A response to an article proclaiming the 'crooked' nature of the New Orleans Saints

Ladies and gentlemen, prepare yourself to be quite angry.

Prepare yourself to read things that you were not expecting to read today.

Prepare yourself to sit there and realize that there are extremely varying opinions in the literary world and you most definitely will not agree with all of them.

I'm not entirely sure how many of you know who Larry Holder is, but I personally did not until yesterday. He apparently is a blogger / writer for CBSsports.com and NBA.com while also doing a sports' talk show on 690 WIST-AM. Seems he's local too but my first exposure to him came yesterday when I read this article of his:

Bush, Paul have more than Big Easy in common

Feast your eyes on that...I'll wait.

Now I am all for everyone being allowed their own opinion since this world is built on everyone being able to disagree. Disagreement is what allows us to have debates, arguments, and even just plain old conversation. That is why I just would like to take the time to express my disagreement with some of the things that Mr. Holder discussed in his article.

In a nutshell, Holder let it be known that Reggie Bush and Chris Paul (of the New Orleans Hornets) have taken the time to become the faces of the the city over the past few years. They have done a lot for the people and the community in becoming icons for good will and just about any other good, charitable thing you could think of. Yet now both athletes have been caught up in controversy over the past few months and that it's rather expected of the city of New Orleans to bring in those kinds of people.

You see, Bush was involved in the whole USC scandal and Paul was...was...wait a minute, what?

I don't condone all of the things that Bush did while at USC which I let be known in a piece a few days ago. My thoughts are that he feels bad about it, but it's all behind him now and he'll simply move on from there. Paul's actions lately of trying to get out of Dodge (New Orleans) and be traded to another team has not sat well with me at all. He's sort of slapped the city in the face and is looking at nothing but the whole greedy side of sports and it's kind of despicable considering the type of guy he's seemed to be for some time now.

Holder basically chastising the both of them  for their implorable actions is a great thing and I fully agree with him there. What I don't agree with him on is this statement from his article:

"Both young budding superstars brought an electricity never felt in the Crescent City. Both oozed innocence and likability.

Now, they've joined the ever-growing fraternity that should be deemed "The Crooked Athletes Club." Would you expect any place else to look for crooked athletes other than New Orleans or Louisiana, considering its history for crooked politics? Didn't think so."

His article is truly not bad and there isn't that much in it that strays far from what my general opinion is on both matters, but this statement about "expecting" this from the city of New Orleans makes no sense to me. There could surely be many comparisons between the sports' world and the world of politics, but it is kind of a strange relationship made here.

So because Louisiana has a history of crooked politics; the professional sports' teams in the city go out and find the most crooked athletes they can? I'm confused here Mr. Holder so I'd truly appreciate it if you could explain that to me. It's not like the Saints sat down in 2006 and thought to themselves, "Let's make sure we get a player with a jaded background so we can bring about a bunch of drama to the team."

No. The Houston Texans had reached a deal with Mario Williams meaning the much coveted Reggie Bush was going to be available to the next team in line in the draft. That happened to be the Saints and they drafted this great football player that any other team was foaming at the mouth to get. Character is something that is being looked at more and more by professional teams when players are coming out of college, but Bush really was not in any hot water at the time of his draft. So to make it appear as if the Saints pinpointed a "crooked" athlete is completely and totally absurd.

It's not like the Hornets did the same thing here when drafting Paul out of Wake Forest. The kid had never really done anything wrong and hasn't while in the NBA either. He hasn't been anything but a model player and person yet now he is coming off as a...well, that's a story for another time. Besides, I'm paid to talk about the Saints not the Hornets, but you get my drift.

I still don't get how the crooked politics in Louisiana, more specifically New Orleans, has anything to do with there being crooked athlete(s) on the Saints. That'd be like me saying a movie theater usually has crappy mood so I'd fully expect it to usually show crappy movies. They make take place in the same location, but neither has anything to do with the other one.

If that's the sort of comparison you're going to make Mr. Holder, then I'd love to see what you think about these teams and the players they signed:

• L.A. Lakers - Ron Artest: I guess since Los Angeles has had riots before that this signing made perfect sense.
• Cincinnati Reds - Rob Dibble: Marge Schott was a bit of a racist and hot head so it was understood signing one of the "bad boys."
• Buffalo Bills - O.J. Simpson: I don't know much about the Buffalo area, but I'm guessing it is well known for it's possible double murder cases?
• New York Giants - Plaxico Burress: Well, there's shootings in the Big Apple all the time now isn't there so fully feel you on this one. Right? Right?
• New York Islanders - Chris Simon: Guess this is another situation with New York being alright with slashing or something.
• San Francisco Giants - Barry Bonds: Ummm...hmmm. People work out on the beach in San Fran...soooo, that makes sense then that the MLB team signs a guy doing steroids. Yeah, that's the ticket.

These are just a few examples I could think of from the top of my head and if I shared the same logic that you did with "corrupt politicians meaning corrupt athletes," then all those bullet points would make perfect sense. But none of them do which is perhaps what I'm trying to ask you here. How can you possibly justify the comments you made?

Mr. Holder, I am in no way bashing you or saying you are trashing the city of New Orleans. Your article is well written and you make plenty of valid points that get praise from me and my agreement. But that statement has soured my entire view of things because it's just so far out there and out of place that it has taken my full attention. I read it, paused, read the rest of your article and that one comment was all that stuck in my head.

Hopefully you're able to make some sense of it because I just can't. That is of course unless your reasoning is that the entire New Orleans Saints' team is full of crooked athletes just because it is what's expected thanks to people like Edwin Edwards, Oliver Thomas, and Ray Nagin.

See how silly that sounds?

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