DATE: Monday, April 28, 1997                TAG: 9704280146

SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C1   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Column 

SOURCE: Bob Molinaro 

                                            LENGTH:   57 lines

ATHLETES ARE JUST PRODUCTS, LIKE ALL THOSE THEY ENDORSE

Whether you're talking about Tiger Woods or Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky or Pete Sampras, today's athlete stands for nothing besides the national anthem.

Some may find this regrettable, but there it is.

There are people who want Michael Jordan to express an opinion about the Asian sweatshops which make the Nike shoes that make him rich. They want him to show signs of having a shred of social conscience.

Jordan says nothing. This irritates some people. And yet, we are none the poorer for his silence.

Nothing any athlete, even Jordan or Tiger Woods, has to say about anything is important.

Jordan's cold, calculated corporate approach to social issues, whether in South Central L.A. or the Far East, reminds us of Larry Holmes, the boxer, who once said that he used to be black but now he was rich.

Jordan, in fact, does stand for something. He stands for the products he endorses. Some would argue that Jordan, like Woods and many other famous athletes, are corporate creations. But they are more than that. They are creations of a country that believes only money talks.

That's what today's famous athletes do: They let the money do the talking for them. This is not necessarily a bad thing, either.

Arthur Ashe was the last athlete worth listening to. Does Bill Bradley, the Democratic voice, still count as an athlete? If so, then he's the other exception to the rule.

Otherwise, everything else you hear from athletes is so much blather.

Two or three years ago, at an NBA All-Star Game, somebody caught Charles Barkley on tape saying he hated white people.

``That's why I hate ----ing white people,'' was the exact quote.

The point in bringing this up is to note that, after the usual knee-jerk reaction by some in the media, the story quickly went away.

Barkley hates white people? He golfs with white people. He's played golf with Dan Quayle, who is whiter than Pat Boone.

Charles isn't a racist, he's a goof. The comment was just his poor attempt at humor. He's what's known in the business as a good quote. He's flippant and often amusing. But nobody takes him seriously. Nobody ever has.

In a roundabout way, this brings me back to Fuzzy Zoeller (Everything these days brings us back to Fuzzy Zoeller). Initially, Zoeller excused his comments about Woods by reminding everyone that he's a jokester.

True enough. But more to the point, he's also irrelevant. No amount of news coverage or angry screeds can change that.

The world does not care what Fuzzy Zoeller thinks. Or if he thinks. The world beyond the golf course does not even know who Fuzzy is.

As proven by Al Campanis and Jimmy the Greek, reputations can be ruined forever with one idiotic comment made on camera. But while these incidents kick up a sandstorm of controversy and keep editorialists busy, they do not change the world, not even a small corner of it.

The games we play and follow serve a useful purpose. But when we try to use sports as a forum for social debate, the results are often, well, fuzzy.

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu