Commentary

Sideshow: Silly awards for the sporting set

By SHARON FINK
Published February 5, 2006

It's time for the inaugural Super Bowl Sunday/Almost the Olympics/Close to the NBA Midseason Break/Baseball Season is Basically Here/Less Than a Month to March Madness/Only One Sports Movie in Any Oscar Race/Where's the Viagra Car? Awards presentation:

MOST WASTED MARKETING OPPORTUNITY: Troy Polamalu's hair. It appeals to both sexes, all demographic groups and a multimedia publicity attack. See Troy pitch Pantene's new Hydrating Curls line with Hurley from Lost. See Troy make the rounds of reality hair shows on Bravo's Blow Out and MTV's The Shop. See Troy get bit parts in all future Barbershop and Beauty Shop movies. See Troy star in a series of Xbox games where you have to run him down on every field in the NFL and cut his hair.

WORST CRY FOR ATTENTION: Dennis Rodman, who spent last month participating in a celebrity version of Big Brother in England but was voted out (his popularity dropped after he verbally attacked a female housemate whose claim to fame was winning the country's first Celebrity Big Brother by pretending to be a celebrity). He then played one game with a British Basketball League team, and he might play another, because he's thinking about returning to the NBA.

ATHLETE MOST LIKELY TO SAVE THE OLYMPICS' TV RATINGS: Bode Miller. If people tune in for anything besides figure skating and hockey, they'll do it to see if they can tell whether Miller pounded a bottle of tequila before slapping on a hip flask and hitting the slopes.

CLOSEST TV RATINGS CALL: Which will draw better, Olympic figure skating or Fox's Skating With Celebrities?

WORST INDUSTRY TO NAME A SPORTS STADIUM AFTER: Phone companies. With next year's baseball All-Star Game at the San Francisco Giants' park, Major League Baseball is considering printing on all game-related items a blank space where the stadium name should be, and everyone can fill in whatever the name is on gameday.

WORST SPORTING EVENT TO NAME AFTER AN INDUSTRY: The Kentucky Derby presented by Yum Brands. Let's just give up now and start raking in the serious money: Mount Rushmore presented by Hanna-Barbera and the Flintstones ... the Statue of Liberty presented by the New York-New York Hotel and Casino, bringing the Big Apple and a Statue of Liberty replica to Las Vegas ...

SPORTS MOVIE GUARANTEED TO BE IGNORED BY THE OSCARS NEXT YEAR: Will Ferrell's NASCAR homage, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, due in August. Though maybe if it has Dolly Parton doing the theme song ...

RUMOR THAT TENNIS MOST DESPERATELY NEEDS TO BE TRUE: Andy Roddick and Maria Sharapova are dating. Sex - and Andre Agassi - sells. Roger Federer and downsliding Williams sisters don't.

Sharon Fink can be reached at 727 893-8525 and fink@sptimes.com

[Last modified February 5, 2006, 01:22:20]