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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">SPORT AND SOCIETY FOR ARETE </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">MARCH 15, 2022 </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">Just in case you missed the big news, March Madness is upon us. This year, for the first time, there are two versions of March Madness: one for the Men’s Tournament and one for the Women’s Tournament.
Previously, March Madness referred only to the men. This change is the result of the NCAA being shamed by having the inequalities of facilities at last year’s tournaments exposed on social media. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">For years, meaning since the NCAA started holding a women’s tournament and since they put the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) out of business, the NCAA has done its best to
treat women as second-class athletes and not as equals, as required by Title IX. So let the hype and hoopla spread like the disease that it is to the women’s tournament. Is this the meaning of equality? </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">As has been the case for several years now, the month of madness began with the conference tournaments that have little reason for being other than to milk the television cow for increased revenue. One
major side effect is to devalue the regular season and muddy the setting of tournament brackets. The false air of excitement seems to fool many fans who get all excited about these conference championships that override the regular season championships. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">At times, one of more of these extraneous games can produce a bit of madness on their own. At the Northeast Conference championship, with Bryant leading Wagner with five minutes remaining, a brawl broke
out behind the Wagner bench. Fans threw trash and water bottles onto the floor, and some Wagner players had to be held back when trying to head into the stands. The game was held up for thirty minutes; one arrest was made; one coach ejected; and several fans
removed from the arena. The good news is that the Bryant Bulldogs got their first bid into the NCAA Tournament in school history while making a significant contribution to March Madness. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">On the men’s side of the tournament, the final four will be held in New Orleans. Although LSU has been chosen as one of the tournament teams, they are not likely to get to New Orleans. If they do, it
will be without their head coach who was fired on Saturday for leading his team to NCAA violations involving payments to players. I am not sure if this is the first time a team celebrated their selection for the tournament with the firing of their coach, but
it certainly fits the theme of March Madness. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">And what would the madness of March be without another sexual assault charge coming from inside an athletic program? This time, a former athletic trainer at San Jose State University was charged by the
Justice Department of having sexually abused four women he was treating for injuries. Less than a year ago the university agreed to pay fifteen women 3.3 million dollars for incidents that occurred between 2017 and 2020 involving the same behavior. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">March Madness expressed itself in other venues outside the NCAA world. Even before the issuing of the Tournament teams and brackets on Sunday, to the surprise of only the extremely gullible or out of
touch, Tom Brady announced, after forty-one days, retirement was not for him. So TB12 returns to Tampa Bay creating a madness of his own. The entire Bucs Nation is now rejoicing. Well, not the entire Bucs Nation. One person who paid a whopping 518,000 dollars
for the last ball Brady threw for a touchdown was dealing with a form of madness of his own. If they were still doing those Excedrin Headache commercials, this high-end collector might have been able to recoup some of that madness money. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">What looked like madness in the form of the baseball lockout came to an end about the same time. This will set off another form of madness with an avalanche of free-agent signings and trades with salary
numbers that will look like madness to some. On Sunday and Monday, the action was already at s high level. Then, on Monday came the maddest of the madness as the Atlanta Braves traded for Oakland first baseman Matt Olsen. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">Looking to shoot for the top, the Braves have shot themselves in the foot, as the trade basically announces that free agent Freddie Freeman will not be returning to the Braves. The man, who has been
a leader on and off the field, the face of the Braves franchise for the last decade, who has been as beloved as the great pitching staff of the 1990s, and who, in many ways has been emblematic of the team as Hank Aaron once was, has been told to take a hike.
Now this is really a vintage form of March Madness. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">On Wednesday of last week, March 9, the NFL made another contribution to March Madness when news broke that Dallas owner and self-referenced football genius was being sued by a 26-year- old Dallas woman
who claimed Jones is her biological father. At age one, the girl was bound by a confidentiality agreement signed by her mother. While denying paternity, Jones paid out a 375,000-dollar settlement in exchange for the secrecy. The one- year-old, now twenty-six,
is seeking to be released from the terms of the agreement. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">Then on Friday, in a new development in the Deshaun Watson case, a grand jury declined to indict Watson any of the charges of sexual assault or harassment made against him by twenty-two women. This apparently
seemed like great news to several NFL teams who have begun explore a trade for Watson despite the fact that he still faces civil suits from at least some of these women, not to mention possible league discipline. This form of madness will now fall into the
purview of NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell who has yet to make a ruling on this case. The fact that teams have rushed to explore a deal for Watson may tell us more than anyone wants to know about NFL standards. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">Certainly, there is more madness out there in the first few days of March than is needed. More is likely to come as the calendar moves on. It is difficult to know when or where it will stop. Of course,
some will argue that March is no different in its madness than any other month. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">When we look back on this year’s March Madness, we may conclude that this year was different in that it began on February 24, with one of the worst possible forms of madness. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">On Sport and Society this is Dick Crepeau reminding you that you don’t have to be a good sport to be a bad loser. </span></p>
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<span style="font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Courier New"">Copyright 2022 by Richard C. Crepeau
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