Looking at the first year of the 21st Century through the rear-view mirror, one sees piles of rubble where the ground once laid more or less orderly. The year just passed is distinctive for the eruptions from underground, both in sports and Cincinnati, as well as where the two are simultaneously concerned.
If it stayed under the radar a year ago, it's probably out in the open today. In some cases, like the arrival of Xavier women's basketball or a banner year for high school football, that's good news. But along with those emergents, we saw racial tension bubble into race riots, terrorism reach across the ocean, the cheapness of the Reds come to haunt and Major League Baseball openly discredit itself before Congress. Last year's bad-case scenario is this year's working reality.
We've seen Michael Jordan return from purgatory, a great race car driver's death in the line of duty, creeping suspicions that athletic outcomes are fixed, the first shots in a long-anticipated baseball labor war and the inevitable decline of top-flight minor league hockey in Cincinnati. All this had been boiling beneath the surface, expanding, surging to break the ground on which we walk.
A year ago, Bobby Knight was underground near Bloomington, Ind. Today, he's working the high plains in Lubbock, Tex. A year ago, Rick Pitino was being buried in Boston. Today, he's being praised in Louisville.
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The Bengals are fighting for every loss. The fighting is new, but the losing isn't. Just like any other year, they have a new quarterback, but they still don't have a good one. With Akili Smith now injured, perhaps losing even a last gasp for the future on which the Bengals spent a top draft pick, it appears they do little more than gamble with young quarterbacks.
It was hoped that Smith would show signs in the next few weeks of being the guy they need, because he's what they've got for a future. Unlike many of their young quarterbacking episodes, this wouldn't have been a bad time for Smith to see his way around. There have been days this year when Jon Kitna didn't get killed and the Bengals showed something of a running game. Smith was motivated and might have stood a fair chance if the Bengals didn't need a Hall of Famer to do it all by himself.
Now the Bengals will have to invest another year in evaluating Smith. What choice do they have? It makes little sense now to expose Smith to the Houston Texans in the expansion draft. He hasn't played enough to prove anything either way. Smith has started 16 games, the equivalent of one year. His rookie year was completely lost, as was this year. If a player has two bad years, make a decision. But one bad year requires another chance. Even if he had one good year, you'd still need to see more.
The Bengals began the year with two wins and raised an eyebrow, but the eyes didn't budge and they all knew what they were looking for. They saw the subsequent losses they expected, but they also saw games that weren't over at halftime. It's the measure of a better season that the "Drive for Five" could even begin, let alone begin in October. But things aren't always as they seem. It seems like progress.
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A baseball stadium is rising from the ground, but the baseball club is going to hell. Two weeks ago, only the clues said the Reds would dismantle their ill-timed rebuilding project just one year before it could have been maintained with the revenues of a new ballpark. Since then, they've traded Dmitri Young, Pokey Reese and Dennis Reyes for what seems like Brian Hunter.
Preferably, the Reds would have borrowed against those future revenues to keep their core together. Maybe they'd stumble on a pitcher and take a crack at it with all their guys. But the Reds might really be playing it smart. Might. It depends on how Cincinnati sports fans feel about Cinergy Field.
One wouldn't be too surprised if everyone in town drops by at least once, just to feel it one more time. The last year at Cinergy should be a draw, regardless of how badly the Reds play. And maybe if the Reds kept their players, they'd lose anyway. And maybe, with an altered crew, they might bounce into a few wins and people will start to think they're pretty good. It happens every year somewhere.
As a bonus, time is slowing down for the Reds because salaries have been frozen by the one circumstance that could cripple the free agent market: a complete lack of confidence in the industry. Two clubs are on death row, the other 28 don't know that they'll play next summer and the commissioner was ridiculed almost without hesitation as he pled for sympathy from the House Judiciary Committee. Bud Selig probably will hang on to the anti-trust exemption, but no one respects baseball's position.
Many clubs are situated like the Reds, facing bleak choices: risk financial losses by overspending or put fans through the dread of losing good players. By all accounts, the Reds are about breaking even, so at least they aren't crying about losing money. Maybe baseball would be in better shape if more clubs took it upon themselves to break even -- if one believes they aren't breaking even already.
So now the Reds aren't spending next year against future years, which means they'll have more money available in future years, while the new stadium maintains its draw. Great American Ballpark isn't going to put the Reds into the payroll big leagues, but they'll be a lot better off than they are today.
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The Cyclones, in their shiny building, couldn't outlast the Ducks, in their old building. Now the Cyclones are back the way they started, in the low minor leagues, but the Ducks are where they started, in Cincinnati Gardens.
The decline of the Cyclones, who fell from the International Hockey League to the East Coast Hockey League, says nothing distinctive about the Cincinnati athletic scene. In a bad economy, two top-level minor league hockey teams is way too much luxury for any town. Everyone knew it was a temporary arrangement.
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A faculty strike looms at the University of Cincinnati, but more are concerned about the basketball team. Same as it ever was.
The football team is headed to its second consecutive bowl game for the first time in 50 years. Credit bowl inflation and the enterprising offices of Conference USA if you must -- anything but change your mind about UC football being a non-entity.
While UC's football team is at its best when the fans don't care, the basketball team is at its best when the fans expect the least. Last spring's run to the Sweet 16 gave UC hoop fans a gratifying season after years of dashed expectations. The Bearcats are the one team in town that always plays with a sense of real possibility, even when that isn't obvious.
After all his success and six straight seasons of 25 wins or more, it's kind of remarkable that Bob Huggins doesn't get bashed because he hasn't won a national championship. It would be an unfair criticism, of course, but coaches are hung with it, and Huggins isn't. As stock criticisms go, it's kind of a compliment.
But he already gets the "Vegas East" rap, so there's no point in piling on. And his teams are the best in Cincinnati. They win.
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The new year brought in a new era for Xavier basketball, both men and women. The men's program was forced to consider its direction when Skip Prosser moved on to Wake Forest. Though the basketball coach's job at Xavier has the earmarks of a career stepping stone, the small university maintained some sort of continuity for 16 years. From Pete Gillen to Prosser, his one-time assistant, Xavier had been on basically the same program since 1985.
With evident hopes that the arrangement is institutional, Xavier turned to Butler coach Thad Matta, who does a passable imitation of Gillen/Prosser. We miss Prosser's humanity and Gillen's frenzy of a working man desperate to succeed, but not because Matta doesn't have them. We just don't know. But we knew the Musketeers without David West would struggle. Now it's in the books with UC's easy win in the Crosstown Shootout.
The women's basketball team at Xavier stirred unexpectedly by beating Tennessee and coming within one win of a Final Four appearance. Judging by the early returns from the new season, it was a one-year wonder. But it was a wonder.
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Long a staple of Cincinnati's athletic scene, the city's high school football programs broke new ground in the USA Today national rankings with three teams in the top 25. The programs at Elder, Moeller and St. Xavier lit up Friday nights as never before in the city's storied high school football history. But Cincinnati still couldn't produce a team that could take the state championship from St. Ignatius.
At least we don't live in Cleveland, right?
