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No joke: Armstrong, Te'o need to hear a line from this movie
Published: 1/18/2013 4:06 PM
Last Modified: 1/21/2013 1:06 PM

This is the best week, ever!

Who said it?

Anybody charged with the responsibility of writing funnies for folks like Jay Leno, Conan O’Brien, David Lettermen, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers and (hey, he’s still alive in reruns) Larry Sanders.

Guess who didn’t say it.

Lance Armstrong and Manti Te’o.

Let’s tackle them one at a time:

1, Armstrong doped while winning bicycle races (really? bicycle races?) and when he came to a fork in the road, he chose to have a forked tongue.

Not only did Armstrong lie about doping for years, he attacked the credibility of anyone who attempted to tell the truth. That’s low on so many levels that the elevator doesn’t come close to stopping there.

He confessed to Oprah Winfrey this week and, though they weren’t really competing against each other, judges so far have scored the interview session this way: Person who will go to any lengths (including cheating and lying) to win: 0. Popular and effective interviewer who needs to kick-start network: 223. FYI, the margin of victory is one point wider than in the infamous 1916 game that pitted John Heisman’s Georgia Tech squad vs. Cumberland College, so the Heisman Trophy will henceforth be known as the Oprah Trophy.

2, Te’o was victimized by an elaborate hoax that is difficult to explain in a handful of words. I’ll try anyway.

The Heisman Trophy runner-up had a girlfriend who never existed and, also, she died. At some point, Te’o became aware that his leg -- and his emotions -- were being pulled. But it appears he continued to play along with the ruse because the lie took on more of a life than his fictional girlfriend ever did.

It was such a bizarre week for sports news that supermarket tabloids must pick up the pace if they want to compete with the “real” news. Elvis is alive and he’s doing concerts exclusively for Bigfoot’s family? Aliens have landed in search of fried okra to fuel their flying saucers? City leaders believe increasing parking meter rates will bring more visitors to downtown Tulsa? Oops. Sorry. That last story was legit, or at least as legit as foolishness can be.

And, of course, it was a ripe week for people who wait on this kind of news so they can pounce on it and start riffing, and I’m as guilty as anybody else.

Regarding Armstrong, I jumped on Twitter and said the Livestrong bracelets were completely accurate if you delete the “v.” I wondered how he could sit on a bicycle seat when his pants were on fire. I said if Armstrong was a throwback toy, he could be Stretch-The-Truth Armstrong.

Do I feel badly about making alleged jokes at Armstrong’s expense. Not really. Bicycle tires aren’t the only thing that fall under the category of what comes around, goes around.

Then came the T’eo news. If he was absolutely hoaxed, is it fair to zing him? Or is it better just to zing the situation? Yeah, that.

I said the Notre Dame story was absolutely accurate except for the dame part. I referenced the “Seinfeld” episode where a funeral was held for a “Susie” that never existed. I referenced an Atlanta Rhythm Section song (you can guess which one) from the 1970s. I Tweeted that Notre Dame gained a commitment from Sidd Finch, the story subject of a famous Sports Illustrated April Fool’s Day hoax.

Maybe I should feel badly about saying those things. Kevin Durant tweeted this yesterday: “(All right) now, I think T’eo went through enough, let him live and learn... y’all killin this guy.”

Do I feel badly? Maybe. It depends on whether T’eo willingly graduated from victim to spreader of fertilizer. And did he get so far into the maze that he couldn’t find his way out without negatively impacting his university and his teammates?

The truth should be his way out. You can apologize for just about anything in this country and we’ll give you a pass, as long as you do it relatively quickly. Pete Rose and Armstrong could have saved themselves a lot of thorns by ‘fessing up long ago. Because they didn’t, forgiveness is more elusive.

Regardless of how Armstrong is perceived now, my guess is he feels better because, post-Oprah, he can look himself in the mirror and more easily like what he sees.

(Quick story in the midst of a long blog: Years ago, I asked a college football coach about his team never running afoul of the NCAA and his response stuck with me. He said he never wanted his children to go to school and hear another kid say “why is your dad a cheater?” I suspect the same rule applies to fibbing. Why would anyone want to risk sending their kids to school and having someone say “why is your dad a liar?”)

When T’eo is up to the task, he will give his side of the story and (maybe not immediately) feel better.

And, despite my repeated attempts at getting a laugh or smile out of the predicaments Armstrong and T’eo found themselves in, I am reversing field and getting all somber. I worry about Te’o. I never met him. I don’t know him. But I worry about him.

Everybody has been through instances where a self-inflicted situation results in you going through what seems to be the worst day of your life. Those are dark, dark days and you can’t escape them. Watch TV. Try to read. Doesn’t matter. You’ll dwell on the elephant in the room that is sitting in your head. Been there, done that.

Here’s what I prescribe: A movie (“My Best Friend’s Wedding”) based on the most unbelievable premise ever. A sportswriter (typically, we have faces that resemble an unmade bed) must choose whether he should marry Cameron Diaz or Julia Roberts. Yes, these type of decisions are made by sportswriters on a regular basis. Or not.

Regardless, there’s a scene in the movie where Roberts’ character thinks she has ruined her life forever and she’s sobbing in a hotel hallway. A bellhop chances by and consoles her by saying that, whatever is wrong, this too shall pass.

In lieu of coming up with an original thought on my own, that’s what I’m telling T’eo and, I suppose, Armstrong, although more grudgingly. Things are beyond bizarre now. But this too -- whatever it is -- shall pass.


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Tulsa World sports writer Jimmie Tramel is a former class president at Locust Grove High School. He graduated magna cum laude from Northeastern State University with a journalism degree and, while attending college, was sports editor of the Pryor Daily Times. He joined the Tulsa World on Oct. 17, 1989, the same day an earthquake struck the World Series. He is the OSU basketball beat writer and a columnist and feature writer during football season. In 2007, he wrote a book about Oklahoma State football with former Cowboy coach Pat Jones.

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