Former BP boss: honest or clued out?

We are all aware that the BP oil spill off the Gulf coast has created one of the most significant environmental disasters in history.

The true impact on animal life and the broader environment—and to thousands of families and individuals—is incalculable.

Outgoing BP CEO Tony Hayward has made many public statements since the incident became public. Perhaps none has registered as poorly as the statement some weeks ago that he “just wanted to get his life back”.

Now, it’s often too easy to criticize those facing media/public scrutiny when they say something that may not have been the wisest thing to say. And it’s natural that a senior executive under duress would want his life to return to “normal”.

But from a communications perspective—and simply from a human compassion perspective—a CEO who makes millions of dollars a year working for a company that makes more money than most people can imagine generates little public sympathy under the best of circumstances.

It’s likely Hayward evoked little but disdain with his comment, given that so many helpless people were impacted terribly by his company’s failings. Not to mention the wildlife and the broader environmental impact which will be felt for years.

Just like professional athletes sometimes become disconnected from everyday people once they start to acquire wealth and fame, corporate executives have long been in a situation where they just don’t seem to “get it”. Their incomes, their stock options and absurd golden parachutes create, it seems, a lifestyle that too often makes them unconcerned with the welfare of others.

The philanthropic efforts of individuals such as Warren Buffet and Bill Gates should be not ignored, but many other business “leaders” fail the true responsibility test.

Many would put BP’s actions before and during the crisis in that category—and their outgoing boss’ comments, as well.

U.S. college football coaches continue to show the worst kind of leadership example

I’ve written in previous posts about a number of U.S. college football coaches and the (to me, at least) disappointing way some of them conduct their business.

They are supposed to be teachers, leaders, role-models, winners.

Too often, in reality they are recruiters and charlatans.

Beyond the obvious (and countless) instances of recruiting violations, poor conduct and such things, too many leave their contracts and the kids they recruited—high and dry because a “better” job came along. Brian Kelly, who recently left his Cincinnati college team to become coach at Notre Dame is an example, as is Lane Kiffin, who left the University of Tennessee after just one season to go to the University of Southern California.

Check previous posts and you’ll see this is a subject I believe is important when we are talking about sports, our youth, and what leadership really means.

A well-respected football writers in the United States, Peter King of NBC and Sports Illustrated, wrote a piece recently (shown in part, below, in italics) which largely mirrors my long-held views. I was particularly drawn to comments attributed to the son of legendary college football coach Joe Paterno.

*****

This Lane Kiffin story really ticks me off.

The gall of Kiffin. The unmitigated, outrageous gall of this kid. And the idiocy of Tennessee apparently giving Kiffin -- when, let's be honest, what options did he have coming off his disastrous 5-15 run with the Raiders? -- an $800,000 buyout after one year of his contract. But I blame Kiffin far more. Tennessee bought out Phil Fulmer's coaching staff, then brought in Kiffin and his staff (including his father, Monte, for a reported $1-million-a-year deal to be a college defensive coordinator) and the minute there's an opening at USC, Lane Kiffin bolts ... in the prime part of recruiting season, a terrible time to hire a coaching staff.

I wonder if Kiffin ever said to a single recruit since getting hired by Tennessee 13-plus months ago, "USC's my dream job, so if it ever opens up, I've got to go?'' Of course not. I'm sure the conversation was something like, "Come to Tennessee, I'm going to be here a long, long time, and we're going to win a national championship together.''

One 7-6 season. After Tennessee rescued a tarnished Kiffin. After Tennessee's athletics department backed Kiffin through six secondary recruiting violations, and after Tennessee backed Kiffin in a potential violation of having campus "hostesses'' make "visits'' to recruits all over the southeast.

And he's rewarded by another institution of higher learning (and I type that with as much sarcasm as I can muster), making him even richer than if he'd stayed at Tennessee .

Where's the decency? The maturity? The gratitude? The simple sense of even a pinch of loyalty?

My favorite part of this story is that Kiffin left Tennessee so hurriedly that he didn't even bother to call his brother-in-law, the brother of his wife, who was also his quarterbacks coach at Tennessee . The New York Times reported David Reaves found out Kiffin was bolting when he saw the news on TV at a local restaurant.

