Not The “Parent Of The Year” …

I do not expect to win any votes in the “2016 Parent of the Year Contest” with this remark:

I have heard more than I want to hear about Drake LaRoche. The next thing I want to hear about him is that he graduated from high school as the class valedictorian and is weighing his options with regard to college or the MLB draft. Until then, can everyone please stop.

My tipping point came this morning when I read a column in the Washington Post by someone who can turn any report of any incident into a “women’s issue”. She spent about 800 words today saying that a woman could not get away with taking her daughter to her job every day the way Adam LaRoche evidently did and wanted to continue to do. Puh-leeez..!

I will not be the least bit surprised to hear this subject brought up in a future “debate” among Presidential candidates. Do not tell me it cannot happen; in the past, one of the “interrogators” asked about fantasy football.

This entire kerfuffle has nothing to do with “rights” nor does it have anything to do with the typical workplace except in the following sense:

Each employer sets rules with regard to what will and what will not be allowed in the workplace the employer establishes. The limits on those rules are set to assure than no one’s fundamental rights are violated.

If there is a “right” to have one’s child present in the workplace whenever the parent wishes to have said child there, I missed that phraseology in Article Whatever of the US Constitution.

Enough already… Adam LaRoche had a choice. He could play for the Chicago White Sox and earn a reported $13M this year but he would not be allowed to have his son, Drake, in the clubhouse whenever it was convenient for the LaRoche family. He chose not to play for the team because of the limitations placed on his son’s access to the clubhouse. He made his choice which is what adults do in situations such as this. So, leave it alone.

I have said more than a few times that coverage of Spring Training is generally a wasteland where there are not enough news events to justify six weeks of coverage of 30 MLB teams. In my opinion, the “Drake LaRoche Saga” is one more piece of evidence to support my assertions.

Yesterday, I mentioned that Drew Rosenhaus was the new agent for Johnny Manziel. Well, in typical agent fashion, Rosenhaus let it be known that there are teams (in the plural) who are interested in signing Manziel but he will not be elaborating on that just yet because the rest of Manziel’s life is so public that Rosenhaus wants to handle these negotiations in private. Sounds good – – except if you want to keep it all private, why did you drop that little tidbit in the first place?

I suspect that Manziel will indeed get another chance with an NFL team other than the Browns. He showed ability in college and talent trumps just about anything else in the NFL world. I also suspect that teams will be very reticent to sign him absent some actions on Manziel’s part to demonstrate that he has a degree of commitment to sobriety and to learning the craft of being an NFL QB. And therein lies an interesting contradiction:

Anyone’s commitment to sobriety is a personal and private matter; that is why they call it “Alcoholics Anonymous”. If Johnny Manziel has made/is making/ever makes a commitment to sobriety, that should not be something that makes headlines nor should it be something posted online at one of the “Gotcha Websites”.

Unfortunately for him, Johnny Manziel’s behaviors in the past related to a seeming lack of commitment to sobriety have been so public and so self-destructive that any change in that behavior will raise questions that go directly to any real or imagined commitment to sobriety.

I will not pretend to bring any expertise to the party here with regard to what sort of help Manziel may need to change the perception that fans and NFL coaches/execs have of him. I do believe that to change those perceptions, he will need to change at least some of his behaviors meaning that if he has a future as an NFL QB, he will have to find a way to alter his lifestyle. And that could bring us to the famous chicken/egg conundrum:

Might a team sign Manziel with contract incentives tied to behavior changes prior to his participating in some kind of commitment to sobriety?

Might a team demand that he makes such a commitment, seek help in finding ways to implement that commitment and then sign him to an incentive laden contract?

I believe that NFL agents get a 3% fee from their clients for the contracts negotiated and various services associated with that representation. If that is the case, I think that Drew Rosenhaus will earn every last penny of his fee in this matter.

Finally, this comment from Bob Molinaro in the Hampton Roads Virginian-Pilot explains clearly the difference between “following the letter of the law” and “following the spirit of the law”. It really needs no further explanation:

“Officiousness: Wednesday night’s game between the Celtics and Grizzlies was held up for about a minute as officials went to the scorer’s table with 1.5 seconds left to look at a replay before adding 1/10th of a second to the clock. Why mention this? Because the Celts were leading by 20 points.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………