Evidence That Things Could Be Different

By now, most of America has digested Connecticut's all-time-ugly win over Butler for the national championship in college basketball, and we're waiting excitedly for a draft that may be the last action we see from the National Football League for a while. Many people also have had a chance to watch HBO's Real Sports put the NCAA through the journalism equivalent of a meat grinder. One thing that's clear from the report is that the NCAA isn't getting the job done when it comes to maintaining the integrity and amateurism of college basketball and football.
Of course, things don't have to be this way. To demonstrate that, it's time to take a look at an individual.
America, say hello to Lionel Messi.
Messi is a forward for FC Barcelona, one of the most powerful soccer clubs in Europe, a place that treats soccer more seriously than America treats any single sport. In 2009, Barcelona won the UEFA Champions League Final, Europe's answer to the Super Bowl, and Messi was named FIFA World Player of the Year, in part because he can do things like this with a ball. His current contract will pay him a salary of 10.5 million euros (just under $15 million) a year until 2016.
And he never had to step foot on a college campus.
Messi was so talented so early in his life that he was recruited from his native Argentina to join Barcelona's youth academy in 2000--at the age of 13. One of the things that lured Messi to the academy was the fact that it promised to pay for the drugs he needed to treat a hormone deficiency. (His height is officially listed at 5' 6 1/2".) And there was no NCAA to tell Barcelona that it couldn't offer him this extra benefit. Messi took classes at local schools and trained daily at the academy until he joined Barcelona's senior team in 2004. He has been there ever since.
And, if this report from London's Daily Mail is any indication, he was a relative latecomer to the academy. As Albert Capellas, Barcelona's senior youth coordinator, describes the soccer training, "From the age of seven to the age of 15 everything is about working with the football."
That's right; kids who won't be eligible for Little League for several years are training for a career in soccer. And they don't have to spend a second worrying about their eligibility.
Here in America, we do things differently. Kids can play professional hockey and baseball (and drive a NASCAR racecar) without taking English 101, but the NBA requires you to wait a year after your high school graduation. That means either taking your chances in Europe or playing by the NCAA's rules for at least a year. Likewise, the NFL makes you wait three years, and the NCAA doesn't have to worry about losing quarterbacks to Europe. And as long as people make money off college football and basketball, people are going to cheat at it.
Is the answer to let, say, the Green Bay Packers set up an academy? Maybe not. After all, Barcelona doesn't have a salary cap or a draft, and Americans aren't much better keeping their youth sports under control. ("Play Their Hearts Out," George Dohrmann's book on youth basketball, demonstrates that.) And then there's the fact that a lot of colleges use their football and men's basketball teams to finance the rest of their athletic programs, where trading four years of sweat for a debt-free bachelor's degree is actually a good deal.
But it might be time for us to stop expecting our colleges to serve as minor leagues for our professional sports. Amateurism is a lot easier to accept if you descend from aristocracy, as Baron Pierre de Coubertin did. For many others, turning down LeBron James-level money in exchange for a bachelor's degree may not be that good a deal anymore.
Disagree? Leave a comment at the link at the bottom of this post, and tell me what you think.

The Climb Continues

This week's NASCAR Sprint Cup race could have gone much better for the People's Pitstop, but we'll take what we got.
What the Internet's favorite fantasy racing team got was 255 points at Martinsville Speedway. The season total is now 1,568, and we moved up one spot, to fifth place, in the highly competitive 9beersfantasysportstavern group on Yahoo Sports. And here's how we did it.
Denny Hamlin: Started 5th, finished 12th, 89 laps led and 78 fantasy points. Hamlin surprised even the experts by having to pit early and being less than his usually dominant self in Martinsville.
A.J. Allmendinger: Started 6th, finished 14th, 6 laps led and 74 fantasy points. Mr. Allmendinger was one of only two Ford drivers to lead this race. Maybe they should fetch some of the cars they lent to American Idol.
David Ragan: Started 14th, finished 8th and 76 fantasy points. Ironically, the People's Pitstop's only top 10 starting driver at the finish was also the only one who did not lead a lap.
And yes, we've saved the worst for last.
Kasey Kahne: Started 3rd, finished 39th (281 laps behind the leaders), 1 lap led and 27 fantasy points. To the long list of things you never want to hear about your NASCAR driver, you can add this gem from Mike Joy: "That might be the hardest hit I've ever seen at this small a race track."
Everybody walked away, though, and now they can walk (or fly, really) to Fort Worth for a Saturday night shootout at Texas Motor Speedway. The lineup polls for the People's Pitstop are now open, but they will close Thursday night, so we can submit a roster in time for Friday's qualifying session. Please vote now. We'll be back.
(Oh, and by the way, here are the results for the Final Four poll. Apparently, the people who read this poll are not into underdogs.)
[polldaddy poll=4832562]