In the past few days, I've learned that I'm really old, because there's not nearly as much outrage as I thought there'd be over this. I'd say my Twitter account has been 60-40 against my anti-Kiffin stance (yes, I did call him "a bum''), believing that as long as he pays the buyout, he's got no obligation to the university beyond that. That's where I'll draw the line in the moral sand. He has an obligation to Tennessee. That school gave Kiffin and his family a life-preserver when he was on the street. Would he have gotten a good coaching job, after Davis booted him out of Oakland? Maybe. An SEC contender's coaching job? I doubt it. And this is how he thanks them.

Interesting column Friday on statecollege.com by Penn State quarterbacks coach Jay Paterno, son of Joe, railing about the state of college football. "This profession has lost touch with the reality of the world around us, and some coaches have lost touch with what the mission of our profession should be,'' Jay Paterno wrote. "We are starting to look as arrogant as the Wall Street bankers raking in seven-figure bonuses. The astronomical explosion in coaching salaries continues at a time of 10 percent unemployment in America and exploding tuition costs burdening working class families ... Coaches walk into a recruit's home and talk about how they will look out for that young man's future. The expectation is that the coach will help to guide him through a very formative time. A year later the same coach is off to another job for more money and left behind are the young men he promised to nurture towards their future.''

That's precisely the way I feel. I hated Brian Kelly skipping out on Cincinnati before its bowl game; I hated the USC staff not returning calls to recruits they'd bombarded with text messages and phone calls for months when Pete Carroll flirted with the Seahawks. But this one is so reprehensible because of Kiffin being rescued by the Vols and leaving after a cup of coffee and tons of broken promises. Now, a few notes responding to many of your e-mails and Tweets to me:

• Why this differs from a NFL coach like Bobby Petrino or Nick Saban leaving for college football. It doesn't. Those things were outrageous too.

• Why this differs from a coach who gets fired despite having a valid contract with his pro or college team. It does, because teams or schools have to pay a coach who gets fired what he's due under the terms of his contract. If he's got three years and $3 million left, the school has to fork it over.

• Why this differs from the Josh Cribbs story. You may know that I've been on Cribbs' contractual side. He's got three years left on a contract that in 2009 made him the 30th-highest-paid Cleveland Brown, though he was selected the all-pro return man this season. I've written the Browns should do the right thing and give Cribbs, the most dangerous special-teamer in football, a new contract. I feel strongly he should be paid more. But if he is not paid, he needs to live up to the contract he signed. He signed it, it stinks, and he's got to live with it if he can't reach agreement on a new deal.

• Why this differs from the real world. Scores of you believe I'm a Pollyanna about this. I currently have a contract with Sports Illustrated, and another with NBC. If another media company came to me and offered me three times what I'm making, I wouldn't entertain the offer. I want to believe I'm like most Americans -- a contract's a contract.

Except, of course, if you're a college football coach.

********

Based on King’s comments above, some people are evidently not troubled by coaches moving around, believing, I suppose, that it’s a “free country” as the saying goes and coaches have a right to go where they want to go, whenever they want to go- just like anyone else

While that is true, the example it sets for young people, on many levels, is anything but good.

McGwire still misses the mark

Former baseball slugger Mark McGwire “came clean” recently, finally admitting he took steroids over many years in his juiced-up major-league career.

That he, and many others who have yet to “declare”, did so should be no surprise.

His hope, and that of his friend and booster, St. Louis manager Tony LaRussa, is apparently that people will accept his “apology” and “move on” and not dwell in and on the past. This is all part of a public relations campaign to be warmly embraced by baseball again.

One wonders if Barry Bonds, with a different personality and relationship to the game, would be given the same embrace if he acknowledged steroid use in the future?

While belated honesty is perhaps preferable to no honesty at all, before McGwire is given absolute ‘forgiveness” by the sporting community, there are some points that really should be raised:

• 
  
   For many years I have preached the importance of acknowledgement, in its various forms. But there has to be a timing element to a willingness to acknowledge. Doing so, as McGwire has, when the obvious attraction is changing the minds of Hall-of-Fame voters (who had days before snubbed him for the third year in a row) is quite obvious.
• 
  
  McGwire’s apology is written with a deft touch, which to give the impression the steroids didn’t really help his performance. His broad-brush claim, saying essentially, “I had good years when I didn’t use them, bad years when I did” is hard to believe. There is simply too much evidence to the contrary, not only in his case but in those of dozens of other “caught” athletes who achieved results they otherwise would not have, or they would not have been using these substances. Interestingly, these individuals are almost always caught well after the fact, and after records have been set.
• 
  
