Big Fish Small Cesspool

Sexual assault lawsuits are pretty common in every professional sport. In fact, if three months go by without one it can be unnerving. Typically these lawsuits revolve around small-to-medium sized fish in the sports pond (Anthony Mason, Cornelius Bennett), buy occasionally we're treated to the big fish behaving badly (Ben Roethlisberger, Kobe Bryant).

The most rare of fish, the Gigantactis, would be a lawsuit that places a team owner at its center. These are never seen, likely for the same reason we don't know much about deep sea life; regular people can not survive inside the places these creatures thrive. This makes the recent sexual assault lawsuit filed against Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones all the more fascinating. A woman named Patricia Gavin has filed a $500 million civil suit against Jones, accusing Jones of sexual assault, false imprisonment, theft, and stalking among other things. Before we go further, I know that sexual assault is a serious issue, and no man should ever force himself upon a woman. Women who've been assaulted and harassed have my ultimate sympathy... But I'm confident that this lawsuit is bogus. If I'm wrong you can sue me, civilly.

The same way scientist are interested in the mating rituals of deep sea wildlife, I imagine John Q. Public is interested in the mating rituals of multi-billionaires. The deep sea fish live in such a high pressured, low-visibility habitat that scientist are uncertain as to what goes on when the creatures "get it on". By contrast, our multi-billionaire owners are extremely visible, and their "pressure" is to continue to make money hand over foot, while putting a winning product out onto the field floor. But the public never really knows what's going on behind closed doors, when the lights get dim, and the Barry White starts playing (See: McCourt, Jaime and McCourt, Frank).

We see seventy-six year old Los Angeles Laker owner Jerry Buss parading publicly with twenty-two year olds (who obviously hate their lives), but don't really visualize all the hard work Buss must do to "execute". The constant refilling of Viagra prescriptions. The staying abreast of the latest drama on "Jersey Shore" and "Bad Girls Club". Pretending to know who or what Beiber-mania is, and how one catches it. The point is, we don't know what is happening behind those closed and bolted shut doors. Its fairly rare when an owner like Jones (allegedly) goes the Roethlisberger route and (allegedly) corners a woman in a restroom and (allegedly) presses his erect "manhood" against her while (allegedly) telling her that she's not going anywhere and he'd planned the whole thing when she had walked in. (Then you draw the connection to this "allegedly" happened the same night he was liquored up and mouthed off about Bill Parcells and Tim "Virgin Mobile" Tebow, and it would be totally understandable if the average sports fan soiled themselves instantly.)

So fellow tabloid journalism lovers, be thankful that one of the upper-crust has allowed himself to fail as a human so publicly. Much like a deep sea fish swimming to the surface, this won't happen often.