Kevin Provencher Sentenced to 2.5 Years in Prison for Running a Prostitution Ring

Whenever I tell people that I'm a sportswriter, they inevitably freak out and start pestering me with questions about how awesome it must be to go to work each day. Unfortunately, my answers tend to disappoint them.

Indeed, writing about sports is not the most glamorous job in the world, and it doesn't exactly pay well. I would tell you to go ask Kevin Provencher, but that might be a little difficult considering his current predicament.

Provencher was a 23-year veteran sportswriter for the Manchester Union-Leader in New Hampshire. The paper recently cut his pay, so he decided to come up with a way to bolster his income. For some reason, he settled on starting up a prostitution ring, and now he's paying the price.

According to the Boston Herald, Provencher has been sentenced to one to two-and-a-half years in jail after pleading guilty to counts of deriving support from a prostitute, procuring a person into prostitution, solicitation for prostitution, and witness intimidation. He was first arrested in July of 2009.

Prosecutors say that the 52-year-old Provencher advertised prostitution services on Craigslist, and that he rented hotel rooms in Massachusetts and New Hampshire where his workers would, ahem, entertain interested parties.

This would seem to be a good time to make some kind of witty remark. But to be honest, I got nothing. Instead, I will urge people to remember the words of Three 6 Mafia, who famously reminded all of us that it can be hard out here for a pimp.

Related article: The 50 Biggest Creeps in Sports

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Danica Patrick Says Her Wreck at Bristol 'Could Have Been Avoidable'

Two weeks removed from her career-best fourth-place finish in Las Vegas, Danica Patrick was once again doing pretty well in the Scotts EZ Seed 300 at Bristol Motor Speedway on Sunday. After spending much of the afternoon in the Top 15, Patrick found herself in 17th place in lap 247, and she was just two laps off the pace.

That's when Mark Truex got a little too close for comfort, and Patrick was spun around. She ended up having to take her car to the garage, and she finished 29th.

Immediately after the incident, Patrick was shown getting out of her car and throwing her arms up in Truex's direction. Clearly, she wasn't entirely convinced that the accident she had just suffered was really an accident.

“I was just running down the straight and it felt like he came into my right front," she said afterward. "I don’t know exactly what happened but I don’t think I did anything."

Both Patrick and Truex were making their debuts at Bristol, and Truex himself was decidedly apologetic about the incident.

“My car was really loose for about half the race," he said. "I just came off the corner dead sideways. I was either backing into the wall or going down the hill and hoping to save it. I came off and came up—the right rear just almost hit the wall and came down to save it. [Patrick] was there and I came down on her and pretty much ended her day. I feel bad about that. It wasn’t on purpose and I’m sorry."

This was the fourth of 12 NASCAR races that Patrick plans on running in 2011. She is now going to take a break to partake in the IndyCar Series, and will return to the Nationwide Series in June. Because of that, she would have preferred to at least have finished at Bristol.

“It would have been nice to finish this race at Bristol...it would have been nice to get the finish especially not being back for a couple of months," she said.

She then went on to say, "That accident sure feels like it could have been avoidable but I don’t really know. I’d have to see the replay.”

Maybe. Maybe not. In fact, all the signs seem to indicate that it was indeed nothing more than an accident. What you had was two drivers who were trying to negotiate one of the toughest tracks in the country, and they happened to get tangled up.

It's obviously quite easy to see why Patrick would be frustrated, but Truex summed it up best when he said "it’s a racing deal."

Of course, one of Patrick's critics might go so far as to point out that something like this can be avoided if she were to make a full-time commitment to NASCAR, instead of trying to balance the Nationwide Series with her IndyCar roots. And this is probably true.

One way or another, Patrick isn't doing herself many favors with NASCAR purists by complaining about the wreck, but maybe that's neither here nor there.

For more racing coverage, check out our latest NASCAR Power Rankings.

Anthony Robles Captures NCAA Title in 125-Pound Division

It's not every day that college wrestling becomes headline news. But in the case of Arizona State's Anthony Robles, the occasion is certainly warranted.

