When sports figures and their fawning fans make me want to puke!

I know many people who follow mom blogs probably aren't sports fans, but here in my house we are.   We live in a suburb of Indianapolis and live in the middle of Colts worship territory.   And we love our Colts!   So far Mr. Peyton Manning and most of the Colts have kept their noses pretty clean.   (We won't talk about the trouble our Pacers have been in...ahem.....)

Many sports figures do admirable and great things.   Our own Peyton Manning gave an undisclosed large sum of money to a local children's hospital and frequently does benefit work for them.   Many of the sports figures worked manually as well as raising funds after Hurricane Katrina.    But so many sports figures are in the paper all the time for all the wrong reasons.   Rape, beating their wives or girls, gun possession, drugs and even murder are topics on the sports pages with alarming frequency.

So enter Mr. Ben Roethlisberger, quarterback of the Pittsburg Steelers.    Ben has been one of those athletes in the sports pages for things other than sports, or  fine charitable work.    There was an "incident" a few years back involving a girl.   Then the motorcycle injury where he, someone a team is relying on and paying an enormous amount of money to, showed his incredible poor judgment.    And then the recent accusation of rape.

Whether what happened that night was rape or not, I can't say from personal knowledge.    But what I can say is that what happened that night was wrong on so many levels.   Giving him the BEST benefit of the doubt, Ben took a girl who was so drunk/impaired/ or whatever and took her into a bathroom, had rough sex with her (he says she fell and hit her head....uh.....okay), while two bodyguards stood outside and guarded the door and prevented her friends from coming in to get her.    At the worst, it was Ben raping an impaired girl while his bodyguards stood there and prevented her friends from rescuing her.   Either way, Ben is not a person I feel any level of respect or admiration for.

So today he finally returns after his puny four game suspension for "violating the NFL's personal conduct policy".    What do the fans do?   Boo?   Remain silent to show their disapproval of his horrid personal conduct?    Nope.    They give him a rousing, cheering ovation that was louder than any other starter to show their love and support.   The article I read even said that instead of announcing their starting defense as they normally do, they introduced their offense just so the fans could welcome him back.

Peyton, be warned if you come back after allegedly raping a girl, you won't get a rousing welcome from me.   You'll get boos and disgust that you're allowed to be a "sports hero".   Seriously......I may puke! 

Here's the article about Ben Roethlisberger's return