Chicago White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen, well known for his brash comments and fiery personality, held a press conference today to apologize for the controversial comments he’ll be making tomorrow afternoon around one or two in the afternoon. “I’m here today to apologize to every one who I’m going to hurt with my ill-advised comments, especially to the individual to whom the comments were made,” said a remorseful Guillen.

“In foresight, I realize that my comments will be inappropriate and I want the person I’m going to insult to know that those comments don’t represent me or the White Sox organization. I feel embarrassed about what I’m going to say. I feel guilty, too. These are going to be comments I’m going to make without thinking. For that, I am truly sorry.” Guillen says he intends to holds another press conference next week, when he’ll take the opportunity to apologize for his behavior on July 16 during the upcoming baseball season.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED FEBRUARY 21, 2006 IN VOLUME 4 ISSUE 4

I remember being 16 years old. My father has just completed another marathon in Duluth, MN. He was resting, and story-telling.

“Did I tell you about Iowa? No? I didn’t? Well, I once drove to Iowa to run a marathon. I don’t remember what number it was. I planned to sleep in my car in a park the night before the race, but around midnight, this cop tapped my window with his flashlight and I got kicked out a few minutes later.”

“Why didn’t you get a hotel?” I asked.

“It seemed like a waste of money,” he replied.

“So then what?” I asked.

“Well, after I got kicked out, I drove around for an hour looking for a place to park. I ended up just pulling my car into a cornfield, putting the driver’s seat back and falling asleep.”

“So what, you just slept a few hours in the car and then woke up and ran 26 miles?”

“Yeah.”

After that, I knew I would be a runner. I didn’t have a choice.

My father has run 30+ marathons. Today, he is not particularly old, but he is worn beyond the point where he wants to hurt himself to feel good.

That is sort of the point of a marathon. It is twisted, yet enthralling. Destructive, but reconstructive.

I have tried to stop running. Too many times to count. I’ve had surgery on both knees and continue to deal with a bad back that is as annoying as the barking dog next door, and as painful as a hot poker. Sometimes I swear I’m getting branded.

But I run.

I run because my father ran until he knew he was done. Until he knew his slower-paced son could run alongside him without breathing heavily.

“You go ahead,” he told me, several years ago when I was home for the holidays. We were out for a rare father-son run. One of only a handful we’ve enjoyed due to the distance between us.

That’s when I knew running had passed him by.

“No, I can slow down a little,” I replied.

“No, run ahead,” he insisted. Demanded, really. “I’m pretty slow these days.”

“It’s OK,” his eyes said. “Go.”

So I did. Because to slow down to run alongside him would have been an insult.

My dad has a bad back of his own. Maybe it’s from the running. Or maybe it’s from putting us three kids on it following my parents’ divorce.

When my own back hurts, I think of my father’s. I think of him. I think of all the miles he put on his running shoes, trying to put the pain of a failed marriage behind him. I think of all the tread he wore down trying to endure. For him, but mostly for his kids.

So I endure the pain. I run.

I run because I cannot stop running.

Despite the lyrics (“Nice fox don’t dance on the oyster shells”), you want to take this song seriously. If I ever have a short film made about my life that recaptures all my poignant moments, “Nice Fox” by The Rosebuds will be the soundtrack. It’s the sort of song you expect to hear in a Zach Braff movie.

I can picture it. Just as the lead character (Zach) fusses over a decision, like kissing a girl, making amends with a drunken, abusive father, or leaving his hometown for good, “Nice Fox” kicks in, and as it fades out minutes later, he makes a bold decision.

Then again, I have an hyper-active imagination. 

Though it’s hard to find another Rosebuds tune that sounds anything like “Nice Fox,” (the band could be labeled indie, pop, folk, rock or dance ), the track is a must-have and belongs in your MP3 folder.

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A study today released by the National Center on Race and Recreation (NCRR) paints a bleak picture for Caucasian males interested in playing professional baseball in Latin America.

Caucasians like Michael Young often get tricked into signing multi-million dollar contracts that prevent them from playing in Latin America

”It’s actually much worse than we expected,” said James W. Haught, leading researcher at the NCRR. “There’s two white guys in Venezuela and one in the Dominican Republic. That’s three. Keep in mind, there are something like 200 billion baseball players in Latin America. Quite frankly, that’s a very poor percentage. Simply unacceptable. Whites should simply have greater opportunities to play the game they love in a country not their own. It makes you wonder if there’s some sort of bias, you know?”