  To say he took them “on and off” over the years again aims to throw people off the scent. What does “on and off” really mean? A car doesn’t need gas every day, but when it runs down, you put in the gas. Was this any different?
• 
  
  He claims he used steroids only to help heal injuries more quickly. Of course, this is one we’ve all heard before (see Andy Petite and others). No doubt it’s true that steroids quicken the healing process. But are we to ignore the other staggering performance side-benefits? And what of those athletes who were also injured but chose to work their way back into the line-up the old-fashioned way—though sheer hard work and dedication.
• 
  
  He says he “wasn’t in a position” to tell Congress the truth five years ago. Why? It’s all because of his lawyers?
• 
  
  McGwire says he is being as “honest as he can be”. How honest is “honest as he can be?”

Surely this is all designed for the aforementioned Hall-of-Fame balloting for next year, and to ensure a comfy landing spot back in baseball.

It’s interesting that former slugging teammate Jose Canseco was laughed out of the baseball fraternity in light of his allegedly silly allegations about steroid use in his book published some years back. Yet much of what Canseco wrote has turned out to be pretty accurate, it seems.

McGwire says he won’t get into a debate with Canseco about the issue, saying he wants to “stay on the high road”. Easy to say when you’ve done the opposite for twenty years.

I really wonder what lesson this circus sends to young student-athletes, and young people in general. Cheat for more than 10 years, wait another five to tell the “truth”—(and was it the full truth?), then become the guy who tells kids “do as a say, not as I did, while I got unbelievably wealthy while cheating…”

The hypocrisy of the entire baseball community is stunning as well. Not to defend the indefensible (a manager betting on baseball games) but Pete Rose remains out of the game, essentially, never to be in the Hall-of-Fame, though his transgressions occurred after his playing career and arguably came as a result of an illness- an addiction to gambling. A worthy player such as Jack Morris isn’t in the Hall-of-Fame because a number of writers didn’t/don’t like him. More “likeable” players with no better or lesser credentials are in. Go figure.

None of this is to suggest McGwire wasn’t an elite power hitter, a hard worker or dedicated to his sport. He clearly was and if you set the steroid issue aide, was inarguably a Hall-of-Fame talent because of his prodigious home run skills.

It’s important—but sometimes a bit too easy—to preach and believe in forgiveness. There are worse things than taking steroids, for sure. But this particular recent apology was just a bit too easy.

Staying "On Message" Can Send a Bad Message

There is a field of work in the public relations industry that is referred to as “media training”.

It is generally done in a workshop format, whereby executives are prepared to interact with the media by putting them through their paces in terms of trying to get a sense of how the media operates. They are pushed to anticipate the kinds of questions spokespersons from a given company may face when they make a particular announcement or respond to an issue that has arisen.

No doubt someone has documented when this kind of ‘media preparation’ first took place in a formal sense (perhaps the Kennedy-Nixon TV debates leading up to the 1960 U.S. Presidential election, when both candidates when through a number of rehearsals), but this has been going on informally for generations.

Spokespeople going through this training process are routinely told to focus on delivering “three key messages”.

The notion of focusing on delivering a select few messages makes sense, as the struggle to effectively deliver a laundry list of important ideas can end up diffusing the impact a spokesperson or organization is aiming for.

Unfortunately, part of the process usually involves telling the “trainee” they should stick to their messages no matter what.

That is, even if they are asked a fair and reasonable question, if it is one they don’t want to answer, they should either ignore the question and simply “deliver their message” anyway, or say something such as, “I’m not here to talk about that, I’d like to talk about our new plans for….”

This brings to mind the recent Hall-of-Fame weekends in both Major League Baseball and the National Football League that brought forward the imminent prospect of Mark McGuire being up for consideration for Cooperstown. (The results of the Hall-of-Fame voting will be released in January, 2007.)

It’s brought to mind because it was McGuire who appeared before a Congressional committee last year and kept “sticking to his message” (as he was no doubt told to do by either lawyers or his PR advisors) and repeating, when pressed about whether he had used performance-enhancing drugs: ”I’m not here to talk about the past…” before launching into his rehearsed message track about how he would like to positively influence young people in the future, etc.

A very nice message, to be sure.

Unfortunately, it was almost completely obscured by – and quite properly so—his ill-advised attempt to not answer questions directly, to avoid revealing anything about his own actions that could have indeed set baseball on a more honest and straightforward path.

