Salon.com > Sports http://www.salon.com Sun, 26 May 2013 01:38:09 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 Radio host tweets rape joke, blames journalists for reporting on it http://www.salon.com/2013/05/22/radio_host_tweets_rape_joke_blames_journalists_for_reporting_on_it_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/22/radio_host_tweets_rape_joke_blames_journalists_for_reporting_on_it_partner/#comments Wed, 22 May 2013 21:50:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13306019 The Daily Dot

In the midst of a crucial game 4 of their Western Conference Finals, marketing geniuses with the Los Angeles Kings made the bold decision to hand the reins of their quarter-million-follower Twitter account to Kevin Ryder, a morning show disc jockey on L.A.'s KROQ.

The decision proved to be a dumb one: Ryder, whose own account maintains very little in the way of a contextual filter, thought it best to tweet out a rape joke after a member of the opposing San Jose Sharks committed a penalty.

The Kings quickly deleted the post, and apologized for it later. Ryder, who didn't do much tweeting from the Kings' account after shilling out the tasteless crack, turned to his personal Twitter account shortly after the game concluded to apologize for his quote—and shift the blame to Deadspin for reporting on it.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/22/radio_host_tweets_rape_joke_blames_journalists_for_reporting_on_it_partner/feed/ 1 David Beckham retiring from soccer http://www.salon.com/2013/05/16/david_beckham_retiring_from_soccer/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/16/david_beckham_retiring_from_soccer/#comments Thu, 16 May 2013 15:41:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13300479 David Beckham, one of the most venerated soccer players in the world, is retiring from professional sports at the end of this season. The BBC reports that Beckham will play his last game with Paris St-Germain on May 26.

From the BBC:

Including PSG's recent Ligue 1 title win, Beckham has won 19 trophies - 10 of them league titles - in a playing career spanning 20 years, and is the only English player to win championships in four countries.

"If you had told me as a young boy I would have played for and won trophies with my boyhood club Manchester United, proudly captained and played for my country over 100 times and lined up for some of the biggest clubs in the world, I would have told you it was a fantasy," he said.

"I'm fortunate to have realised those dreams."

Beckham signed his current contract with PSG in January, but donated all of his salary to charity.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/16/david_beckham_retiring_from_soccer/feed/ 1 Little rituals really do work http://www.salon.com/2013/05/15/little_rituals_really_do_work_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/15/little_rituals_really_do_work_partner/#comments Wed, 15 May 2013 16:37:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13299452 Scientific American


Think about the last time you were about to interview for a job, speak in front of an audience, or go on a first date. To quell your nerves, chances are you spent time preparing – reading up on the company, reviewing your slides, practicing your charming patter. People facing situations that induce anxiety typically take comfort in engaging in preparatory activities, inducing a feeling of being back in control and reducing uncertainty.While a little extra preparation seems perfectly reasonable, people also engage in seemingly less logical behaviors in such situations. Here’s one person’s description from our research:I pound my feet strongly on the ground several times, I take several deep breaths, and I "shake" my body to remove any negative energies.  I do this often before going to work, going into meetings, and at the front door before entering my house after a long day.While we wonder what this person’s co-workers and neighbors think of their shaky acquaintance, such rituals – the symbolic behaviors we perform before, during, and after meaningful event – are surprisingly ubiquitous, across culture and time. Rituals take an extraordinary array of shapes and forms. At times performed in communal or religious settings, at times performed in solitude; at times involving fixed, repeated sequences of actions, at other times not. People engage in rituals with the intention of achieving a wide set of desired outcomes, from reducing their anxiety to boosting their confidence, alleviating their grief to performing well in a competition – or even making it rain.

Recent research suggests that rituals may be more rational than they appear. Why? Because even simple rituals can be extremely effective. Rituals performed after experiencing losses – from loved ones to lotteries – do alleviate grief, and rituals performed before high-pressure tasks – like singing in public – do in fact reduce anxiety and increase people’s confidence. What’s more, rituals appear to benefit even people who claim not to believe that rituals work. While anthropologists have documented rituals across cultures, this earlier research has been primarily observational. Recently, a series of investigations by psychologists have revealed intriguing new results demonstrating that rituals can have a causal impact on people’s thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.

