"Ethics and Sports"

As the annual Super Bowl approaches, once again we realize that sports is big business. Millions of dollars will be invested in commercials on Sunday. Betting in Las Vegas, as well as in thousands of other venues, will be the largest of any sporting event this year. The viewership on Sunday will not only be important for the commercials that are shown, but will make money for hundreds of other people. All of this hoopla will be created by twenty-two men on the field at any one time chasing a pigskin. It seems like it has gotten totally out of proportion to the nature of sport. What ever happened to the good old days of the Ice Bowl?

At the same time there are many other ethical issues in sports today. The colossal mismanagement of the Olympics, the tragic results of head injuries in football, and the use of anabolic steroids and illegal substances in baseball all raise ethical issues about sports. They lead bystanders to wonder “what happened to the innocence of games?” What happened to the days when you could sit down on Sunday afternoon and watch a three-hour game and come away feeling refreshed? What ever happened to those good old days?

Today is also the signing day for NCAA football. Players, families, and their agents often make videos and other personal media to aid the high school athlete’s attempt to land the best college possible for his career. Of course, the goal is to use that college career to make a fortune in the National Football League. But the seventeen or eighteen-year-old is already sacrificing a good share of his life choices for the game of football where so much is uncertain and even dangerous. What ever happened to good sense?

Then there are those smaller areas in sports where ethics comes into play. A current sideline skirmish is taking place between a former player who analyzes the game of basketball and the unquestionably best player in basketball today. Recently sports commentator Charles Barkley and player LeBron James have expressed their differences over a comment that Barkley made about James. Barkley called James out about “whining” that his National Basketball Tea, the Cleveland Cavaliers, is not doing enough to help them repeat as champions this season. James took offense at Barkley’s comment, taking the superior high road of being a current player and “the new sheriff in town.” He then made the conversation personal by attacking Barkley’s past antics when he was a player. In response Barkley took the high road and did not respond personally to James, saying they likely just need to agree to disagree. Although an ethical view would say that Charles Barkley demonstrated professional ethics, does it really matter in view of the rest of what is happening today?

The skirmish itself is indicative of the world we live in—the days of the 24/7 sports cycle. With talk shows where people scream their points of view and tweets during games that insult other people, it is clear that the Barkley-James skirmish is not an isolated situation of disagreement. The idea of sports is that it will serve to take people’s minds off of what is happening in the real world. But now in the days in which we live, the anxiety of living in a precariously uncertain world seems to carry over to sports. What ever happened to the escape of sports?

There is no turning back. The Super Bowl game will go on and millions of dollars will exchange hands. Even one of the good guys, recently retired play-by-play announcer Brent Musburger, will soon be exclusively covering betting and sports! People will chase their dream for something that at worst can alter their life or even kill them. The “one-on-ones” will be followed by “shouting matches,” perhaps all for the good of television ratings. A sports fan could just turn it all off, giving up on “the love of the game.” But then what would we do on Sunday afternoon?