After Atalanta

So the Big Ten is being the Big Tease these days after announcing, this past winter, it's thinking about adding another team to the conference. Note that the conference already has 11 teams which sets off my OCD tendencies a little and, of course, that adding another makes 12. There's a already a Big 12 Conference! Makes me want to grind my teeth. Anyway, besides the obvious counting issues, there is the issue of which team to extend the invite to. It's pretty much all about money and which team could lead to some nice(r) television contracts. Also there's supposed to be a commitment to strong academics and athletics. But then the (in)famous Joe Paterno, of Penn State, the 11th Big Ten team added in the early 1990s, said this : "It's not a question of just bringing somebody in that you're just going to kick around. It's a question of bringing someone in who can handle the academics, the research, AAU schools, people with a commitment to the women's ...

...about Venus Williams's dress. I mean, really? This is a big deal? I am currently watching Venus for the second time in two days and I have to say I don't see what all the hoopla is about. The flesh colored underwear we already discussed when she wore them at the Australian. And the lace and the illusion of bareness? One, I don't think the illusion is that great. It looks like lingerie. It's black with red trimmings. Two, it's very French in my mind. Very stylish. And three, let's not forget that Bethanie Mattek has worn actual lingerie (not that there's anything wrong with that) before. I don't know what is so revealing about it. I mean it's kind of annoying that she pulls up the straps after every point. But other players are pulling down their compression shorts every point, too, which speaks generally to ill-fitting or designed sports clothing. So please stop talking about it. I mean if she shows up at Wimbledon in an all-white version of the d...

So we (fans of women's soccer) cheered when the Philadelphia and Atlanta teams joined the WPS this season. We were dismayed when the LA Sol folded wondering how the top team (arguably) in the league featuring Marta and other key players could not be sustainable in a city like LA. But we kept our faith in the WPS and blamed the economy and a myriad of other cultural factors all the while sporting wary smiles. But now those smiles are turned upside down! Because WPS announced today that St. Louis Athletica is folding --immediately. As in right now. As in no games this weekend for Athletica players. The rest of the season's schedule is being adjusted and Athletica players are free agents as of June 1. So Hope Solo, Shannon Boxx, and Lori Chalupny, all key players from the US National Team, are now on the job market. What happened? A funding crisis is what is being given as the reason. One would think given the current economic situation the whole country finds itself in, largely ...

Remember back in the 90s some time when Bill Clinton was in office and Hilary Rodham Clinton was empowering some and causing great consternation to others? Wasn't there a Year of the Woman in their somewhere? I guess when that year was over we went back to It's Always Already All About Men. I didn't get the memo which must be why I'm just kind of shocked by the announcement that Boston Breakers co-captain Kristine Lilly (I love the way she spells her first name--so unique!) is being inducted into the The Sports Museum under the special Traditions program which honors Boston athletes. Not surprised that she is being honored in this way. But definitely surprised that she is the first woman to be so honored. I could not find the criteria for induction just that it honors the athletes who have helped make Boston a great sports city. Not sure if it has to be professional athletes or not. If not, how about hockey player Angela Ruggiero who played for Harvard (ok, so it's ...

Every morning I receive in my inbox a google alert for women's sports (along with offers for Viagra, Christian dating sites, and a chance to help out some former royal from Malawi). I scan the headlines and pass over things like BGSU women's lacrosse MVP banquet and most of the stuff published by the Bleacher Report (unless I am feeling ornery and in need of pointing out some ridiculousness). This morning, reading the headlines in my alert, I had a pang of blogger jealousy. Someone had come up with a title that was very After Atalanta-esque--and it wasn't me! And it was about softball--and lesbians. How could this be? Well because it was Dr. Pat Griffin who wrote the piece "Can Jennie Finch Even Say Lesbian?" and so I feel much better now. And especially so after reading it. Griffin calls out all (or most) of the people who have been speaking up in the wake of the astounding revelation that Elena Kagan once played softball--and the messages that sends. And Griffin...

I haven't written anything recently about pinkification, because I have said (probably more than once) before it places one in the not so pleasant position of appearing to be pro-cancer and maybe even anti-woman. Nonetheless, I find it difficult to refrain from infusing some critical commentary when the issue comes up. This one is not a diatribe. I just happened to come across news that the University of Alabama (whose softball team just won the SEC regular season and tournament and got a #1 seeding in the NCAA tournament) has renewed its contract with Nike . (This isn't even going to be an anti-Nike post!) As part of said contract (which runs through 2018!) Nike will provide 'Bama with apparel, equipment, coaching gear, and shoes. They will also: will allocate funds...for the athletic department's annual Power of Pink initiative in which the company will provide specific "pink garments" to be worn by each women's sports team at one contest per year. ...

Laura Pappano and Eileen McDonagh argued in their book, Playing with the Boys: Why Separate is Not Equal in Sports , that the continued separation of the genders (for the purpose of this post we'll go with the rather simplistic construction of gender as a binary system) harms women's athletic participation. Note that their argument is more nuanced than that one-line synopsis as they compare the historical and ongoing separation of boys and girls and men and women in athletic endeavors to the cultural and political separation of races in the United States and discuss the damage done by failures to integrate, by gender, sports. This is an ingoing debate in the study sport, gender, and culture and I myself haven't come down on any particular side (shocking, I know!). What worries many, myself included, is that we just don't know what will happen if sports that have not been integrated (and some certainly have and some certainly should be--hello, billiards??) begin to move ...

