No matter what Bill Murray's character did in "Groundhog Day", nothing ever changed.
Phil Connors, an arrogant and self-centered television weather man from Pittsburgh, woke
up on February 2 at 6am to the hit song, "I Got You Babe", by Sonny & Cher.
As you know, he covered the big event in, Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania to see if the
groundhog saw his shadow. Connors hated the event, absolutely despised it. Unfortunately,
it kept happening over and over again. Connors tried driving off cliffs, getting hit by trucks,
and electrocuting himself in the bathtub. Nothing ever happened. 6am came, "I Got You Babe"
played and Connors was covering the event again.
In many ways, I feel like Connors (Murray) when it comes to covering the sports world.
Like Connors, I was in television for many years, working as a sports anchor in Atlanta
and Boston. And I actually went to Punxsutawney, Pa. to cover a high school wrestling
meet back in the day. Just like Connors, I hated covering that event, too. Some people
would say I was arrogant like Connors (Murray), but those were usually the people that
didn't know me or have any sort of clue.
Anyway, it's been Groundhog Day for me for the last month. I wake up every day at 6:30am
to the song, "You're So Vain", by Carly Simon. I don't know why that song comes on for
me, but whatever. And no matter what I tried, the same thing kept happening every day in
the sports world: a salacious scandal that made everybody's head spin.
First it was the Lance Armstrong lying and cheating stuff. It seemed like the same thing
over and over and over again. Lance lied about this, Lance lied about that, Lance is crying
to Oprah, Lance lied about his lies. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Stop the insanity! I can't take
it anymore. I went to Dunkin Donuts and downed 23 Boston Creme donuts, hoping the
spike in sugar to my system, would make all the pain go away. It didn't
I woke up the next day and all this Manti Te'o stuff was breaking. Are you kidding me?
Every day seemed to run into the next. Lennay Kukua, Tuiasosopo, Katie Couric, Are
you gay? Dr. Phil, Tuisasopo's gay but he's not really sure, Manti talking 500 hours on
the phone, but whose voice was whose? Help me, Lordie! Please take me! I tried doing a Triple-Lindy off the Tappen Zee Bridge but even that didn't work.
I woke up the next day at 6:30am and "You're So Vain" was blaring at me once again.
And once again, there was more scandal, this time it was a double-dose. Revered Ray
Lewis was using Deer Antler Spray and A-Rod was injecting PED's again. A-Rod, can
you really be that obtuse? Scandal, scandal, and more scandal. It was driving me insane.
I went up to Mike Tyson, bit his ears off, and hoped that he would knock me senseless
so I could forget about all this nonsense that was happening in the sports world. Nothing
happened. Nothing.
Here we go again. 6:30am, "You're So Vain" and another scandal. Chris Culliver of
the San Francisco 49ers told the media contingent at the Super Bowl that he didn't
want an openly gay man on his team in his locker room. If that happened, he said,
he'd have to "get up and get out of there." Oh, boy. And this came the day after an
ex-49er was arrested for beating up his ex-lover, who just happened to be a man.
Police reports said Kwame Harris tried to rip off the pants and steal the underwear
of his ex-boyfriend outside of a restaurant. You just can't make this stuff up. But
I just couldn't take it anymore. I watched a seasons worth of "Jersey Shore" in
one night, hoping that would somehow end my misery. Unfortunately, it only seemed
to add more.
The next day, the broken record of "You're So Vain" continued. Speaking of vain,
Dan Marino apparently needed some stroking of his ego about seven years ago while
working his job as an NFL analyst for CBS Sports. A 35-year old production assistant
obliged and they had a baby together. Cute. Trouble was, the Hall of Fame QB is
married with six kids. Ooooops. So you can imagine how the new baby played in
the household. More scandal, more drama, please help me.
The Marino scandal ended the month of January, perhaps, the craziest month the
sports world has ever seen. Amazingly, I woke up on February 2, Groundhog Day,
at 8:30am and with "Staying Alive" blaring on my radio. No 6:30am wake-up
call, no "You're So Vain" on the radio, and no scandal. Nice. Oh, so very nice.
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