Basketball superstar Michael Jordan wore his North Carolina shorts underneath his Chicago Bulls shorts in every game; Curtis Martin of the New York Jets reads Psalm 91 before every game. And Wade Boggs, former third baseman for the Boston Red Sox, woke up at the same time each day, ate chicken before each game, took exactly 117 ground balls in practice, took batting practice at 5:17, and ran sprints at 7:17. (Boggs also wrote the Hebrew word Chai (“living”) in the dirt before each at bat. Boggs was not Jewish.) Do rituals like these actually improve performance? In one recent experiment, people received either a “lucky golf ball” or an ordinary golf ball, and then performed a golf task; in another, people performed a motor dexterity task and were either asked to simply start the game or heard the researcher say “I’ll cross fingers for you” before starting the game. The superstitious rituals enhanced people’s confidence in their abilities, motivated greater effort – and improved subsequent performance. These findings are consistent with research in sport psychology demonstrating the performance benefits of pre-performance routines, from improving attention and execution to increasing emotional stability and confidence.

Humans feel uncertain and anxious in a host of situations beyond laboratory experiments and sports – like charting new terrain. In the late 1940s, anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski lived among the inhabitants of islands in the South Pacific Ocean. When residents went fishing in the turbulent, shark-infested waters beyond the coral reef, they performed specific rituals to invoke magical powers for their safety and protection. When they fished in the calm waters of a lagoon, they treated the fishing trip as an ordinary event and did not perform any rituals. Malinowski suggested that people are more likely to turn to rituals when they face situations where the outcome is important and uncertain and beyond their control – as when sharks are present.

Rituals in the face of losses such as the death of a loved one or the end of a relationship (or loss of limb from shark bite) are ubiquitous. There is such a wide variety of known mourning rituals that they can even be contradictory: crying near the dying is viewed as disruptive by Tibetan Buddhists but as a sign of respect by Catholic Latinos; Hindu rituals encourage the removal of hair during mourning, while growing hair (in the form of a beard) is the preferred ritual for Jewish males.

People perform mourning rituals in an effort to alleviate their grief – but do they work? Our research suggests they do. In one of our experiments, we asked people to recall and write about the death of a loved one or the end of a close relationship. Some also wrote about a ritual they performed after experiencing the loss:

I used to play the song by Natalie Cole “I miss you like crazy” and cry every time I heard it and thought of my mom.

I looked for all the pictures we took together during the time we dated. I then destroyed them into small pieces (even the ones Ireally liked!), and then burnt them in the park where we firstkissed.

We found that people who wrote about engaging in a ritual reported feeling less grief than did those who only wrote about the loss.

We next examined the power of rituals in alleviating disappointment in a more mundane context: losing a lottery. We invited people into the laboratory and told them they would be part of a random drawing in which they could win $200 on the spot and leave without completing the study. To make the pain of losing even worse, we even asked them to think and write about all the ways they would use the money. After the random draw, the winner got to leave, and we divided the remaining “losers” into two groups. Some people were asked to engage in the following ritual:

Step 1. Draw how you currently feel on the piece of paper onyour desk for two minutes.
Step 2. Please sprinkle a pinch of salt on the paper with your drawing.
Step 3. Please tear up the piece of paper.
Step 4. Count up to ten in your head five times.

Other people simply engaged in a task (drawing how they felt) for the same amount of time. Finally, everyone answered questions about their level of grief, such as “I can’t help feeling angry and upset about the fact that I did not win the $200.” The results? Those who performed a ritual after losing in the lottery reported feeling less grief. Our results suggest that engaging in rituals mitigates grief caused by both life-changing losses (such as the death of a loved one) and more mundane ones (losing a lottery).

Rituals appear to be effective, but, given the wide variety of rituals documented by social scientists, do we know which types of rituals work best? In a recent study conducted in Brazil, researchers studied people who perform simpatias: formulaic rituals that are used for solving problems such as quitting smoking, curing asthma, and warding off bad luck. People perceive simpatias to be more effective depending on the number of steps involved, the repetition of procedures, and whether the steps are performed at a specified time. While more research is needed, these intriguing results suggest that the specific nature of rituals may be crucial in understanding when they work – and when they do not.

Despite the absence of a direct causal connection between the ritual and the desired outcome, performing rituals with the intention of producing a certain result appears to be sufficient for that result to come true. While some rituals are unlikely to be effective – knocking on wood will not bring rain – many everyday rituals make a lot of sense and are surprisingly effective.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/15/little_rituals_really_do_work_partner/feed/ 3 ESPN’s plan to kill net neutrality http://www.salon.com/2013/05/13/espns_plan_to_bust_the_internet/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/13/espns_plan_to_bust_the_internet/#comments Mon, 13 May 2013 17:56:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13297310 If you are someone who likes to watch live sports events on your mobile phone, then it is probably welcome news that ESPN may be in negotiations with a big telecom company to exempt its streaming video services from  caps that limit how much data mobile users can download. Watching the NBA playoffs on your iPhone, without any free Wi-Fi to rely on, is an excellent way to chew speedily through your allotted bandwidth for the month. ESPN, reports the Wall Street Journal, wants to ensure that viewers get to eat as much cake as they want (and, of course, therefore be exposed to as many ESPN-delivered advertisements as possible).

