King Kaufman's Sports Daily

Michael Richards, Michael Vick sing the new apology hit: It ain't me, babe. Plus: Jay Cutler -- Tony Romo 2.0?

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Nov. 28, 2006 | We seem to be moving into a new era of apologies. One of my favorite subjects, public apologies.

We're still squarely in the celebrity non-apology apology era, with one miscreant after another from sports and showbiz stepping up to a microphone or, more often, a law firm fax machine to declare that if anyone may have possibly had the temerity and bad taste to -- if you can believe this -- be offended at the totally benign words and actions of the miscreant, then the miscreant is truly, deeply sorry to have to live in a world with such a bunch of sniveling pansies.

Good times. We're due for another one of those any day now.

But this week we've been treated to a double dose of this new-school apology, the denial of self. Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick and comic actor Michael Richards have both offered what seem to be heartfelt apologies for their recent actions, but with a twist. The twist is: I'm sorry for what I did, but it wasn't me who did it.

Vick, who has been slumping along with his team, flipped off boo-birds in the home crowd Sunday after a loss to the New Orleans Saints. And I'm confident you've heard about Richards' racist tirade at a Hollywood comedy club last week. You've probably seen the video.

"I'm not a racist, that's what so insane about this," Richards told David Letterman and his audience last week, an interesting gambit for someone who had just spent the last few moments of his non-infamy fame screaming the N-word at and about a black heckler and speaking nostalgically about lynching.

I'm pretty sure that if you do those things, you're a racist. But maybe Richards was really saying that he wasn't that guy who did those things. That's the tricky part. Or should I say the Vick-y part.

"People that know me know that's not what I'm about," Vick said about his obscene gestures to the people who pay his salary and who built the dome where he works.

See, it was some other guy, some guy who is all about flipping off the fans, who flipped off the fans. Are you following this? It wasn't Michael Vick. The guy on the stage who shouted racist epithets at the audience was clearly a racist, but since Michael Richards isn't a racist, it clearly wasn't him.

Next page: This is deep, man. We're talking philosophy here. Plus: Will Cutler be the new Romo?