Why are they called “World Champions”?

In sports, teams work hard all season to get to the promise land, to the final championship series of their respective sport and when they win it all, gladly call themselves champions. In the US, when teams win their leagues and are handed the coveted trophy, they are deemed “World Champions”. Except there is one problem, they are not. How can they receive the title of best in the world, when they only play teams from other states in the US? Why are the New York Giants of the NFL (NATIONAL football league) called World Champions? They beat a team from Massachusetts, which is ironically from a region called New England, but not the European England. All the teams they beat to get to the Super Bowl were from one of the 50 states. Plus, outside the US, the real “football” players around the world or “Soccer” players to us, actually play other countries to win it all. In Canada, for example, there is the Canadian Football League, which has teams from all parts of Canada play, each other. When a team wins the Grey Cup, they are called CFL Champions. The champion defeated other teams within its countries borders and they got an award
Why are the Boston Celtics World Champions? It is a fact that they did beat a team from a city 3000 miles away, but Los Angeles is part of the United States. There is an organization called, FIBA. The abbreviation 'FIBA' derives from the French 'Fédération Internationale de Basketball Amateur'. A ton of countries are represented in FIBA, even the USA; and the winner could definitely declare itself the champion of the World. Boston did not get a chance to play Bosnia or Germany in the NBA finals, only LA. Yet we as American sports fans still call them the “World Champion Boston Celtics”.
What made the Boston Red Sox the best baseball team in the World? Did we miss the telecast of them defeating the Yomiuri Giants from Japan? They didn’t even play the one team outside the US in the playoffs, the Toronto Blue Jays, to have a slight argument for being World Champions. Also, just having teams from Canada, doesn’t mean it can represent the rest of the World in competitive sports. The name, the World Series, is even more confusing. It sounds like there will be a series of games where teams from all around the World will compete for a trophy, symbolizing their status as best on Earth. What it really sounds like, is that America is the embodiment of all things baseball and no other country would have a chance to challenge that, so Americans can then assume that as long as one team from the US beats another, they are the best in the world by default. There are plenty of international players in Major League Baseball. Countries like Cuba, Korea, Dominican Republic, Taiwan and many others are represented in baseball every game, even as recent as this years World Series. SO there is an international aspect to the Series, but no country alone wins anything, one of the States here in the US gets that honor.
Securing the title of “World Champion” in a sport played only by American teams is somewhat of a debatable topic. Some might say that because the sports played here are only played here, the team that wins is the best in the world. Others might say that it is unfair to deem yourself the worlds best until you beat an international team within the sport. Still, others don’t care either way. Imagine this, the Hamburg Sea Devils of NFL Europa win the league championship series or what is called the “World Bowl” and then parade around the streets of Germany as “World Champions”. They succeeded in defeating the Amsterdam Admirals and then the Frankfurt Galaxy en route to the trophy. Are they the real “World Champions”? Are the New York Giants the real champions? Should they play each other in a real world bowl to see who really is the best? We’ll never know because the NFL closed the book on its European league last year due to significant monetary losses. They replaced it with regular season games between NFL teams over seas in Europe. Maybe that would be the answer? Have American teams play over seas in other countries, so that when it comes time to crown a world champion, there will be no argument as to why or how. Major League Baseball did it this past year, with the Oakland A’s and the Boston Red Sox playing in Japan. The National Basketball Association did it as well, but not during the regular season, it was two pre season games where the Heat, Nets, Hornets and Wizards competed in four European cities. So the answer to why they are called world champions lies within the extension of American sports into other countries. By representing itself and presenting its product over seas, American sports as a whole is making a strong case for being able to say, “Our teams are the best in the world”. It also helps that the athletes who play these American sports are enormous celebrities worldwide and are more recognizable then most international politicians. The fan base has stretched so far for these athletes that other countries are willing to double some of their salaries to play overseas permanently. If that were to happen, organizations might follow their players and we all might see a change of scenery for sports, opening the door to a fully international field of play and creating a real World Champion.

Your New York Knicks!!