But if you're not an ESPN addict, you might do well to look askance at the news. That's the take of Public Knowledge, a consumer-interest Washington-based public advocacy organization that quickly decried the possible ESPN deal as an obvious violation of the principle of "net neutrality."

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/13/espns_plan_to_bust_the_internet/feed/ 32 NFL commissioner on gay players: Teammates and fans will “respond the right way” http://www.salon.com/2013/05/10/nfl_commissioner_on_gay_players_teammates_and_fans_will_respond_the_right_way/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/10/nfl_commissioner_on_gay_players_teammates_and_fans_will_respond_the_right_way/#comments Fri, 10 May 2013 15:37:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13294826 Following NBA player Jason Collins' recent announcement that he was gay, many athletes from outside of basketball, like former-Ravens linebacker Brendon Ayanbadejo, took to Twitter to congratulate him on the brave decision to come out. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell says he wasn't surprised by the outpouring of support from his league's players, and expects the same kind of response if a member of the NFL comes out.

"I have such great respect for our players," Goodell told NFL.com. "I don't think [a gay player coming out] will just be tolerated, I think it will be accepted. These are individuals who play in our league. We're all different in some fashion, and we're accepting of our differences."

Adding: "To me, if it happens in the league, that's a personal choice that someone would decide to do. But I know their teammates and teams, and I think the fans will all respond the right way."

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/10/nfl_commissioner_on_gay_players_teammates_and_fans_will_respond_the_right_way/feed/ 1 Transgender students press high school athletics to become more inclusive http://www.salon.com/2013/05/07/transgender_students_press_high_school_athletics_to_become_more_inclusive/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/07/transgender_students_press_high_school_athletics_to_become_more_inclusive/#comments Tue, 07 May 2013 13:12:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13291515 A small but growing number of transgender students in the United States have begun to try out for their high school sports teams, leading schools to revise athletics regulations to become more inclusive.

Following the example of the International Olympic Committee and the National Collegiate Athletic Association, school boards and state lawmakers across the country are taking steps to craft policies to allow transgender students to compete on teams that correspond with their gender identities.

As reported the New York Times:

More than half a dozen states, from Washington to Massachusetts, have adopted rules to allow transgender students to compete on teams that correspond with their gender identities rather than the sex listed on their school records. Half a dozen more states are considering similar regulations. And a bill in the Legislature would make California the first to specifically guarantee by law that transgender students... are allowed to play school sports.

“Transgender students deserve equal access to everything in public education, including sports,” said Tom Ammiano, the state assemblyman sponsoring the bill. “You can’t discriminate just because you’re uncomfortable with a young man transitioning to become a young woman.”

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/07/transgender_students_press_high_school_athletics_to_become_more_inclusive/feed/ 18 Jason Collins’ ex-fiancée to write a memoir about his coming out http://www.salon.com/2013/05/06/jason_collins_ex_fiance_to_write_a_memoir_about_his_coming_out/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/06/jason_collins_ex_fiance_to_write_a_memoir_about_his_coming_out/#comments Mon, 06 May 2013 22:07:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13291104 Jason Collins made sports history when he came out as gay in April, prompting an outpouring of support from pretty much everyone but Fox News. Collins, who was once engaged to former WNBA star Carolyn Moos, only revealed his sexual orientation to his former fiancée days before his story was published.

The news prompted Moos to go on a media tour of her own, in which she spoke to TMZ, CNN and other networks of her surprise and support for the star. The personal trainer now has plans to capitalize on her ex's story with a memoir about his coming out experience. From her website:

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/06/jason_collins_ex_fiance_to_write_a_memoir_about_his_coming_out/feed/ 8 179 pro athletes’ reactions to Jason Collins http://www.salon.com/2013/05/06/179_pro_athletes_reactions_to_jason_collins_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/06/179_pro_athletes_reactions_to_jason_collins_partner/#comments Mon, 06 May 2013 18:50:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13290991 Outsports

We'd been told for years that professional athletes are Neanderthals who hate gay people. Yet when asked about the coming out of NBA player Jason Collins last week, the overwhelming majority of pro athletes had not just tolerant, but welcoming, comments.