The People's Choice - Martinsville

We're back from our sojourn in Las Vegas. We'd like to tell you all about the ultimate margaritas, the Michael Jackson impersonator, the world's dumbest roulette player, the 70 beers, the roller coaster, the lions and the man lying unconscious on the Strip, but what happens there stays there. (Really, it's in the contract.)
It's back to work for the People's Pitstop, but you, the Internet, did not take this week off. You came out and selected a lineup for Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Martinsville Speedway. Here are your results.
A List. You must have seen something in Jimmie Johnson's near-win last week in Fontana. The five-time defending Sprint Cup champion won this poll, followed by Denny Hamlin.
B List: This race was a lot closer. Three drivers (Juan Pablo Montoya, Martin Truex Jr. and Kasey Kahne) tied for first place, while A.J. Allmendinger came in fourth. Good thing we have four spots -- two starting and two bench -- to give them.
C List: Only two drivers received votes in this poll. One of them, surprise, surprise, was Paul Menard. The other was David Ragan. You know the drill by now. Whoever qualifies better will start. The other one will sit.
Thanks again for voting. The results appear below, and a new poll about college basketball's big event is available for voting. We will update this post after the qualifying session.
UPDATED 2 P.M. Kahne has spent a lot of time on our bench this season. Not this week; he qualified 3rd and earned the People's Pitstop 3 bonus points. The other starters are Hamlin (5th), Allmendinger (6th) and Ragan (14th). That's right; Paul Menard, who qualified 16th, finally gets a seat on the bench.
We'll be back with a fresh set of predictions.
[polldaddy poll=4801881] [polldaddy poll=4801961] [polldaddy poll=4802021]

The People's Choice - Bristol

Today, instead of focusing on what's wrong with sports (we'll cover some of that territory over the weekend), we'd like to extend a special thanks to you, the Internet. You found time during your busy bracket-filling (and shredding) schedule to vote in the lineup polls for the People's Pitstop. As a result, the Internet's favorite fantasy NASCAR team has a roster for this week's Sprint Cup race at Brisol Motor Speedway.
A List: One driver ran away with this poll, and he should be familiar to longtime readers of this blog. Kyle Busch, last seen reporting "flames in my face," was the winner. He'll be joined in the roster by runner-up Tony Stewart. Whoever qualifies better Friday afternoon will get the starting nod.
B List: We another clear-cut winner here. That would be NAPA commercial co-star Martin Truex Jr. Three other drivers tied for second place: Dale Earnhardt Jr., Mark Martin and Kasey Kahne.
C List: Paul Menard is threatening to become the first driver in People's Pitstop history to use up all his starts before Independence Day. He won this week's poll yet again, and he'll be joined in the roster by Trevor Bayne, who hopefully celebrated Saint Patrick's Day responsibly, seeing that he's still 20 years old and all.
Again, thanks for voting. The results appear below. A new poll about your weekend plans is now available for your consideration. We'll update this post once qualifying is complete.
UPDATED 11:30 P.M. At least Menard is earning your faith in him. He qualified 4th, earning not only a starting spot but a bonus point for the People's Pitstop. Busch (12th) edged out Stewart (13th). Truex (8th) and Martin (9th) beat out Kahne (10th) and Earnhardt (22nd).
[polldaddy poll=4730878] [polldaddy poll=4730892] [polldaddy poll=4730910]

A Quick Bristol Preview

While everyone in the western world is getting their brackets filled out and/or prepping for fantasy baseball drafts, the NASCAR world is getting back from its random week off and heading to the bull ring of Bristol Motor Speedway.
The polls for this week's lineup are up (finally) and will stay up until Thursday night. So please vote now, and encourage a friend to vote, too. The People's Pitstop is depending on you.
We'll be back with some thoughts on that other sport.