Bias or not, whites are failing to defect from their country and illegally cross into Latin America at an alarming rate.

”I’ve thought it, but it just sounds like a whole lot of trouble,” said Boston Red Sox right fielder Gabe Kapler. “One, I’d have to sell my 1.3 million dollar home, and two, I’d have to get out from under the lease of my Hummer H2 and find a buyer for my S-Class. Believe me, the Dominican sounds appealing and I think about going every day, but I’m kind of tied down.”

”For me, it’s just too dangerous, said Chicago White Sox first baseman Jim Thome.” I don’t want to risk my luggage getting lost on the flight over there. Plus there would be a two-hour layover and you never know if the movies they’re going to show are any good. Then you have to wait for the plane to taxi and wait for all the people sitting in rows ahead of you to disembark. It’s just not worth it.”

“I let whatever dreams I once had die. I was so enthusiastic about playing college ball, but then I got out into the real world, started playing for the Yankees, and I got complacent.” – Mike Mussina

Many white kids grow up with the dream to play overseas in Latin America, but few of them pursue it. They get signed by a major league club here in the states, get married, start a family, and soon enough, they’ve given up on their aspirations.

“It’s kind of sad sometimes,” said Texas Rangers pitcher Kevin Millwood. “My brother always wanted to study law so when he graduated from college he took the LSAT, got into NYU and now, he’s a criminal prosecutor in LA. But I’m still here, pitching in the majors – same thing I’ve been doing for nine years. I feel like my time had passed me by, you know? Like, I had my shot to go to play for Cuba but I got comfortable doing this and now I’m probably too old. I just hope my son doesn’t make the same type of mistake. I love you Tommy. Daddy loves you so much. I know I’m not perfect but I love you.”

New York Yankees pitcher Mike Mussina can relate to Millwood’s disappointment.

Gabe Kapler dreams of defecting to Cuba

”I always thought I would be the one in my family to make it, you know? I remember playing baseball in Little League on fields groomed with hundreds of thousands of dollars in sponsor’s money and thinking ‘Some day, Mike. Some day you’re going to get out of here.’ But I never did. I let whatever dreams I once had die. I was so enthusiastic about playing college ball, but then I got out into the real world, started playing for the Yankees, and I got complacent.”

”When he was growing up, Mike used to tell me that he would make me proud,” said Jerry Mussina, Mike’s father. “Today, I can’t even look him in the eyes. I’m going to go to my grave hating him, my only son, a complete failure. I wish I never had him.”

Though the results of the study clearly indicate that white baseball players in the States need to be afforded greater freedom to travel to Latin America to play ball, few people have offered idea that attempt to fix such a problem.

“I’m not sure what the solution is,” said Omar Gonzalez, head of the Latin America Baseball Organization (LABO). “We know there are great players over there in the States. it’s just a matter of getting scouts over there and developing a pipeline for getting them here. For some of those guys, they might not know anything beyond their own backyard. But if we can get some communication going, maybe sit down and talk to their parents and explain the opportunities that exist in Latin America, we can make some progress. If I can change, then you can change. And if you can change, then we can change. And we can change, well, I’m not sure what comes next, but that’s a lot of change.”

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED MARCH 16, 2006 IN VOLUME 4 ISSUE 6

It’s not a stretch to think that if Eminem were Somali, he’d sound exactly like K’NAAN – a Somali-Canadian poet and rapper who learned English as a boy in Mogadishu partially by listening to Nas, Rakim and other soulfoul rappers. But the comparison only goes so far as their frenetic style.

Gangsta rappers often rhyme about life on the streets, sometimes comparing it to war. But K’NAAN lived through it – literally. He grew up during the Somali Civil War in in the district of Wardhiigleey (“The Lake of Blood”), where machine guns, warlords and rock-propelled grenades were as commonplace as blinking.

No wonder K’NAAN spits, “If I rhyme about home and got descriptive /I’d make 50 Cent look like Limp Bizkit.”

K’NAAN will gain mass exposure in 2009 for late 2008′s Troubadour, but “Dusty Foot Philosopher” from the self-titled release in 2005 is the most proper of introductions to this immense talent.

