Three HUHS? and a HMM

                Lots of odd things happening in the sports world and vicinity of late. Time for another News/Views.

               NEWS: Dad of an NBA rookie-to-be announces a line of $495 sneakers.

                VIEW: Huh?

                LaVar Ball, father of Lonzo Ball, the one-and-done UCLA basketball flash who is expected to be a top NBA draft choice in June, has been getting lots of ink and TV time lately, talking up both his son’s and his own hoops prowess. Among other things, he said he could whip Michael Jordan in a one-on-one game, both now and when MJ was in his prime. This from a guy whose sole Division I basketball exposure came in 1986-87 when he averaged 2 (that’s two) points a game at Washington State U.

                Now comes LaVar with his Big Baller Brand shoe, which he says will sell for the above price. That’s about $300 more than the top-priced shoes endorsed by the likes of LeBron James and Steph Curry. If it actually comes out, that is—it’s not scheduled to hit the stores until November.

                It should be noted that whatever their retail prices athletic shoes cost no more than $30 to make in Asia, where just about all of them are manufactured. Any additional value is added by branding and marketing.  To those who scoffed at his, uh, cojones for asking such a markup, Ball scoffed back. “If you can’t afford them you’re not a BIG BALLER,” he tweeted.

                NEWS: Alabama gives head football coach Nick Saban a contract extension worth about $8.625 million a year over the next eight years.

                VIEW: Huh?

                It’s no news that big-time college football and basketball head coaches make big money, but the extent of their haul becomes more eye-popping annually. Their salaries had reached the seven-figure mark when I turned in my press card in 2003 but they’ve ballooned since, rivaling those of the heads of Fortune 500 companies. These days, none of those guys at the so-called “Power Five” conferences (the SEC, Big 10, Big 12, ACC and PAC-10) makes less than a million annually, and the median seems to be around $3 million. Not bad for someone who, in the case of basketball, directs a 12-player “program,” as they call their teams these days.

                The package for Saban, whose ‘Bama teams have won four national championship in the past seven years, stands out even in that milieu. It’ll will pay him $8.125 million a year for the next eight straight up, plus a $4 million “signing bonus” this year. Prorating the bonus over eight years produces the $8.625 figure, although getting the full $4 mil up front makes the deal sweeter.  And remember that college coaches’ deals typically contain such additional lollipops as free country club memberships, private planes for personal use and free auto use, as if they can’t afford to buy their own.

                Writers wanting to make a point usually compare college coaches’ salaries with those of other public officials in their states, or profs on their campuses. The Alabama governor is paid $119,950 a year and a full prof at the U. of A. makes $186,636, each of which figure probably wouldn’t cover Saban’s car-park tips.  More telling is the fact that the two top-paid head coaches in the NFL—Pete Carroll and Sean Payton—make $8 million a year each, or less than Saban will pull down. If the pros call him again (he coached there before) he could turn them down on financial grounds.

                NEWS: Jay Paterno, Joe’s son, is elected to Penn State University’s board of trustees.

                VIEW: Huh?

                Paterno, 48, won election last week to the university’s governing body by vote of the school’s alumni, who pick nine of the unit’s 38 members. This is despite a work history consisting mainly of 17 years as an assistant on the school’s football staff (1995-2011) while his dad was head coach. He was fired in 2011 with other football staffers after the arrest of assistant coach Jerry Sandusky. Sandusky’s serial predations upon young boys, conducted under Joe Paterno’s regime and often in university facilities, led to a far-reaching scandal that resulted in a 60-year prison term for Sandusky and, recently,  lesser terms for three high Penn State officials, including the school’s president at the time. Joe Paterno, who died of cancer in 2012 at age 85, never was charged, but if he knew what his longtime top aide was up to he never called the cops.

                Since leaving coaching six years ago Jay Paterno has been concerned primarily with refurbishing his father image, with a book he wrote and lawsuits he’s joined against the university for its handling of the case. He’s also pushed something called Paterno Legacy beer, which has been sold around Pennsylvania at football season the last few years with “Joe Pa’s” picture on the can.  If nothing else, his election ensures that, welcome or not, the Sandusky episode’s aftermath will continue to burn brightly in State College, Pa., during his three-year term.

                NEWS: A proposal to wipe out all world track-and-field records set before 2005 is making the rounds.

                VIEW: Hmm.

                Pierce O’Callaghan, chairman of the European unit of the IAAF, track’s world governing body, says the move would mark the start of a “new, clean, credible era” for the sport, which has been beset with doping scandals. If adopted it would limit records to ones established at approved international events Involving only athletes who had been subjected to the drug testing and urine-or-blood sample-storing rules begun in 2005. Records predating such requirements would remain on a “historical list” but no longer would be considered official, O’Callaghan said. IAAF President Sebastian Coe said the rule would be “a step in the right direction,” indicating it might be adopted.

                The idea calls to mind baseball’s struggle with records set in what I call its HITS (for “Heads In The Sand”) Era, stretching from about 1990, when steroid use seriously invaded the game, to the institution of credible drug-testing standards in 2005. Power-hitting numbers swelled in that period, setting them apart from those that had been set before, or will be set after. These include the top six annual home run counts topped by Barry Bonds’s 73, all of which were posted by him, Mark McGwire or Sammy Sosa between 1998 and 2001.

                Baseball lives off its records so a purging of HITS Era marks probably would go too far, but marking them with asterisks would be a good move. They were set under unusual conditions and should be recognized as such.