Spilling Over into the Streets

By Tom Callahan

Earl Warren's dated sigh about men's failures being on the front page and their successes on the sports page changed to a laugh last week when, in the same edition, several football agents, two boxers and a hockey player extended the fields of play to a grand jury room, an all-night boutique in Harlem and a prison cell.

First, the hockey player. Dino Ciccarelli, an especially unruly forward with the Minnesota North Stars, was jailed for a day in Toronto for clubbing the Maple Leafs' Luke Richardson twice before punching him in the mouth. Known for stark behavior (already on probation for indecent exposure), Ciccarelli was judged to have exceeded the National Hockey League's acceptable level of savagery, not an easy thing to do. Though hockey players have come before judges before, Dino is thought to be the first one directed to a real penalty box after an on-ice assault.

In fact, all sports have trouble recalling an occasion when the laws of the land superseded or even complemented the rules of the game. Within the white lines, berserk baseball players regularly brandish bats and spikes with legal impunity, and the football and basketball players who rampage beyond the whistle and the pale risk civil reparations at their worst. "It is time now," lectured Provincial Court Judge Sidney Harris, "that a message go out from the courts that violence in a hockey game or any other circumstances is not acceptable in our society." For one thing, he said, it "spills over from the arena into the streets." At least in his bailiwick, "perpetrators can expect punitive measures, including jail sentences."

In a curious example of violence spilling over from the arena into the streets, Heavyweight Boxing Champion Mike Tyson and one of his earliest ring conquests staged an impromptu rematch in New York City around 4:30 a.m. outside a 125th Street haberdashery that boasts a formidable clientele. Anyone purchasing a necktie at that hour better at least have been the champion of the Pacific fleet. After giving Mitch ("Blood") Green a Carmen Basilio facial, crumpling one of his licensed hands in the process, Tyson momentarily faced charges brought not by the law but by Green. They were eventually dropped in the apparent hope that the champion might someday be agreeable to closing Green's other eye in a supervised match.

Meanwhile, Sports Agents Norby Walters, Lloyd Bloom and David Lueddeke were indicted by a grand jury in Chicago, along with former Ohio State Receiver Cris Carter, on charges involving improper payments to college athletes. Such charges are customarily leveled only by the National Collegiate Athletic Association. Throughout a long and public investigation, Walters' position has been that Frank Merriwell is dead, and so what if a few undergraduates lose their eligibility in the rush to riches? The N.C.A.A. rules have no weight of real law.

The grand jury, however, took seriously certain hints to defecting clients having to do with bone breaking. Walters and Bloom characterized the atmosphere as good-humored. Nonetheless, racketeering, mail fraud, obstruction of justice and a few other terms not found in the playbooks made their way into the sports section. Brent Fullwood of the Packers, Paul Palmer of the Chiefs and Ronnie Harmon of the Bills headed a list of 43 named but unindicted former Walters and Bloom clients who cut pretrial deals involving community service and scholarship refunds. So sports are not above the law after all.

Two weeks ago, leaning on the letter of that law and the essential provision of presumed innocence, the diver Bruce Kimball posted bail on a double vehicular-manslaughter charge and instantly sprang back into the pike position. But he lost his Olympic trial and soon must turn to the other kind. What page of the paper suited this sad specter whose face was flattened by a drunk driver seven years ago? Since then he has garnered six traffic citations of his own, and one Olympic silver medal, in 1984.

Even in sports, standards of plain decency are as subject to interpretation as laws and rules. For instance, gamblers are generally not the National Football League's favorite types, and yet in 1933 the man who became the most beloved and benevolent citizen of the league bought his way into the business with winnings from horse bets. The Pittsburgh Steelers' owner, Art Rooney, really the city of Pittsburgh's Art Rooney, died last week at 87, still penciling the racing form. Rooney shared his hugest track windfall with his brother, a China missionary who unknowingly repaid him in soybeans. Based on a Hong Kong weather report from Father Dan, Art made another big score in the commodities market. A saloonkeeper's son, he knew a remarkable variety of athletic pleasures. As a schoolboy football star, he basked in the attention of the Notre Dame coach Knute Rockne, though he went to Duquesne and Georgetown. Both the Chicago Cubs and Boston Red Sox signed him. He boxed professionally. And he collected friends. On the court and in the courtroom, standard rules and common guidelines begin to describe legality and morality, but personal honor may be the heaviest measure of the account. Last week, the success was found on the obituary page.