- Casey Hampton is fat. Really, really fat. That might not be a surprise for a man who is a defensive lineman for an NFL team, but Hampton is pushing even the generous weight boundaries typically afforded to a man in his position. He showed up at Pittsburgh Steelers training camp in Latrobe, Pa. and within a day, Hampton was placed on the physically unable to perform list for being too fat. Well, he wasn’t specifically placed on the PUP list with the (too fat) designation beside it, but he might as well have been. As one of their first activities upon arriving at camp players are put through a conditioning test by their team. The tests vary from team to team, but across the board they involved a lot of running. Hampton, nicknamed “Big Snack” by his teammates (a more appropriate nickname may not exist), could not complete the test. As a result, head coach Mike Tomlin followed team policy by placing him on the PUP list. Hampton admitted his conditioning was subpar but tried to defend his total lack of being in shape. “I could be in better shape,” he conceded. However, he went on to point out that being able to run well and complete running drills doesn’t make one a good football player. No, fatass, but not being able to run a few simple sprints without nearly going into full cardiac arrest does ensure that you’re going to be the slowest guy on the field and need a lot of rest breaks. Being a world-class sprinter is one thing; being in shape enough to complete a simple conditioning drill is another. You’re being asked to do the latter and you could - if you’d shove away from the buffet table, put down the pork rinds, Yoo-Hoo and Ding-Dongs and stop raiding the fridge for late-night snacks. Reintroduce yourself to the treadmill and exercise bike and see if that doesn’t help. My man, your body is how you make your living. Take care of if, keep it in reasonably decent shape and stop being placed on the PUP list for being too fat.
- Some people are bilingual, meaning they speak two languages. Others are bisexual, meaning they swing from both sides of the plate, sexually speaking. But rare is the individual who is a bi-national criminal. It takes a rare bird to commit major felonies in two different countries and be convicted in each of them. In other words, it takes a man like Emmanuel “Toto” Constant, 51. Constant is the former leader of the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti, a group formed in 1993 following the ouster of Haitian Presidnet Jean-Bertrand Aristide. In that capacity, Constant was convicted of leading a ruthless death squad that raped and killed its political rivals. Now, more than a decade later, Constant has brought his criminal ways to a new nation. He was convicted late last week of running a mortgage fraud scheme here in the United States that arranged millions of dollars in fraudulent financing for three Brooklyn properties. For those crimes, “Toto” faces 15 to 45 years in prison when he is sentenced on Sept. 10. I can't really condone mortgage fraud, what with the current mortgage crisis in the U.S., but I do have to admire a man who was able to transition so seamlessly from brutal, blue-collar crimes in one country to multimillion-dollar white-collar crimes in another. Nice versatility, “Toto,” I’m sure you’ll adapt just fine to your new surroundings for the next 15 to 45 years….
- Memo to you, Iraq: so you’re not welcome at the Olympics, so what? Look at it as the blessing it is. Yes, your athletes received a standing ovation upon marching into the stadium for the opening ceremonies at the 2004 Summer Olympics, but if the International Olympic Committee says you can't come this time, don’t sweat it. Your tumultuous political situation may have inspired the IOC to tell your athletes to stay home, but consider the positives and you’ll see it’s not such a bad thing. By staying home, your athletes won't have to breathe Beijing’s toxic air that would leave them blowing buckets of soot out of this nostrils. They also don’t have to worry about getting anywhere near the algae-clogged waters, eating food that may or may not contain doses of steroids or trying to fight through the city’s other-worldly traffic. You’ll save tens of thousands of dollars you would have spent on fuel and travel costs for them. Plus, the Olympics are a tired and over-the-hill event in the sports world anyhow. So stop your last-minute negotiating to get back into the Games, allow the IOC to pretend that it’s “very disappointed” not to have your athletes competing and give it a shot at the 2010 Winter Olympics or the 2012 Summer Olympics, both of which will take place in cities where breathing the air for an hour won't take a year off your lifespan….
- Even with all of their members in their 60s, the Rolling Stones are still cashing in big time on their decades of musical success. The Stones were actually the top-earning band in the world last year, making them a hot property and thus a valuable acquisition for Universal Music Group, which signed them away from EMI. Mick Jagger and the boys have reached an “exclusive, long-term, worldwide recording agreement” with Universal, becoming the latest big name to leave EMI. Radiohead left the label last year and Coldplay, still with EMI as of now, have expressed extreme displeasure with changes at the label since it was bought by a private equity firm. Universal already owns the rights to the Stones’ catalog from 1963 to 1970, which is some of their best music. Still, the band grossed $88 million between June 2006 and June 2007, mostly from their Bigger Bang tour. Universal might be getting grizzled, veteran rockers, but the Stones are by no means washed up. I’ll listen to them over any American Karaoke contestant, Black Eyed Pea or former man-bander every day of every week of every year of every decade of every century and then some……
- Californians can shoot fat and poison into their faces, they just can’t cook food with trans fats in them. The Gover-nator Ah-nold Schwarzenegger announced the new law Friday and I’m here to salute the decision. Ah-nold signed the bill into law and from here on out, restaurants and other commercial food establishments will be banned from preparing foods using oil, margarine and shortening that contain trans fats. Seeing as our first story today was about a man so fat he’s too out of shape to play nose tackle in the NFL, I think Americans need all the help we can get in making our diets and lifestyles healthier. Hopefully this won't be one of those California-only, wheat-grass-and-soy-milk trends that the rest of the country rejects as the wacky ideas of those flaky surfer dudes and dudettes on the West Coast. Bill Gates and Michael Bloomberg are teaming up to tackle smoking, the Gover-nator is attacking trans fats and at this rate, we just may find a way to stop being such an obese, nicotine-addicted country that the rest of the world mocks….well, they’ll still mock us for having the worst president in the history of the world, but at least they’ll have a few less subjects to make jokes about.
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