Note to Athletes: Please No More Guarantees
Maybe it’s just me, but I used to remember when it meant something to guarantee a victory in professional sports.
Although I was not alive for it, perhaps Joe Namath’s bold prediction that his New York Jets would beat the heavily favored Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl III, is the most well known guarantee.
Honorable mention goes out to Mark Messier for guaranteeing a New York Ranger win in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Final against the New Jersey Devils to not only stave off elimination, but to eventually propel the Rangers to the Stanley Cup Finals.
In today’s look at me era, it seems that every athlete under the sun wants to guarantee a victory at some point during their career.
Sure some big mouth athletes such as Plaxico Burress can get lucky with their predictions. Burress predicted the Giants would beat the Patriots 23-17 in Super Bowl XLII. The Giants in fact won with a score of 17-14.
The most recent Nostradamus is Charlie Alexander Villanueva of the Detroit Pistons.
Villanueva boldly predicted, via Twitter no less, that his 26 win Piston team would defeat the mighty Toronto Raptors last night.
For those of you who are unaware, the Raptors have 39 wins and are fighting for the 8th spot in the Eastern Conference playoff race.
TNT loves drama; you would think they want exclusive rights to this game.
My point is, there was no one outside of a few diehard Raptor fans in Toronto who had any interest in this game, and for Villanueva to guarantee a victory is absurd in every sense of the word.
Villanueva joins a growing list of athletes who have “guaranteed” victories in the past.
Does the name Anthony Smith ring a bell? He famously predicted his Pittsburg Steelers would beat the New England Patriots back in 2007. The Patriots won 34-13.
Patrick Ewing tried to harness some Madison Square Garden magic when predicting his Knicks would win Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Finals. Unfortunately, the game was played in Indiana, and the Knicks lost 93-80.
Back in 2006, when Roy Williams was still in Detroit, he made the prediction that his Lions would beat the Chicago Bears. It was the second game of the season. The Bears won by 27.
Courtney Paris boldly predicted if her Oklahoma Sooners didn’t win the 2009 Women’s National Championship, she would pay back her scholarship. Oklahoma lost in the Final Four. Whoops.
How could we forget Matt Hasselback? At least he was running on adrenaline, but still…
This is just a sample, but you get the idea. The guarantee used to be one of the more famous and special aspects of professional sports. Yet sadly, it has become nothing more than fodder to today’s athletes who throw the word guarantee around so casually.
Part of the problem is, the media treats these announcements like they are still noteworthy, when in fact they are not. Once the media begins to ignore these foolish guarantees, they will become less prominent.
For those of you that are anxious to know, the Pistons were defeated by the Raptors 111-97.
Villanueva had 16 points, 6 rebounds, and 1 plate of crow.
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