We've compiled a list of all the pro-athlete reactions we could find. If you find some we haven't yet included, please send them my way at cydzeiglerjr@gmail.com

NBA

Tony Allen: Ain't no problem with it. You are what you are.

John Amaechi: Congratulations to Jason - society couldn't hope for a more eloquent & positive role model

Chris Andersen: "he's going to have a tough road, but you know what, I think he's in the right part of a state of mind that he's going to be ... a tough leader."

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/06/179_pro_athletes_reactions_to_jason_collins_partner/feed/ 9 Chris Broussard doesn’t matter http://www.salon.com/2013/05/02/chris_broussard_does_not_matter_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/05/02/chris_broussard_does_not_matter_partner/#comments Thu, 02 May 2013 16:55:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13287717 The ClassicalEarlier today, Jim Cavan made the case that Chris Broussard's (very unpopular) opinion on Jason Collins' decision to come out as gay does, in fact, matter. This is a mostly ad hominem (towards Broussard, not Cavan) counterpoint to that.

Brendan Flynn: Everyone's all mad at Chris Broussard. Evidently unwilling to Embrace Debate.

David Roth: And Tim Brando! No one wants to hear his truth because he's white and old and successful, and that's not worth a damn thing these days. I've always thought the big issue with regard to how gay athletes was how it made random television guys feel. Are they proud? Are they angry? We need to know about this, it's the most important thing.

Brendan: Really interesting to hear Broussard's thoughts on adultery and children out of wedlock as it relates to gays. Really looking forward to his #TruthToPower moment on all the other sinners he's covered.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/05/02/chris_broussard_does_not_matter_partner/feed/ 4 Jason Collins’ ex-fiancé: I didn’t know he was gay http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_ex_fiance_i_didnt_know_he_was_gay/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_ex_fiance_i_didnt_know_he_was_gay/#comments Tue, 30 Apr 2013 21:12:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13286052 Jason Collins made sports history this week, in a splashy cover for Sports Illustrated, when he became the first openly gay male professional athlete, drawing praise from fellow athletes, journalists and politicians, including President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton.

But for years, Collins, who came out with the simple line “I’m a 34-year-old NBA center. I’m black. And I’m gay,” was so guarded about his sexual orientation that he even kept it hidden from his ex-fiancée, former WNBA player Carolyn Moos.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_ex_fiance_i_didnt_know_he_was_gay/feed/ 14 I cried when Jason Collins came out http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/i_cried_when_jason_collins_came_out_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/i_cried_when_jason_collins_came_out_partner/#comments Tue, 30 Apr 2013 20:45:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13286012 Outsports

I'm not afraid to admit it: I cried Monday. A couple times.

It's not that the coming out of Jason Collins is somehow the answer to all of our prayers or that those who continue to perpetuate homophobia in sports will now silence their quieting roar. I just kept getting emotional thinking about how far we'd come -- those of us who've been fighting this battle for so many years -- to now see something that many thought was impossible.

I thought about Dave Kopay. The former NFL player was the first former professional athlete to come out publicly when he shared his story in 1975. At the time, he expected a wave of athletes to follow, yet he hasn't even seen a trickle of men take his lead.

I thought about Pat Griffin and Helen Carroll and Sue Rankin and all the women who have pushed the sports world for so many years, long before I even came out, to accept them for who they are.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/i_cried_when_jason_collins_came_out_partner/feed/ 1 Jason Collins: Out of the NBA? http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_out_of_the_nba/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_out_of_the_nba/#comments Tue, 30 Apr 2013 16:32:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13285629 Yesterday, NBA journeyman Jason Collins became the first active American athlete in a major team sport to come out. There have been gay athletes before, whether active in individual sports, like Martina Navratilova; or retired from their league, like basketball player John Amaechi. But at the risk of reducing one man’s major life-decision to a sociology experiment, Collins is the test case everyone has been waiting for.

With his self-penned Sports Illustrated cover story, Collins forces a discussion about all the hypotheticals that have been bandied about for the last few years: How will players deal with a gay teammate in the locker room? How will fans feel about rooting for him? Will the insertion of an out athlete into the American sports mainstream change the discourse around gay rights in this country?