By choosing the old, worn tactic of “sticking to his message”, ignoring the questions he was being asked, and so obviously not answering questions directly, he wavered badly off the high road. He left a horrible impression in the minds of the public and the media, and lost all credibility.

Based on his statistical accomplishments (assuming he was “clean”, which his testimony did nothing to affirm), McGuire indeed deserves induction into the prestigious baseball Hall.

But taking the advice given to too many politicians over the years, to “stay on message” no matter what, has put him in the same class in most people’s minds as the vast majority of political-types: they are seen as being untrustworthy, evasive and as lacking integrity and credibility.

A missed opportunity to communicate truly effectively may have not only cost McGuire an opportunity to make a real difference to our youth through taking an opportunity to acknowledge his errors and seek forgiveness. It may well keep him out of the Hall in 2007, and well beyond.

When Leadership Doesn't Lead, This is What You Get...

In early April, local newspaper stories reported that a 15 year-old high school hockey player from New Brunswick scored a goal in double-overtime to help her team win a high-school playoff game.

While she had her hands raised in celebration, an opposing player allegedly cross-checked the young girl.

The 15 year old has spent time in hospital, suffering from a lacerated spleen.

The 18-year old senior who evidently pushed, shoved or hit the younger girl has been suspended indefinitely.

Unfortunately, these incidents, while relatively isolated, are not all that rare, and they speak to a disconcerting attitude that afflicts ‘competitive’ sports, including youth sports.

We all say youth sports should be for the kids; should be about having fun; should be about getting a chance for all kids to play, regardless of ability.

Perhaps we are simply fighting human nature, as many people tend to be competitive to varying degrees, but the moment we “keep score”, playing a game for fun becomes almost impossible.

From supposedly casual so-called recreational or house-league sports programs to the various levels of competitive ‘rep’ or ‘elite’ sports, the demands and expectations placed on kids, teenagers and young adults is sometimes overwhelming.

As adults, we offer conflicting messages. We encourage our kids to have fun, and some people even suggest winning is truly unimportant, and mean it. Yet we put our kids in games, leagues and situations where there are so-called winners and losers.

In a society where we unfortunately still put a significant emphasis on who is bigger, faster, stronger or tougher, the moment a youngster shows a bit of skill, they are often encouraged to try out for a ‘higher’ level of competition. Pressure grows as expectations rise. (For some, it leads to the use of performance-enhancing drugs, but that’s a story for another day.)

Where does all this come from?

Well, we as parents certainly are part of the problem. Hockey Canada aimed a series of public service announcements at parents over the last couple of years, dealing with this very issue of parents taking youth sports more seriously than their kids do. The leading hockey organization in Canada was seemingly hoping to encourage people to look in the mirror and do a little self-reflection, and perhaps recognize that certain behaviours as parents and spectators were in fact harmful to kids. All this in the hope that we may all start to put the emphasis back on fun.

Yet in the same breath, Hockey Canada bent over backwards this year to ensure that Todd Bertuzzi was named to Team Canada for the 2006 Winter Olympics—despite his alleged assault on Steve Moore in an NHL game two years ago, an unquestionably dirty hit from behind that has been seen countless times by millions of kids across the country.

Bertuzzi can do that, and still be granted the greatest honour available to hockey players in this country, less than two years after the incident.

What messages does this send to parents—and to their kids?

If that kind of behaviour – and Steve Moore still is not healthy enough to play hockey to this day-- is not only tolerated and goes virtually un-punished by Hockey Canada (the NHL purports to have “punished” Bertuzzi with what amounted to a minimal suspension), what should hockey parents think?

Is it any wonder a youth hockey coach was allegedly grabbed around the neck in the fall of 2005 by an angry parent? Is it any wonder a young girl is hit violently enough after scoring a goal that she is seriously injured? We can talk about these things being isolated incidents, or suggest it’s just a matter of a few adults or kids with anger management issues. But it goes deeper than that.

Yes, parents have a huge role here. Parents teach and model the values of ethical thought, sportsmanship and acceptable social behaviour. No question.

Many people don’t like to lose. And many people spend a lifetime learning to accept defeat in life’s many forms, whether sports-related or not. Many never do adjust.

But reacting violently to the success of another is never acceptable, and it certainly isn’t acceptable in a youth hockey game.

You can spend millions of dollars on advertising in an effort to spread a positive message. But as many have said before, words are just that-- words. It’s what a person -- or in this case an organization in a position of leadership-- does that actually matters.

