(This column was written May 10, 2011)

                                      Violence in Sports

By Shelly Saltman

This evening I was watching the Los Angeles Lakers play the Dallas Mavericks in round two of the 2011 playoffs.  Dallas easily manhandled the Lakers and swept the team in four straight games to advance to Round 3.

The frustrated Lakers were completely outplayed and looked like old men who had no legs left to stand on and run.  Until this point, for the most part, when I was associated with the team, I was proud of the organization.  The Lakers epitomized all that was good in sport ... sportsmanship, dedication and the desire to win.  All three were missing.  Dedication and desire to win appeared to be left in only the two players with the longest association with the team... Kobe Bryant and Derrick Fisher.

Sportsmanship went out the window when Andrew Bynum, the Laker's  youthful center, low bridged and nearly crippled the Mavericks Juan Barea... an uncalled for and unnecessary act of violence.  But we have to ask ourselves what precipitated this?

In  preparing this column, I called on many past incidents of athlete violence in sports, some I witnessed personally and others I have only read about.

However, before I show examples, let's look at how violence has crept into the fabric of our games.  To that, let's go back to back the year 1939.  In that year, a man named Carl Stotz and his wife, living in Williamsport, Pa., along with a few of their friends, actually started the "Little League".  The came up with this idea a way to bring about an organized league that would teach kids sportsman, fair play and teamwork.

Today, it is the world's largest organized youth sports program with nearly 200,000 participants yearly, in 80 countries.  However, it has deviated far from the original concept. The idea was to win if you can with proper coaching and fun.  In fact, when I was living in Ocean Township, N.J., I coached a couple of years. Fortunately, I had a former major league ballplayer to help teach the kids fundamentals.

He took care of the baseball while I took care of having fun.  If we got too far ahead, I made sure every kid played.  In fact, I would bring in my son Steven to pitch and, although  he loved it, he could not pitch and the other teams would be given a modicum of self esteem.  It was not win at all costs.  It was learn, do your best and play hard.

One of the parents was always yelling at his son in a merciless fashion.  The poor kid, only 12 years old was crying all the time.  I had a few words with the parent as had the umpires.  Next week at the local Town Hall Meeting, the township enacted a fine system to control rowdy parents.  This fine consisted of money, possible banishment from the field, or even jail time.

 It was a shame that we had to come to this. However, the win at all costs mentality of many parents demanded drastic action.

Psychologists tell us that we can almost always directly attach the reaction of the youngster to role model behavior.  This simply boils down to parents and star athletes.  Numerous polls  have been extremely indicative of the out-of-control parental interference.

There have been some drastic results.  On April 12, 2005, a 13-year-old boy was held for murder at a Pony League ball game.  Three months later, it came to light that a T-Ball coach paid a player to assault a teammate.

SportingKids magazine conducted a survey of over 3,300 parents, coaches, youth sports administrators and youth and here's what they found:

84% witnessed parents acting violently (shouting, berating, using abusive language)

80% believe inappropriate behavior is destroying what youth sports are meant to be.

There are many more :  In Hampton, Pa., a parent body-slammed a high school referee after he ordered the man's wife out of the gym for yelling obscenities during a basketball game... the referee had a concussion.  In Kentucky, during a fifth grade Little League game, a player's father who happened to also be a teacher physically confronted the umpire at half time and precipitated a riot.

Sports Illustrated for Kids had a similar survey with even more example. In New Jersey,  referee James Clay, a 50-year-old with seven years of officiating experience, was slugged in the head and neck after ejecting a Clayton High School soccer player.  He was arrested but released in the custody of his parents. ... In Illinois, a 39-year-old parent  ran on to the football  field and attempted to strangle Mike Byrne, a 27-year officiating veteran.  Illinois is treating this as felony.

In Oklahoma, a high school baseball coach attacked the umpire after the game in the locker room... In California, a 32-year-old father knocked the umpire unconscious over a disputed call at a Palm Springs 9 and 10 year old game...

But the most heinous is when arguments spill over and become fatal...

In Palmdale, Calif., a boy killed another boy while standing in a concession stand line with a baseball bat, all because he was being teased at just losing a game ... and finally in July1999 in New York State, a teenager was convicted  of killing a six-year-old.  His defense was he was imitating wrestlers on TV.

I have only demonstrated the tip of the iceberg.  There are 1,000 more instances of mayhem committed by imitating role models.

Andrew Bynum is the latest to fall off his pedestal.  His apology today was vacuous and appeared insincere. I feel Commissioner Stern must make an example of him. At the risk of being trite, he must be stern !