Luckily, Collins, in a sense, is the ideal candidate. And the NBA is the perfect choice for the first league to enter into this uncharted territory.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_out_of_the_nba/feed/ 7 Jason Collins calls coming out “mind-boggling” experience http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_calls_coming_out_mind_boggling_experience/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_calls_coming_out_mind_boggling_experience/#comments Tue, 30 Apr 2013 12:48:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13285472 With the Monday announcement that he is gay, NBA free agent Jason Collins broke a historic barrier in men's professional sports. And the experience of being the first active out player in major team sports has been "mind-boggling," he told George Stephanopoulos on ABC News.

"That's kind of mind-boggling. I think I talk about that. That, you know, I never set out to be the first," he said.

"You're sort of waiting around for somebody else to … raise their hand," Collins went on to explain. "I'm ready to raise my hand but, you know, you still look around like, 'OK, come on, guys.' It's time for someone else in the room to raise their hand and say, 'You know what? Yeah, so big deal. I can still play basketball. I can still help the team win, and that's what's most important.'"

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_calls_coming_out_mind_boggling_experience/feed/ 3 Jason Collins: Black — and gay — like me http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_black_and_gay_like_me/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_black_and_gay_like_me/#comments Tue, 30 Apr 2013 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13285172 I’d never heard of Jason Collins when I saw a friend's Facebook status earlier today announcing the news that he was gay. (I prefer college basketball over the NBA.) As I googled his name to find out more, one thought kept running through my mind: "Please be black."

I wanted Jason Collins to be black, because I knew what it would mean to black gay youth in this country. I wanted him to be black because I’m hyper-aware that the list of influential LGBT celebrities like Rachel Maddow, Anderson Cooper and Neil Patrick Harris is very white. Most important, I wanted Jason Collins to be black because I know exactly what it's like to be a gay teenager with dark brown skin who comes out but cannot find anyone gay who looks like you on television. Or in magazines. Or on the news.  These days, when I lecture about LGBT issues on college campuses and various other events, people often tell me I’m the only black person they’ve ever seen speak out for gay rights. The pride I feel is mixed with uneasiness because I wish that weren't the case.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/30/jason_collins_black_and_gay_like_me/feed/ 44 ESPN sportswriter Chris Broussard: Jason Collins is “walking in open rebellion to God” http://www.salon.com/2013/04/29/espn_sportswriter_chris_broussard_jason_collins_is_walking_in_open_rebellion_to_god/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/29/espn_sportswriter_chris_broussard_jason_collins_is_walking_in_open_rebellion_to_god/#comments Mon, 29 Apr 2013 20:37:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13284947 During a Monday segment on ESPN's "Outside the Lines," sportswriter Chris Broussard denounced Jason Collins, the first openly gay male athlete in the history of major team sports, for "living in unrepentant sin."

Broussard went on to accuse Collins of not being Christian and "walking in open rebellion to God":

Personally, I don’t believe that you can live an openly homosexual lifestyle or an openly, like premarital sex between heterosexuals. If you’re openly living that type of lifestyle, then the Bible says you know them by their fruits. It says that, you know, that’s a sin. If you’re openly living in unrepentant sin, whatever it may be, not just homosexuality, whatever it maybe, I believe that’s walking in open rebellion to God and to Jesus Christ. So I would not characterize that person as a Christian because I don’t think the bible would characterize them as a Christian.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/29/espn_sportswriter_chris_broussard_jason_collins_is_walking_in_open_rebellion_to_god/feed/ 109 NBA player Jason Collins comes out, Twitter reacts http://www.salon.com/2013/04/29/nba_player_jason_collins_comes_out_twitter_reacts/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/29/nba_player_jason_collins_comes_out_twitter_reacts/#comments Mon, 29 Apr 2013 16:36:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13284735 NBA free agent Jason Collins is the first active male athlete to come out as gay in the history of professional sports. Many on Twitter viewed this very big news as, appropriately enough, very big news.

A sampling of the cheers for Collins and questions about what's next for gay athletes in professional sports:

[embedtweet id="328902203379175425"]

[embedtweet id="328902277303775233"]

[embedtweet id="328902367657472000"]

[embedtweet id="328902429078855682"]

[embedtweet id="328901917507989504"]

[embedtweet id="328903558609125377"]

[embedtweet id="328891585339203585"]

[embedtweet id="328912978055413761"]

[embedtweet id="328905675889598465"]

[embedtweet id="328907441746108416"]

[embedtweet id="328903861307838464"]

[embedtweet id="328904963008913408"]

[embedtweet id="328894970440327169"]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/29/nba_player_jason_collins_comes_out_twitter_reacts/feed/ 33 Thousands run in NYC, elsewhere to support Boston http://www.salon.com/2013/04/21/thousands_run_in_nyc_elsewhere_to_support_boston/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/21/thousands_run_in_nyc_elsewhere_to_support_boston/#comments Sun, 21 Apr 2013 17:15:00 +0000 http://www.salon.com/2013/04/21/thousands_run_in_nyc_elsewhere_to_support_boston/ NEW YORK (AP) — Thousands of runners in New York and across the world are showing their solidarity with the victims of the Boston Marathon bombings.