Hockey Canada dropped the ball on the Bertuzzi matter, when they had a chance to really send an important message. Instead they decided that trying to win an Olympic medal was more important than doing the right thing.

And they are the ones in charge of hockey in this country?

With that kind of leadership, should we wonder why we face the problems we do in the youth hockey world?

He Said, She Said... Or Did They?

It’s so common now, and there’s no turning back the clock.

The issue? Unidentified sources.

This is certainly not a new phenomenon. The notion of a journalist, a reporter of some description, writing a story with compelling information from “sources” is as old as journalism. (Woodward and Bernstein will likely go to their graves without revealing the name of “deep throat”, the individual largely responsible for providing the then soon-to-be-famous investigative reporters the anonymous information that led to the disintegration of the Nixon administration in the mid 1970’s. Theirs may be one of the more prominent historical cases of the media utilizing so-called “unidentified sources” to chase down a story)

That these media “sources” are often undeclared remains through the years a question of some ethical debate. Reporters have, through the years, been willing to risk jail time in order to protect – that is, not publicly identify – their sources.

One view puts the information shared privately between the “source” and the investigating reporter in the realm of a sacred trust, not to be disclosed at any cost.

Others view this approach as a dangerous game.

If a person can report as fact something that may have occurred based on information obtained from anonymous sources, what guarantee is there that such events absolutely took place?

If a reporter quotes an individual speaking about someone else, without naming the first person, how does the public know that the quote was not simply “made up” in the interests of weaving a more ‘sale’-able story?

Might the reporter have an agenda, a personal bias?

These are but a few of the simplest questions that can be asked when discussing the reality of how such sources are utilized.

I recall a time (in the late 1970’s-early 80’s, if I’m not mistaken) when Scott Young, the highly-respected columnist for the Globe& Mail resigned his position at the prestigious Canadian national newspaper. Why? Because a younger fellow writer had written a rather poisonous piece about the then General Manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs, Punch Imlach.

Perspective and fairness requires that it be said that Young and Imlach had been close through the years, and had collaborated on a couple of popular books together. But Young’s resignation stemmed from his concern that the story which vilified Imlach was filled with quotes from unidentified sources – apparently not a longstanding or fully accepted practice at the time, at least not in Young’s mind, it would seem.

Young saw this as journalistically unsound, and lacking the high ethical standards required of a reporter.

So, he resigned in protest.

Much more recently, that same newspaper ran a major story on the alleged dysfunction within the basketball operation side of the Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment empire.

The story was sprinkled liberally with anonymous quotes about then General Manager Glen Grunwald (since fired) and his supposed internal battles with the apparently soon-to-be-fired Kevin O’Neill.

Not surprisingly, the story – quoting current and former Raptor players without attribution, as well as people supposedly ‘close’ to Raptors forward Vince Carter and others within the management group of MLSE – caused a firestorm. It also undoubtedly hastened the timetable that will see the continued dismantling of the struggling organization.

For appearances’ sake, on the record, at least, the players stood behind their coach. But the public is left to wonder: Who were these anonymous players who spoke out against O’Neill? Who were the management types who allegedly said the things they said? Did anyone have an agenda here?

Were all of these quotes accurate? Was the story really credible when everyone quoted was unnamed? Could any of this have been made up?

Was the newspaper outlet and its reporters simply reflecting what was really going on inside the organization?

In recent years, one of the best – and most outspoken – players in baseball has been pitcher Curt Schilling. Schilling of course was a mainstay with the Phillies and then the Diamondbacks, when Arizona beat the Yankees in the World Series a few seasons back.

Schilling went on a nationally syndicated radio program recently, and spoke about the media attention the Red Sox receive in Boston.

His contention was that the Boston press simply make up quotes to create stories, and sell newspapers.

So we can count Schilling as one athlete who does not support the use of anonymous quotes.

If you are a young athlete, you need to be aware that the media is always looking for a story – good, bad or anywhere in between. Most ‘beat’ reporters covering the local major-league NFL, NHL or NBA team need a story a day.

When they sense trouble in paradise (i.e. within the clubhouse or dressing room, or within the front office) it is in their blood to seek out – some will say create – the story.

They will utilize whatever approach and sources they can to develop a story that is entertaining and potentially of great interest.

It may even be accurate.

