And now, sports headlines you won’t see anytime soon

Written by Joe Kleinsasser Tuesday, 28 May 2013 10:56

You’ve heard the saying, “Nothing surprises me anymore.” Well, here are some headlines that would definitely surprise me.

With most prognosticators, it’s safe to assume that they’ll miss a certain number of their predictions. I’m prepared to boldly predict with 99.9 percent certainty that the following headlines will never come true.

Without further adieu, here are those fake headlines....

“Coach credits officials for helping team win game”

This is a no-brainer. The players and coach deserve the credit win or lose, although some coaches find it far easier to blame officials than themselves. And it’s easy for coaches to point out the bad calls that hurt their team. If they were consistent, wouldn’t they point out...

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Fighting terrorism will be a marathon

Written by Joe Kleinsasser Tuesday, 14 May 2013 13:50

What was your reaction to the recent terrorism at the Boston Marathon?

Shock?

Stunned?

Did you wonder why?

Did you ask, “What’s this world coming to?”

Did you think, “How could anybody do something like this?”

Are you more surprised this tragedy happened or surprised that it doesn’t happen more often at sporting events?

The reactions vary, but answers to these manmade tragedies are few, and it reaffirms the depravity of man.

We live in a sinful world where evil continually rears its ugly head.

Truth be told, terrorism at sporting events is relatively rare. Perhaps the most brazen and infamous act of terrorism in sports took place when Palestinian terrorists murdered 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics in...

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WSU’s Final Four is shocking for many reasons

Written by Joe Kleinsasser Tuesday, 30 April 2013 12:21

Even though I’ve been gainfully employed at Wichita State for more than 26 years as director of news and media relations, I can honestly say I was surprised the impact a Final Four run has on an institution of higher learning.

The athletic department has its own media relations staff, so they took the brunt of media requests. Still, the amount of requests that spilled over into my area and other areas of the university were remarkable.

For example, the day before Wichita State’s game against Louisville in the Final Four, I was interviewed on a morning radio show in Lexington, Ky., just to talk about all things Wichita State and Wichita for about 15 minutes. I had no advance notice of the phone interview until it happened. That was...

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Officiating basketball is a tough call

Written by Joe Kleinsasser Tuesday, 16 April 2013 12:19

Officiating basketball is virtually synonymous with controversy. In fact, with the growth of new and improved technology for taping games and the explosion of social media, mistakes and perceived mistakes are there for everyone to see.

In reality, there’s no proof that officiating is worse today than in the past, but you’d never know it from the reaction of fans and some coaches.

There are a plethora of reasons why officiating is actually better now than it was 30-40 years ago, but my ability to convince the average fan of that fact is about as likely as my ability to convince you that it will snow in Marion County in July.

Basketball has always been difficult to officiate. No matter what the rulebook states, the game requires...

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