More than 6,000 runners finished Sunday's Run for the Parks, a four-mile run in Central Park that was planned before Monday's attacks.

Organizers sold "I Run for Boston" T-shirts with proceeds going to the One Fund Boston, the official fund for bombing victims.

Other "Run for Boston" events have taken place worldwide, with many runners wearing blue and yellow, the official Boston Marathon colors.

More than 500 runners gathered Saturday in St. Louis for a Unity Run. In San Francisco, about 400 people ran Friday along the Embarcadero. A run christened "Boston Strong San Diego" is planned for Monday.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/21/thousands_run_in_nyc_elsewhere_to_support_boston/feed/ 1 We can’t make every marathon safe http://www.salon.com/2013/04/17/we_cant_make_every_marathon_safe/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/17/we_cant_make_every_marathon_safe/#comments Wed, 17 Apr 2013 21:52:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13273977 When Frank Shorter won the Olympic marathon in Munich in 1972, he ushered in the running boom. Until then, distance running was an oddity practiced by knobby-kneed guys wearing long underwear who spat freely on the side of the road. But it was the decision to move the New York City marathon out of Central Park and onto the streets of the five boroughs in 1976 that brought running to the masses. At first Fred Lebow, the president of the New York Road Runners Club, was opposed to the idea of leaving the confines of the park, where runners completed four loops under relatively controlled circumstances (in those days the greatest danger was being mugged). Eventually, however, he was convinced that a one-time event to celebrate the country’s bicentennial was worth the logistical headaches. The rest, as they say, is history.

Now, after the tragic events at the Boston Marathon, there is already talk about limiting access and restricting the routes a road race can run. But that would be a mistake.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/17/we_cant_make_every_marathon_safe/feed/ 1 Sports fandom doesn’t have to be miserable http://www.salon.com/2013/04/15/sports_fandom_doesnt_have_to_be_miserable_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/15/sports_fandom_doesnt_have_to_be_miserable_partner/#comments Mon, 15 Apr 2013 16:45:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13271225 The Classical

“This really should be the end of it,” someone I wouldn’t exactly call a friend said to me about the Cleveland Cavaliers. “Or something has gone horribly wrong.” He’s talking about, or more accurately issuing ultimatums about, the rebuild through which both the Cavs and their fans have suffered over the past three years. You know the one: LeBron left, team ripped off the longest losing streak in NBA history, Kyrie Irving teleported in from a planet where people believe in themselves but have very vulnerable lower bodies, and that about catches us up. There is reason for hope, but the team is still, at this stage, highly capable of getting blown out by 18 points in Detroit. This means some fans consider Cavs GM Chris Grant to be on the hot seat. They are not the ones whose hands are on the temperature dial, but they are no less certain for that.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/04/15/sports_fandom_doesnt_have_to_be_miserable_partner/feed/ 0 National Hockey League announces initiative for gay athletes http://www.salon.com/2013/04/11/national_hockey_league_announces_initiative_for_gay_athletes/ http://www.salon.com/2013/04/11/national_hockey_league_announces_initiative_for_gay_athletes/#comments Thu, 11 Apr 2013 20:35:00 +0000 http://www.railrode.net/?p=13268358 The National Hockey League announced on Thursday a partnership with gay rights group You Can Play Project and an awareness-building initiative on gay issues for its coaches and players.

As reported by The New York Times:

You Can Play will help run seminars for N.H.L. rookies to educate them on gay issues and make resources and personnel available to each team, as desired. The league and union will also work with You Can Play to integrate the project into their behavioral health program, enabling players to seek counseling regarding matters of sexual orientation confidentially. Burke said the joint venture would also step forward when players make homophobic remarks.

Patrick Burke, a scout for the Philadelphia Flyers and a founder of You Can Play, applauded the partnership, as he explained to the Times:

We have players from around the world, and a lot of those players are from countries that are seen as more progressive on LGBT issues. So I don’t think it’s unreasonable or strange to think that the N.H.L. and the N.H.L.P.A. are driving this, in part because our players tend to be more comfortable with this issue.

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