawl between New Mexico State players and Utah Valley fans.
ESPN once held an expert’s group discussion on court-storming. Bring it on!
It’s all just good, clean fun.
Condescending House Genius Jay Bilas, after a frightening court-storming at Kansas State following a win over Kansas: “It’s not necessary, but if you want to do it, that’s fine. But have the proper security. … It might be a little dangerous.”
Sure, hire an additional 200 more security guards per home game. Just in case. That should do it!
This week, following the Wake Forest tumult, Bilas: “If they wanted to stop it, they could stop it tomorrow. ... All you have to do is, once they’re on the court, don’t let them off. Just say, ‘You’re all detained,’ and give them all citations or arrest them if you want to. Then courtstormings will stop the next day.”
Perhaps the college arena parking lots will regularly include dozens of police wagons, judges’ kiosks and bail bonds booths in service to transporting or charging, oh, 1,500 students with rioting. Hey, ESPN can be named as co-defendants for years of aiding and abetting such scenes!
ESPN’s Seth Greenberg, the former Virginia Tech coach who was in the studio for Sunday’s Duke-Wake, saw the Kansas State courtstorming as both a fundamental right and obligation:
“That was a legal courtstorming because it was a Top-10 win and a rivalry game. And the place was packed. That’s good for college basketball, good for everyone.”
Was Sunday’s “a legal court-storming”?
Stephen A. Smith, ESPN’s first-in-line fool: “Hire extra security, put ’em by the visitors’ bench, call it a day.” Solved!
Well, that might protect the visitors, but what about the vast majority?
ESPN’s Digger Phelps: “I have no problem with it. … Safety? Sure, you may get one person hurt.”
If lucky, just one hurt at a time ... as long as it isn’t your person.
ESPN’s Dan Dakich, former Indiana and Bowling Green coach, said he loves court-storming — even if one of his players had his knee wrecked during one. ESPN’s since-departed Jalen Rose said he loves it, regardless, too.
Court-storming met with
CBS’s Doug Gottlieb’s approval. Greg Anthony, former CBS hoops analyst, said, “What’s next? Are you going to outlaw tailgating?”
The only one to apply see-it/say-it common sense to the common senselessness was ESPN’s Jay Williams, who said he’s against court-storming because it can be inescapable to those innocently caught in the rush. He called it “dangerous madness.”
Hell, the first talk I had with my daughter after she decided in 2004 to attend Indiana was to avoid the rush toward the court near the ends of close games by moving toward the upper regions of the arena. I had her pledge to head up rather than down.
4) Perhaps the least surprising of these misadventures is that tape of the above court-storming approvals exist for ESPN’s airing. But ESPN has always played selectively dishonest with hard evidence. Consider that its regularly seen “Bobby Knight Goes Nuts” reel disappeared after ESPN hired Knight, returning only after Knight left ESPN.
5) The worst part: ESPN was twice — 2007, then 2013 — warned by ESPN’s “Outside The Lines” investigations against court-storming for its serious consequences, including an update on Stanford-bound Kay who had to relearn how to read, write and speak after he was floored in a court-rush.
Yep, ESPN tried to warn ESPN, but ESPN just wouldn’t listen. It can take years for ESPN to wake up. It once celebrated the most excessively brutal and even illegal hits in football in “He Got Jacked Up!” sessions. Yes, it’s easy — much too easy — to blame ESPN.