Wow, this is the kind of post that just gets me so...excited! So I missed the whole Wall Street Journal printing pics of SCOTUS nominee Elena Kagan playing softball--on their front page! I did see said pics in various postings/blogs around teh internets. And of course I have been around for the remarkable silence around her sexuality--besides that whole denial thing by the White House. This situation seems to be getting stickier every day. And I could pontificate about political strategy and the ins and outs and in-betweens of the closet. But I'd rather talk about softball! And lesbians! And lesbians who play softball! Because you gotta love the New York Post chiding the more snooty and allegedly high brow WSJ by publishing an article about the connection between lesbians and softball. And even getting one my favorite (former) softball-playing lesbians and sexuality and sport scholar, Dr. Pat Griffin, to comment on it. Why yes, Virginia, there are lesbians who play softball! And ...

I know the margin of victory in track and field events is often minuscule. People win by a proverbial hair or nose or something. But losing by a string? Or rather losing because one was wearing a string, in the form of a friendship bracelet? And not just losing the event, but losing the meet and thus the championship for one's team. Oh yeah, and losing because the opposing team pointed out your "jewelry" which required your disqualification and gave the tattle tale coach's team the victory--by default. That's rough. And that's what happened in California a couple of weeks ago when pole vaulter Robin Laird successfully cleared a height that gave her team the win in the meet and the league title. She was wearing a friendship bracelet when she jumped, an infraction (because it is considered jewelry), that cost her team the aforementioned accolades when the opposing team coach, let's call him Coach Machiavelli (since I just finished reading The Prince), pointe...

...and apparel and equipment and a lifestyle. It's the last part that seems a little off when we think about--or when Christine Brennan makes us think about--Nike continuing to sponsor Tiger Woods, Ben Roethlisberger, and Kobe Bryant. Sure "image is everything" is Canon's slogan. (Of course it was famously spoken by one-time Nike client, Andre Agassi.) But clearly, as Brennan points out in a very good column* (and sometimes I think Brennan is a little too easy on certain aspects of sportocracy so I was pleased by this one) Nike does not think it's image will be harmed by continuing to be associated with these men. Conversely, Nike also sponsors out US soccer player Natasha Kai, so I guess their devotion to their stars cuts in many different directions. Former Women's Sport Foundation CEO Donna Lopiano felt that Nike's refusal to admonish their athletes sends a clear message to consumers about the image of the company (macho, edgy--Kai certainly fits the la...

Alternate title: Why I shouldn't turn on the TODAY show while still in bed. Not just because I hate the TODAY show, but because I hear more about stories I had kind of been avoiding, like the murder of University of Virginia lacrosse player, Yeardley Love by her (ex?) boyfriend, George Huguely, also a lacrosse player. Not avoiding because I am indifferent to the murder of a young woman, but because the more I listen to and read the coverage, the more irate I become. This column was particularly bad. I do believe writer Les Carpenter had the best of intentions in trying to both memorialize Yeardley Love and bring attention to the issue of bad behavior by student-athletes. But in attempting both, he succeeded in neither. First, I found it highly problematic that in describing the vigil for Love held on UVA's campus, he wrote only of women holding candles in their "flowing summer dresses" and sandals coming to the vigil site from all over campus. It was kind of Greek tra...

Looking back over stories/articles/incidents I have been meaning to mention, I noticed a theme: homosexuality. (I guess there really is an agenda!) First was the controversial press conference by the new women's head coach at the University of Missouri. Robin Pingeton's press conference in which she announces her Christianity and talks about the family atmosphere of her coaching staff (all married to opposite sex partners and with children) has been fairly well covered but I thought I would mention it anyway. You can check out Pat Griffin's blog for an excellent assessment of the conference and the ramifications of Pingeton's discourse. In the aftermath of the press conference, a lot of comments have been made about Pingeton's intentions. There is a lot of skepticism regarding them; about whether Pingeton was sending the message to potential recruits, their parents, and fans that this was not going to be a dyke-y program. But this guy , an avowed atheist, is giving...

So sometimes I can be a little judgmental. Last week when I posted on the Hunky Dorys chip company in Ireland selling chips (and sponsoring men's rugby in the process) by using poorly outfitted female models in some costumed version of a rugby kit ( may raise a few eyebrows (two of which would be mine) but would likely go largely uncommented upon. And maybe there is not an uproar in Ireland. But there is this one sport columnist for Irish Times who did a very good job assessing the situation and chiding both Hunky Dorys and his professional colleagues and people in general. [He does note that some rugby officials might be not so pleased with the campaign by one of their sponsors as it counters the less "bestial" image rugby is going for.] I also learned what camogie and hurling are--bonus! Here are some excerpts: The reason Hunky Dorys didn’t have to think twice about descending into the world of dreary single entendre with their ad campaign is that women in sport are ...