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Team Kazakhstan’s surprising 5-2 win Monday over Latvia had its players in a good mood and forgetting that none of them have eaten in three weeks. “What a wonderful win for the great republic of Kazakhstan,” said Yevgeniy Koreshkov. “Perhaps now, President Nursultan, in all his glory and goodness, will award us some bread and tea. Or maybe just some livestock and grain. With all this celebrating, I forgot how hungry I was. Oooo, did you hear that? No, that was my stomach growling. My goodness, does anyone have any crackers?”

Kazakhstan, the largest of the former Soviet republics in territory, excluding Russia, experienced a contraction of its economy following the breakup of the USSR in December 1991. The country has been mired in poverty and reconstruction ever since. As such, food is scare, even for athletes. “Government officials packed us lunches but when we went to open them we discovered they were filled with rocks, not sandwiches,” said Fedor Polichshuk. “There is no food for them to send – there’s no meat in the shops, no eggs, nothing. I was able to find a rotten cabbage out of a dumpster, but that’s all I’ve eaten in three weeks. I’ve had to chew my nails just to keep up my energy for the games. Say, you wouldn’t happen to have any chocolate, would you? No? Ok, how about some Levis or a VCR?”

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED FEBRUARY 21, 2006 IN VOLUME 4 ISSUE 4

“Full Moon” by UK dance-punk outfit The Black Ghosts is an eerie, haunting song, most especially when strings are at their loudest. If it is ever licensed for a commercial, it will be for Nike. As the song starts and the lyrics “I am going out to see what I can sow/And I don’t know where I’ll go/And I don’t know what I’ll see” are spoken, I can’t help but picture a runner shutting his or her front door at dawn, casually getting into stride, and disappearing into the shadows still lining the tired streets. 

Band member Theo Keating was encouraged by his mother to watch horror movies at a young age. He also lived behind a cemetary. Band member Simon Lord’s grandmother was considered psychic. In total, that’s good enough reason for the both of them to consider The Black Ghosts music “perverse” and “personal.”

Coincidentally, that pretty much sums up what you need to be to run 26.2 miles.

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As far as mannequins go, I think their creepiness factor lies somewhere between clowns and barn owls. Following that, I’ve never understood why they’re used to sell clothing. To me, that’s like trying to sell a set of tires by putting them on a rusted out, window-less, white creeper van whose recently-paroled driver smells like tuna fish and cat pee.

But that’s just me.

All I’m saying is this: I’ve bought clothes because they’ve looked good in a magazine, on a wall or on a friend, but I’ve never bought them because they’ve looked good on fiberglass pseudo-humans.

Having said that, if you’re going to use them to sell clothes, you might as well acknowledge their creepiness factor and run with it, as Harvey Nichols did in its holiday sale, where mannequins are posed in protective positions because they are scared of the rush.

I love this campaign. Not just because it’s fun, but because it’s so damn simple. And therein lies the beauty. As marketers and advertisers, we spend exorbitant amounts of energy trying to invent the uninvented. As members of the creative class, we take honor in fashioning ideas of out thin air, or dust.

But as Harvey Nichols proves, sometimes the best ideas are there: they just need to be repositioned.

If English indie band The Kooks seem like they’re a fresh face, they are; only they’re not. They’ve been together since 2004, but only released two albums  – most recently 2008′s Konk - which may or may not be the sound of their popularity ramming the docks of the States.

Part of the fun of discovering a band massively popular overseas who finally finds success here in the USA is digging through the band’s old work. In this case, that’s only one album – 2006′s Inside In/Inside Out - but it does bear several Willy Wonka golden tickets, including “Ooh La.”

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Former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson, who owes more than $38 million to various creditors, the Internal Revenue Service and his ex-wife, Monica, announced he is selling the two George Foreman Grill he bought more than three years ago on e-Bay to help pay down debt. “This lean, mean fat-reducing grilling machine is an impregnable piece of steel and plastic perfect for preparing quick, low-fat meals for one or two people,” writes Tyson on the website.

“The ferocious, double-sided grill surface heats in less than five minutes to a temperature perfect for grilling most foods, leaving choice meats and chicken discombobulatingly sumptuous.” Tyson added that if you want to help him out but already own a George Foreman grill, you can always send him toothpaste, toilet paper and socks.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED MARCH 16, 2006 IN VOLUME 4 ISSUE 6