For years in NY, the Knicks have relied heavily on the big man and on the center position to be the focal point of their offense. Starting in the late 1970’s and right up until the end of last season, the Knicks’ offensive style of play has been a half court, post up type of offense. From Bill Cartwright, to Patrick Ewing, the team has always focused on them, getting things going through the biggest guy on the court. That type of play is a slower kind of offense, utilizing the clock and setting up a controlled situation. Now with the addition of a new coach, Mike D’antoni, that whole entire scheme is getting thrown out the window. D’antoni coached for four seasons in Phoenix, prior to coming to NY. There in Phoenix, the Suns averaged 110.07 points per game, that is good for third highest in the league over that span. D’antoni’s coaching stems from a run and gun philosophy, allowing any player who has an open shot to take it at will. He wants his teams to get the ball across the half court line under 7 seconds. He also wants his teams to play fast and aggressive, scoring as much as they can. When D’antoni has had the right players in his system, he has been very successful and it showed in the win column where he averaged 59 wins a season in Phoenix. After finally getting out from under the Isaiah Thomas fire blanket, the Knicks as an organization can start new in this upcoming 2008-2009 season. They have a new coach, as well as a new GM, Donnie Walsh, a New York City native. Walsh has come into a position of power with the future as bright as he wants it to be. Walsh can do no wrong this season due to the fact that he is following such an abysmal GM and President like Thomas. Isaiah left the team in turmoil, failing in all aspects of his job that resulted in a playoff draught and a significant drop in attendance never seen at Madison Square Garden. Walsh has tried desperately to separate himself from all of that and he has vowed to bring the Knicks back from the dead while he is in NY.
D’antoni has made it clear that every player on the team, regardless of contract and star power, is auditioning for their role. Nobody is a lock for a starting position or for playing time. He has said that whoever can get up and down the court the fastest, passing and scoring as much as they can, will see the most action. The Knicks, however, didn’t make that many changes to their roster to give D’antoni players ready to perform up to his standards. The Knicks acquired Chris Duhon; a point guard who didn’t play much in Chicago and was a pass first, shoot second guard at Duke University. He is really a back up and there are questions about whether he can lead a team and orchestrate the offense. With the 6th overall pick, they did draft a 19-year-old Forward from Italy, named Danillo Gallinari. Gallinari is a player who could flourish in D’antoni’s system when he’s healthy; unfortunately he has begun his American Basketball career on the disabled list with back problems. So, the Knicks haven’t really changed at all from last year to this year, leaving little room for the coach to maneuver his lineup into something he would like to see everyday. The Knicks predominantly have never been a team that consistently ran up and down the court, scoring at will. None of the players currently on the roster have been on a team like the one D’antoni wants to mold this one into. It really takes good team chemistry to create the mixture D’antoni wants to serve up to the league and the Knicks have not shown any signs of that in the last four years. So the question still remains, why D’antoni?
There is a lot of truth to what D’antoni preaches. He believes that any player that puts his best out on the court, game after game, will have the chance to do well under him. His approach, to coaching and to the game itself, is structured in a loose and relaxed manner. He smiles a lot on the sidelines and doesn’t get too tight about losses. That could be the reason for his hiring. Loosening things up at the Garden would be a real breathe of fresh of air, after all the tension during the Isaiah years. He does have a tough task though, in trying to turn the ship around in New York. Although, if he gains enough trust from the players and if they reciprocate with enough effort, things will only get better. There is another problem. This new situation can be a recipe for disaster if the team doesn’t win very much, early on in the season. Knicks fans have endured too many losing seasons, witnessing their team become the joke of the NBA and it can get real ugly if things don’t change. NY sports fans in general are very passionate about the teams they root for. Since the 1991-1992 season and up until the 2003-2004 season, the Knicks made the playoffs. But once Isaiah Thomas began his stay here in NYC that all came to an end and the Knicks have now failed to reach the postseason for five straight years. It is going to be hard to fill seats at the Garden, especially with the prices where they are and the economy where it is. Even though Thomas is gone, the damage he did still remains and Donnie Walsh and Mike D’antoni will have to try to fix it all, while hoping to lure fans back.

Hey, YOU SUCK!

In the last decade or so, fans of every sport in almost every country have come to use the screaming phrase, "You Suck!" as their battle cry towards their favorite teams rivals and opponents. In American sports, especially, fans in stadiums around the country have now gone past just yelling this intelligent put down, they have gotten more specific. "Jeter Sucks!" "Manny Sucks!" Favre Sucks!" Cincinnati Sucks!" and “Other Fans Suck!” These negative and obnoxious chants have made the people who blurt them out look and sound like morons. How much knowledge of a sport does someone have to have, to come up with the term, "BLANK Sucks!”? None. Any fan can attend a sporting event and randomly pick a player, choose one of the cities the two teams are from or just pick another fan and scream that he or she thinks they "Suck". The problem with that is usually what happens next. The evocations of others to either join in or disagree. This then creates the always-popular chaotic mob effect. One person screams, another one screams back and a chain reaction occurs and all the fans soon begin taking sides, turning the stands into an angry sea of drunken looters. While I was at a New York Mets game, sitting in the upper deck, I noticed in front of us, that a fan had told more then one person or player that they "Sucked". This fan was gradually getting intoxicated and he felt that everyone and everything around him "Sucked" and he let us all know very loudly. At first, I kind of laughed it off with my friend, with both of us agreeing that there is no place like New York. But then, as the game went on and this fan inhaled more and more beers, it started to get annoying. A person in a white hat would walk by and the fan would yell, "White hats suck!” Then a woman with a Polo shirt on would walk by and the fan would of course yell, "Polo shirts suck!" No one was safe around our upper deck section and neither were our attention spans. My friend and I began to lose focus on the game and could only hear what this creative individual was spewing. We both looked at each other and knew that if we reprimanded this guy, we too would "SUCK!" and since the stadium was sold out, we had nowhere else to move to. Everyone likes to get a "You suck!" chant in there somewhere during a game, but this fan in particular over stepped his boundaries and ruined the fun. The most interesting thing about this fan was that he was a Yankees fan, who wasn't there to cheer on the Mets, the Braves or anything concerning the games. He was just there to get drunk and yell, "You suck" to everything. The chants finally came to an end when this fan told the wrong woman that "She sucked" and ended up meeting her husband, who didn't agree. Security then escorted all three of them out of the stadium, with the innocent bystanders whom the fan thought "Sucked", missing out on a great ninth inning comeback from the Mets. How much did this fan accomplish when he declared that all things "SUCKED"?? Did he make a statement as a smart sports enthusiast?
When a referee or official like, Ed Hochuli, blows a huge call during a crucial time in a game, a fan has every right to tell him from the seats that “He Sucks!” When a player like, Sage Rosenfels, tries to hurdle two linemen instead of just laying down on the football to get his team a win, he too must be told, “He sucks!” There are so many rules and plays in sports, giving fans numerous choices to yell about. Telling another fan that they "Suck" because they have on a yellow windbreaker is not one of them. Sports have always been and always will be something for fans and non-athletes to argue, scream, fight and agree on. Sporting events are not outlets for people to insult others just for the heck of it. I have been to too many games where I am embarrassed by the way other humans act and sound. When someone clearly has no clue what they are talking about and just compensates for it by screaming profanities and “You Suck!” at random things, it takes away from the enjoyment of sports. Americans are prone to following the mob; this is ever so present at sporting events. But the mob can’t be led into the fire by someone with no regard for the aspects of intelligent heckling.