Style Points

WASHINGTON D.C. – Style Points has confirmed reports from multiple sources that one hundred and six sportswriters for major American newspapers have tested positive for the performance enhancing substance, Sanctimony. Their names are currently being withheld as the testing was done anonymously, as per the bylaws of the Sportswriter Association of America union contract. These results do not come as a surprise to most of the American public, who have been noticing dramatically higher levels of moralizing and faux concern for children, in addition to the markedly increased heights of high horses in Sports pages from Boston to Los Angeles.

“We have no comment on these reports,” said SWAA President and Daily News columnist Mike Lupica. “We only hope that these accusations do not take attention away from the continuing degradation of Americana at the hands of overpaid athletes, from the atrocities being waged every day on honesty, integrity, and most importantly, the American children. ” Early indications are that Lupica is most certainly among the 106 positive results.

Sanctimony is defined by Webster’s as “Feigned piety or righteousness; hypocritical devoutness or high-mindedness” and has been on the watch-list for Sportswriting PED’s since the beginning of the decade, when an increasing number of reporters, and particularly columnists, began to rely on the tool to turn their watered down blase content into veritable pieces of water cooler discussion. Insider rumblings about the thematic abuse began to leak out back in the late 90’s, but were dismissed by most as either jealousy or “siding with the arrogant, egotistical, ungrateful mass of sub-human fecal matter that is the professional athlete.”

Sanctimony is thought to enhance sportswriting in two distinct ways – first, through heavy reliance on exaggerations, broad generalizations and misleading anecdotes, the sportswriter is able to divert attention away from what he is saying to how voraciously he is saying it; second, it allows the reporter or columnist in question to abdicate their prior ignorance and inability to operate a discerning eye before-the-fact through the sheer vehemence of his current opposition and dismay.

“It’s really quite simple,” says Dr. K. Phillip Stevenson, noted sportswriting expert and professor emeritus at the Columbia School of Journalism. “Most sportswriters make their livings on naysaying and pessimism – ’subject X is what’s wrong with sport Y, and I don’t like it.’ The problem here, as is this case with the current uprising over steroids, is that everyone already knows that subject is a problem – that’s why it’s illegal, banned, and tested for. Sanctimony serves as a communicative crutch to allow the writer to sidestep the more important question of how the problem came to be in the first place and instead capture the reader’s attention through cheap tricks of fear mongering and holier than though attitudes. It takes articles that would be standard pop-up fodder and pushes them over the outfield walls of our consciousness, and it brings those who penned the pieces much more attention and accolade than they rightfully deserve.”

The positive results came after a surprise sweep of newspaper offices last night, where writing samples were unexpectedly collected from every working sportswriter at the Top 20 newspapers in America. Initial reports indicate there was an overwhelming abundance of such words and phrases as “disgrace,” “crime,” “shame,” “national embarrassment,” and “What about the children? Won’t somebody please think of the children!?” Very little was found in terms of evidence, cautious reasoning, grounded arguments or even minimal traces of personal culpability, all of which are thought to counteract the dangerous effects of Sanctimony.

Additional side effects of prolonged Sanctimony use include inflated self-worth, lack of foresight and inability to write declarative sentences longer than five words (also known as Bill Plaschke disease). Years after initial use, many sportswriters still struggle with pontificating the basic tenets of an argument without morphing into slobbering, ravenous, uncontrollable moral hyenas. Other former Sanctimony abusers report being less likely to be taken seriously, a complete inability to enjoy anything at face value and serious complications in maintaining healthy relationships with reasonable persons.

“Actually, I’m kind of glad they’re cracking down on it,” says one columnist, who wished to remain anonymous as to not be ostracized by his colleagues. “I mean, I’m guilty of an overstatement here or there, but some of these guys have taken it to another level. Barry Bonds could have set fire to an orphanage, locked the front door and played the fiddle in the street while it burned and not gotten as hammered as he did by some of these guys. Holy hell people, it’s just baseball. And if I hear one more out-of-touch sportswriter in his 60’s publicly worry about the children of a generation so far removed from himself he wouldn’t know their mentality if it kicked him in his shriveled dick, I’m going to quit. Shit, I’ve said too much.”

No one seems exactly sure where the issue of performance enhancers in sportswriting is going to go from here. While many are encouraged by the crackdown on Sanctimony, others are still worried about the rampant use of Jingoism, Fabrication, Race-Baiting and Lowest Common Denominator content-injections. Still others wonder how we can take any of this testing seriously when Ron Borges, Jay Mariotti, and Mitch Albom are still gainfully employed.

“I’m afraid we’re going to look back on this as a tainted era of sportswriting,” said 32-year-old journalism fan and Olympia, Washington native Ben Jacobi. “If it were up to me, none of these guys would even make it in the Hall of Fame. I’d like to see Mike Lupica pen a piece without passing value judgments on complete strangers, or Mitch Albom author an article without sounding like a sniveling bitch. If Shirley Povich could see this nonsense today he’d kick all their asses himself. And don’t even get me started on Plaschke. That guy is to sportswriting what AIDS is to sex. Just terrible.”

Luckily, there’s already an upcoming opportunity for a referendum on the topic – Lupica, Albom, and Bob Ryan are all up for induction in the SWAA Hall of Fame this fall. The anxious public will have to wait a few months to see for sure, but an informal poll conducted by Style Points of likely voters shows that all three, widely believed to be among the 106 positive tests, now face an uphill battle for enshrinement.

“I just don’t know how I’m going to be able to look my kid in the eye after all this,” continued Jacobi. “We just ordered his Mitch Albom Detroit Free Press replica jersey yesterday. I mean really, what the hell is he supposed to believe now? I guess we’ll have to start getting him to read blogs instead. What a sad day for America.”