Joshua Malbin

Why do all the Heat players keep spitting out their mouthguards and chewing with them hanging half out of their mouths? It’s gross and they all do it.

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We live in a Golden Age of sports revisionism movies. 2008 brought Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck’s Sugar, a tender hymn to washouts, and Darren Aronofsky’s The Wrestler, the athlete as sex worker, a body for sale. 2009 brought Wrestler writer Robert Siegel’s Big Fan (which the former Onion writer–who claims responsibility for the ‘Area Man’ trope–wrote and directed), which finds the serious fan on a perpetual seesaw of striving and emasculation. Some spoilers after the jump.

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The topic:

A study commissioned by the National Football League reports that Alzheimer’s disease or similar memory-related diseases appear to have been diagnosed in the league’s former players vastly more often than in the national population — including a rate of 19 times the normal rate for men ages 30 through 49.

The PR:

An N.F.L. spokesman, Greg Aiello, said in an e-mail message that the study did not formally diagnose dementia, that it was subject to shortcomings of telephone surveys and that “there are thousands of retired players who do not have memory problems.”

“Memory disorders affect many people who never played football or other sports,” Mr. Aiello said. “We are trying to understand it as it relates to our retired players.”

Jeez. “We are very concerned about the findings of this study. Our scientific and medical advisors are reviewing them carefully to determine what steps we need to take to ensure our players’ safety.”

Is that so hard? It still doesn’t commit to a damn thing.

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This article and accompanying photo gallery about a sports memorabilia collection incorporates most of what  people love and hate about Bill Simmons. It’s way too long, has too many dated pop culture references, and at least half the jokes aren’t funny. But mixed in with the dross there is some gold. Specifically, among other things sports memorabilia vendors apparently sell famous athletes’ canceled checks. Including this one:

If you ever get famous and have a failing, people will laugh at you for the rest of your life. I know I did.

PS: Just tangentially while I’m thinking about Bill Simmons, is this not a terrible list of nominees for “best movie drama of the decade?” I’m going to have to come up with a list of all the better movies of the last ten years. Feel free to nominate your own.

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