I respect all sports columnists, no matter how outrageous their claims may be. Everybody has a right to say or write whatever they want, and I’ve never thought lower of any person or any writer just because of that.
But every writer has a responsibility to have at least one brain cell, and since Jeff Miller of the Orange County Register did not seem to be able to abide by that rule, I don’t feel too guilty about disrespecting his latest work.
In one of his recent columns, Miller flat-out bashed UCLA’s 100 national titles, saying that football was the only thing that mattered in the realm of collegiate sports. Miller brings a bad name to the beer he is named after, saying “Impressive, 100 championships certainly are. That’s a nice round number. Then again, so is zero ““ the roundest of them all, in fact ““ and also the total number of football championships won by the Bruins since 1955. Isn’t that the real way colleges are compared on the sports pages, by who beat who on Saturday and who outranked who on Sunday? Especially in this town, where everyone knows the name of USC’s backup quarterback even as the Bruins themselves struggle to name their starting quarterback?”
He went on to say, “So there the Bruin faithful stood Tuesday, rightly celebrating themselves and doing so in the exact spot where their football team practices to not win championships.”
And then finally, the kicker of them all: “The Bruins have been more successful than any other school in sports that don’t make headlines or money,” he said.
Is this guy a USC alumnus or what?
It’s one thing to say that the 100 national titles might be a bit overhyped. I actually somewhat agree with that; I mean, it’s just a number after all. It also only includes NCAA titles, not football or any of the other sports that won before the NCAA was established.
Nevertheless, that number is also a representation of how successful Bruin athletics have been not just in one sport, but in all of them for the past few decades.
You are entitled to your opinion, Mr. Miller, and if you think that football is perhaps more important than every other sport for whatever reason, then so be it. But you cannot belittle our other athletics because our football team does not win national titles. It’s not exactly easy to win 19 NCAA men’s volleyball championships or 16 men’s tennis championships.
These statements make me disgusted to say I live in Orange County. Though since the majority of the population in Orange County is rich, white and thus USC supporters, I can’t say I’m surprised.
If you think that the number 100 isn’t a big deal, then fine. I understand a lot of it is hype and seems like it’s primarily used for athletic recruitment purposes. But to say that this athletic program is underachieving because it has not won a football title is preposterous. It’s ludicrous. As far as I’m concerned, every sport is practically the same: There’s a ball and you try and get it in the goal. Sure, it may vary a bit, instead of a ball there is a puck, and instead of a goal we have a hoop, or maybe we even try and hit that ball over a net. But it’s all the same basic idea.
And UCLA is damn good at creating teams that get that ball in the goal.
E-mail Allister at awenzel@media.ucla.edu.