Robles won the NCAA wrestling title in the 125-pound division on Saturday night, beating defending champion Matt McDonough of Iowa in the final, 7-1.

What's so remarkable about that, you ask?

Well, aside from the fact that Robles was born without a right leg, nothing really.

Indeed, it is a truly remarkable story. Just don't make the mistake of thinking that this is some kind of fluke. Robles is a three-time Pac-10 champion, and he finished in the top 10 in the NCAA championships each of the last two years before finally capturing the title this year.

"I had a lot of butterflies going out there," Robles said afterward. "I've dreamt about stepping on that stage a dozen times, and this whole year I've just been preparing for that moment. And I was scared. I was scared out there, but as soon as I hit that first takedown I sort of relaxed. I said, 'OK, back to business. Same drill as usual, like every other match.'"

What gives Robles an advantage is his significant upper body strength. He has also said that years of holding onto crutches have provided him with formidable grip strength. He cannot stand up to wrestle, so he forces his opponents to stay low to the ground. If he gains any kind of advantage, he basically can't be beaten.

When you consider the fact that we're currently in the midst of March Madness, that Robles' accomplishments have taken center stage should give you an idea just how inspiring his story is. However, according to the LA Times, Robles doesn't exactly crave attention.

"I didn't get into the sport for the attention," he said. "I wrestle because I love wrestling."

That being said, Robles did also admit that serving as a source of inspiration for others does get to him.

"It inspires me when I get kids, even adults, who write me on Facebook or send me letters in the mail just saying that I've inspired them," he said, "and they look up to me, and they're motivated to do things that other people wouldn't have thought possible."

Tiger Woods' Image Reparation Process May Have Hit a Snag

When the general public looked at Tiger Woods a couple years ago, they were thinking of the greatest golfer in the world, maybe even the greatest of all time.

When people look at Tiger Woods these days, they see a has-been adulterer whose best days are in the distant past. Harsh, but also true.

Credit where credit's due, Tiger has done his damndest to repair his image ever since that fateful night in November of 2009. And for the most part, he's done an admirable job. He has seemed like a genuinely humble man in recent months, and taking to Twitter is one of the best decisions he could have possibly made.

At this point, it probably wouldn't be too much of a stretch to say that most people are rooting for Tiger  again, which is no small feat considering the general sense of animosity that most people felt for him this time last year.

And then came a report from TerezOwens.com that Tiger has himself a new girlfriend, a 22-year-old aspiring golfer by the name of Alyse Lahti Johnston. This by no means had to be a bad thing, mind you. But when you hang out with Tiger these days, you run the risk of having all your secrets exposed to the world.

As it turns out, Johnston was recently arrested on suspicion of DUI, and a gossip columnist told ABC News that she has a reputation of being a "party girl."

Now, I'm not about to fault Tiger for dating again, and I'm not about to scold him for not running a background check on Johnston, either. But I will say that this just doesn't look good. People are always going to be skeptical whenever a 35-year-old man starts dating a woman in her early 20s, and the fact that Tiger just so happens to be dating something of a wild child is certainly not going to help matters.

Is Tiger aware of this? Probably.

Does he care? I doubt it, but I can't say I fault him for that either. If he's happy with Johnston, then so be it. Last I checked, this is still a free country.

It is not, however, a forgiving one. Tiger should know that as well as anyone, so here's hoping he knows what he's doing.

Related article: The 50 Biggest Creeps in Sports

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NBA Labor Talks Could Very Well End Up Being Just as Heated as the NFL's

For all the press that the ongoing collective bargaining situation in the NFL is getting, not much ink has been spilled about the fact that NBA's own collective bargaining agreement is due to expire after the 2010-2011 season. The NBA could also face a lockout in 2011, and it's likely that the players and the league could be in for a rather nasty battle.

Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports published a very interesting story earlier today. It talked about an incident that occurred in the Staples Center locker room on the eve of the NBA All-Star Game in which Players Association executive director Billy Hunter gave a rather intriguing speech.

Hunter talked about how the owners had made an unfair proposal, and that a long lockout was looming. He also told the players that they were going to be the ones who were going to have to bear the biggest financial and public relations burden.