My sense has long been: if you don’t want to see it in the newspaper, don’t say it. Don’t say it in the elevator, the hotel lobby or the dressing room. On the record or “off the record”.

Just don’t say it.

If you go “off the record”, if you speak on the condition of anonymity, you may feel ‘protected’. And that particular reporter may like you as a “source”, especially if your comments gave that reporter a supposed ‘scoop’. But at the end of the day, he or she will wonder about your personal integrity, all the while using your quotes to make his or her story.

Since integrity is still important to most people, that’s something worth thinking about before playing the ‘unidentified source’ game.

Turning a Negative into a Bigger Negative

It was, presumably, an effort to spread the basketball gospel to the far reaches of Canada, and to “give something back” to the community that is home to the “farm” team of the National Hockey League Toronto Maple Leafs.

The ‘effort’ was the decision by Maple Leafs Sports & Entertainment to have the NBA team that that entity owns, the Raptors, play an exhibition game at the home of the St. John’s (Newfoundland) hockey Leafs, Mile One Stadium.

Wonderful thought, and particularly appealing to the local sports fans, no doubt, given that the opposition was the once-lowly Cleveland Cavaliers, now a team with the highest-profile rookie to come into the NBA in years, young LeBron James.

As fate (or lack of proper preparation) would have it, with a full house watching, it evidently became clear that condensation on the temporary playing floor would not allow the teams to play safely. The Raptors, and the NBA, determined that conditions were unsafe and called the game off.

Amazingly, Raptors officials actually herded the players from the teams out of the building BEFORE letting the crowd know the game would be cancelled.

It was a stunning display of arrogance, and a classic case of turning a negative into an even bigger negative.

Presented with what was, in effect, an opportunity, Raptors officials could have, from a “public relations” perspective at the very least, if nothing else, (or simply because it would have been the right thing to do) handled this situation very differently.

With thousands of moms and dads and youngsters on hand to see their first-ever, and possibly only-ever NBA “game”, the players skulked out of the building-- caught by TV cameras, but not so noticed by the poor fans.

Did any of the Raptors officials think about another way of handling this situation, other than General Manager Glen Grunwald lamely offering to return to Newfoundland “within two years”?

Perhaps a slam-dunk contest was out of the question, given the potentially slippery conditions. But how about a three-point shooting contest to entertain the fans?

Maybe an impromptu “Question & Answer” session with young LeBron James, or Raps star Vince Carter, holding a microphone in their hands at center court and kids having an opportunity to ask questions?

Or a quick ticket stub “raffle” to offer a chance to at least a few fans to take photos with/of their favorite players?

Or better still, with the allotted time still available and everyone already there (even though the game was delayed, they were supposed to be playing an entire game, after all), how about asking (insisting?) that each one of the players on both teams spend some time in the stands, signing autographs?

Oh yes, a few of the multi-million dollar athletes might have had to walk up a few flights of stairs to get to the top of the small arena, but one senses they are in good enough shape to handle the task.

Any of these things would have brought a smile to the faces of youngsters, many of whom had been thinking about this night for weeks and weeks.

Any of the above would have given a sign, a glimpse of hope, that today’s professional athletes are not totally out of touch with the “average fan” – and that MLSE management, accustomed to charging ridiculously high amounts for sometimes middlish entertainment value at the Air Canada Center in Toronto – was not equally out of touch.

Any of the above would have turned a mess into a positive experience for many of those on hand.

Instead, in their wisdom, Raptor officials determined that the precious players were somehow at risk of a hostile reaction from the crowd.

Rather than actively doing something positive, they ran out the back of the building, literally (while unsuspecting volunteers, many of them youngsters, were still trying to help dry off the floor).

Sometimes, when you don’t “do” much of anything, as the Raptors officials did not, you are really “communicating” a lot.

And by implying that the St. John’s sports faithful, of all people, might have reacted badly was dead wrong, and also missed the point.

All they wanted was to see the players a little, see them up close, and see them as real people, not small distant figures on a TV screen.

The Raptors had a chance to take an unfortunate circumstance and do something really neat, and they failed on all counts.

Perhaps what is most disappointing is that –tucked “safely” on their bus and the subsequent flight home-- they probably still don’t get it.

The Coach comments that he missed a chance to “see different guys” play in one of the fall’s last exhibition games. The team President says the organization was concerned for the safety of the players. The General Manager says they will come back in two years.

They all so badly missed the real point of the whole exercise.

Talk about a missed opportunity.