Your p.m. roundup for July 18, the day we found out even punk rock was for sale. Got any stories or photos for us? Tip your editors.
What we're watching (all times EDT unless noted): This being a Monday in the summertime, there is another light schedule tonight. There are 11 Major League Baseball games, with ESPN airing Yankees-Rays starting at 7 p.m. If baseball doesn't cut it for you, over on ESPN2 there's a friendly between Manchester United and the Vancouver Whitecaps that starts at 10. That's pretty much it.
Elsewhere
Colin Cowherd is the father of stupid: "Cowherd references a column by CBS' Gregg Doyel, in which Doyel compares the NFL commissioner to a strict father and refutes the claim by some players and media outlets that Goodell purposely disciplines black players more than white ones. Cowherd then takes the column and uses it as a jumping-off point for this argument: since 3 out of 4 NFL players are black, and since 71% of African-American men grow up without fathers (I'm not sure where Cowherd got this figure from, but according to the Census Bureau, 56 percent of black children lived in single-parent families in 2004), and since star football players don't get told what to do in high school and college, the NFL is the first time some of these guys have ever had a dad. Which, based on Cowherd's logic, would mean Roger Goodell, who looks like a much bigger version of Bobby from The Brady Bunch, is a dad to roughly 1,017 black NFL players." [SportsGrid]
Bloggers can be sportswriters, too: "It's just growing acceptance of new things. A few years ago, bloggers couldn't get credentialed for a ballgame. Now they have prominent places at the table, and some online writers are now even voting for major awards. Likewise with analytical sportswriting, people are becoming more open to it. They're realizing that those who go into great detail when breaking down sports aren't ruining the game or the experience of following it … they're enhancing it. I'm not less of a sports fan because I want to know more about the numbers. Just the opposite, it shows how much of a fanatic I am, and how much my colleagues who do what I do are." [The Good Men Project]
Exit, Yao. Enter … ?: "For nearly a decade, China has been enthralled by the cult of Yao spun by Communist Party propagandists and corporate sponsors: the winner, the gentle giant, the favorite son. His image was ubiquitous here, and the public basked in his glow even as other Chinese stars in the N.B.A. sputtered. Yet his retirement is forcing many Chinese to acknowledge that their country has relied on Yao alone for victory and national pride, ignoring shortcomings in the state sport system that leave China facing a future bereft of N.B.A. and Olympic basketball glory." [New York Times]
Trick shot bowling interlude, featuring seven trick shots in a row:
President of HBO Sports steps down: "Greenburg, though, insisted he is leaving of his own accord and was not pushed out. He said he simply became weary of the backbiting and the contentious negotiations with many of the promoters, most of whom were angry about his close relationship with Oscar De La Hoya and Golden Boy Promotions. ‘I started to feel like a ticket agent at the airport when all the flights had been canceled with a lot of angry passengers in front of me looking to get on a plane and go home,' Greenburg said." [Yahoo]
Greg Oden's brother is unable to play, either: "Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino says offensive tackle Anthony Oden has been dismissed from the football team after his second arrest for driving while intoxicated in the last year." [ESPN.com]
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