Sportmanship
may be gone, cost still high
(AP) — Staging the Olympics is going
to cost billions and there’s scant
evidence it will bring the nations of the
world closer together. The opposite is more
likely to happen, given the headlines of
the day.
So
even though athletes around the globe are
making great personal sacrifices, there’s
no point in making grand claims for sport
and competing in Athens this summer. Let’s
start with a few small, but significant
ones instead.
Check
out Edwin Moses’ travel schedule these
days. If anything, he has picked up the
pace since stepping off the Olympic track.
He has remained a tireless advocate for
athletes and track and field, serving on
both the international and U.S. Olympic
committees. And since becoming chairman
of Laureus’ world sports academy in
2000, he has used the organization’s
charitable foundation to set up and run
youth sports programs in some far-flung
corners of the Third World.
In
some of those places, Moses is recognized
as a two-time gold medalist and the greatest
hurdler ever. In others, where electricity
is scarce and the Olympics are more fable
than fact, he’s regarded as a curious
but kind visitor who makes it possible for
kids to slip the crushing grip of poverty
for a few hours.
In
India, the ‘‘Magic Bus’’
program provides transportation to a few
safe playing fields for kids too frightened
by random kidnappings to hold games in the
streets. In Morocco, the goal was to win
the support of village leaders, first to
let girls compete in soccer matches and
then, to attend classes in brand-new schools.
On
some of the trips, Moses’ sidekick
might be Michael Johnson, another of track
and field’s greatest names. On others,
it might be Nadia Comaneci, Boris Becker,
Pele or any of three dozen other retired
world-class athletes who volunteer for Laureus
duty.
They
aren’t ambassadors for a particular
country or cause, beyond trying to do some
good through running clinics and games,
and they have no illusions about what they’re
accomplishing.
‘‘There
are three universal languages,’’
Moses said in a telephone interview from
Portugal this week. ‘‘Love,
music and sports. People are passionate
about those no matter where we go.
‘‘Some
of it is the simple joy that goes with physical
activity. Beyond that, it’s people
wanting to test themselves, and then measure
that against others. It’s the same
all over the world.’’
Though
he competed at the highest levels, even
Moses wonders how useful the Olympics remain
— beyond serving as an ideal.
‘‘Opportunists
show up at every Olympics, casting them
in a way that works to their advantage.
I got caught in the boycott of the Moscow
Games. That was 24 years ago and it didn’t
help the movement in the long term.’’
‘‘Besides,
it’s just one competition that happens
every four years. The problems that people
we see have continue regardless of whether
the Games come off or not.
Tackling
those seem a lot more important to me now.’’
Johnson,
too, has become a proponent of the small-scale
approach to sports in recent years. He took
part in Laureus programs in India and Morocco
and other clinics and fund-raisers have
carried him to France, China and South Africa.
He feels firsthand the respect and goodwill
that athletic achievements can command,
but worries what happens when there is so
little follow-through.
‘‘Obviously,
the Olympics have survived tough times before.
Can they capture attention? Yes. Can they
save the world? No. We already know those
things.
‘‘So
don’t get me wrong,’’
Johnson added. ‘‘It’s
important that things like competition,
sportsmanship and goodwill get put on a
world stage. But none of them are going
to stop conflicts unless we bring them down
to the level of some of the people involved.’’
It’s
easy to be cynical about well-off athletes
pushing grass-roots involvement in disadvantaged
pockets of the globe as a way to do good
and restore some of the luster that’s
been scraped off sports in modern times.
But it’s also worth remembering that’s
how Moses and Johnson and countless others
got their start, and why the lesson is worth
reinforcing in ways big and small.
‘‘Where
we succeed, it’s because we have credibility,’’
said Comaneci, who was in Portugal along
with Moses and Johnson for the academy’s
annual awards ceremony.
‘‘Some
of the kids were not even born when we competed,
but still they look up to us, and why? It’s
because they know you can be born a princess
or into a family with money, but the only
way you can be an Olympic champion is through
hard work.
‘‘The
wonderful thing about sports is that everybody
can have a dream. For only a few will it
ever come true at the Olympics, but that’s
not the most important thing. I did gymnastics
at first because I loved it. And I did more
than I ever expected, because I learned
to love working at it.
‘‘Maybe
the world would be better,’’
she concluded, ‘‘if everybody
at least had a chance to do the same.’’
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