He even referenced how Jerry West and Oscar Robertson had staged a protest at the 1964 All-Star Game, seemingly hinting that the same thing needed to be done in this year's game.

Also in the room was NBA commissioner David Stern, and Hunter's speech did not exactly sit well with him. When Stern took the microphone to offer up a few words of his own, he took the time to remind everyone in the room of all the things he's accomplished in his time.

He then cryptically said that he knows where "the bodies are buried” in the NBA, because he had buried some of them himself.

Exactly what he meant by that was, and still is, something of a mystery. It nevertheless did not sound good, and several players, including Chicago Bulls star Derrick Rose, couldn't believe what they had just heard.

Thanks in large part to Stern's strange remark, Hunter essentially succeeded in casting Stern and the NBA's owners as villains in the eyes of all the players in the room, who of course are the best and the brightest the sport has to offer. One supposes that Hunter didn't think the players were angry enough about the NBA's labor situation, and it would appear that he has successfully rallied his troops.

Considering the fact that the league apparently wants to install a hard salary cap, the players should be angry. A hard cap would cut salaries across the board, and super-teams like the Lakers and Heat would would become a thing of the past.

Moreover, the league's rising superstars would not be able to command salaries as huge as players like Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett.

The problem facing Hunter and the players is that it's going to be very hard for them to win the PR war. In fact, he even went so far as to say, "We can't win it."

Hunter also said that it really doesn't help matters that former players like Julius Erving are under the employ of the NBA, and that people tend to listen when they criticize contemporary players.

Said Erving in a recent interview, "When I played, the owners had the power. The prisoners are running the prison now, not the warden. The warden is strong and he has say-so but, the balance of power is definitely with the players.”

This may be so, but the league dishes out the checks, and that's where their power lies. A lockout would mean no more paychecks for the players, which is obviously not in their interest. This is where Hunter's ploy to get them angry about what's going on comes into play. If they wilt, they're only going to get less money anyway, so it's in their interest to resist.

In essentially urging the players to pick a fight with Stern, Hunter is pretty much going for broke.

“If you don’t give us a way out, a chance for a compromise," he said, "you’re going to get a fight.”

Sounds like it's officially on.

Thanks again Mr. Wojnarowski for writing such a fantastic piece.

For more on the NBA, check out our latest NBA Power Rankings.

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Bruce Pearl Reportedly Let Go After Six Seasons and Six NCAA Tournament Appearances

In a move that should come as a surprise to nobody, sources say that Tennessee head men's basketball coach Bruce Pearl has been fired. Nothing is official quite yet, but the word has been passed down by VolunteerTV.com and FOX Sports.

The news comes just a couple days after the Volunteers were bounced from the NCAA tournament, as they suffered a 75-45 loss to the Michigan Wolverines in the Round of 64. But that's not the real reason why Pearl was fired.

Indeed, even if one were to look past Tennessee's embarrassing exit from the Big Dance, this last season did not exactly go well for Pearl. He admitted to breaking NCAA rules in September, and then subsequently lied to investigators. That netted him an eight-game SEC suspension, and the university cut $1.5 million from his salary.

Throughout the season, the powers that be at Tennessee seemed to be behind Pearl, but things started to change in the days leading up to the NCAA tournament when athletic director Mike Hamilton said in a radio interview that he was not so sure that Pearl would remain with the program after this season.

One supposes that Pearl's job security hinged on how far the Vols advanced in the tourney. That they were eliminated so swiftly appears to have made the university's decision quite easy.

Tennessee was not really known as a basketball school before Pearl came along in 2005. The Volunteers had not been to the NCAA tournament since 2000, and Pearl was replacing a coach in Buzz Peterson who went just 61-59 in four seasons at the helm.

As it turned out, Pearl took the Volunteers to the Big Dance in his first season, and they made it back each of the next five years as well. He took the Vols to the Sweet 16 three times, and they made it as far as the Elite Eight in last year's tourney.

For more college basketball coverage, check out our list of The Most Likely Sweet 16 Upsets. You might also enjoy a little taste of European March Madness.