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发帖数: 764 | 1 A parable about a children's game and elders in authority.
By Bill Dwyre
December 2, 2010|11:43 p.m.
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A parable …
Once upon a time, long ago, in a land known for sports and cattle grazing,
several dozen children picked out a pasture to play their favorite game.
Their game was known as pie-pushing, and each team used tree branches to
poke and push the pie past a goal.
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This was a time long before naming rights, agents and shoe companies. The
children played their favorite sport because they liked to run around and
play. No other reason. Centuries later, in the evolution of sport, that
concept would be officially voided.
After the children had played a few games, parents decided the game would
need rules and a governing body. They appointed elders from the community,
all of whom smoked big cigars. The elders decided they needed to be more
closely involved, so they built an ivory tower next to the pasture, where
they could sit on high and watch the games. Soon, they had the tower catered.
After a few games, the elders decided they would name themselves. Authority
needed identity, they said.
And so they called themselves the NCAA. That stood for National Cowpie
Athletic Assn.
Thing went smoothly for awhile. They even upgraded the cigars to Cubans, in
exchange for putting the cigar company's decal on each of the children's
tree branches.
But as in all things, along came a crisis. The elders were unhappy, but they
knew that, with authority came responsibility. From this was born the
phrase: There are No Free Cigars.
One of the star players was Little Reggie. He had moves with a pie en route
to the goal that few had seen before. But Little Reggie's parents had
violated the elders' rules by accepting a pig for their farm. In exchange,
the man who gave them the pig got exclusive rights to shop around Little
Reggie to professional cowpie leagues. Under the elders' rules, a pig was an
extra benefit.
But it was long after Little Reggie had joined a pro cowpie team that the
elders acted, ruling that all the victories where Little Reggie played would
be voided. All the other players and parents who had participated in, or
watched those games, were ordered to forget them. Cowpie history books
became a bunch of torn pages.
The elders were delighted with themselves. They had been tough, decisive.
Some were invited to speak at Rotary luncheons.
Then it happened again, right before the cowpie playoffs.
This time, it was Little Cam, also a player who could do magical things with
the cowpie. The elders learned that, before Little Cam had decided which
team to play for, his father had solicited offers for as many as three pigs
as payment for Little Cam's services.
This time, they did not penalize Little Cam. They let him keep playing. They
ruled that there was no way to prove that Little Cam knew his father was
offering him around for pigs. They reasoned that Little Cam and his dad
probably talked only about his abacus class at the dinner table.
A local sportswriter, writing on stone tablets, suggested that there seemed
to be an inconsistency in these rulings. The elders responded that it was
complicated, and sportswriters are not bright enough to understand nuances.
This is an argument still used in modern times.
Despite the controversy, the elders were pleased with themselves. They knew
that people watching the cowpie games didn't care about cheating unless it
was being done by the team beating theirs. They knew this would pass, that
their power would go unchallenged and that the NCAA would become bigger and
more powerful than life itself.
So this is how it came to pass, long ago and far away. And there is a moral
to this story:
Where there is an NCAA, there might also be pigs and cowpies. |
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