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Unfortunately, 2007 Was Year Of The Lyin'

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By MARTIN FENNELLY | The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 27, 2007

Updated: 12/27/2007 12:11 am

TAMPA - It's not on the Chinese calendar, but The Year of The Lyin' is in its final week. We can't wait to say goodbye.

To think 2007 began with such promise, what with Tony Dungy, honest man, lifting a Super Bowl trophy.

From The Year of The Saint to The Year of The Sinners.

Has there ever been so much lying crammed into one year of sports? Have there ever been more lying cheats?

There has been so much lying that the Bucs telling us Chris Simms wasn't injured is a raindrop in a sea of storms.

There has been so much lying that merely being a gutless scoundrel like Michael Vick might not even be enough to be the No. 1 story in 2007.

Vick will do prison, and if there's true justice will do community service by cleaning cages at the Humane Society.

Back to 2007.

We cannot tell a lie.

It was the worst.

Year Of Lying Dangerously

In the summer, we watched the cheater Barry Bonds set the home run record, breaking the mark of an honest hammer named Henry Aaron.

In the winter, we heard the Mitchell Report conclude that steroids cheating was once a runaway train in baseball, and owners and players did nothing to stop it.

The lying cheat Floyd Landis was finally and officially stripped of his 2006 Tour de France cycling victory, his appeals having been played out, his honesty, too.

Track star Marion Jones once denounced those accusing her of steroids use. She stood by her 2000 Olympics, where she won five medals, including three golds.

It ended on courthouse steps, after Jones told a judge she was a cheat and a liar. It ended with her tear-filled apology to everyone for betraying their trust. Amazing what federal perjury charges will do.

I've already reserved a spot on Barry Bonds' courthouse steps. Tickets are going fast. All they have left is upper reserved.

The Year of Lying Dangerously would be incomplete without Bill BeliCheat and his perfect Patriots.

They're going for 16-0 this weekend against the Giants in the Meadowlands - the scene of the crime. The Pats' only loss this season came when the NFL punished them for sideline filming Jets defensive signals in the Meadowlands.

In full CIA waterboarding mode, the NFL destroyed all the evidence in the case. Belichick, in the best lying cheat tradition, has played victim, gutting opponents whenever possible, as if to show us. When they hand him the Super Bowl trophy in Glendale, Ariz., in February, they ought to destroy that film, too.

Good Luck, Arkansas

And don't forget the liar Bobby Petrino telling his Falcons not to quit when he had every intention of doing so, or shaking hands with the Atlanta owner about 278 seconds before he jumped to Arkansas.

There has been so much lying that even a smidgen of truth makes a fellow look good, like Andy Pettitte admitting, post-Mitchell, that he did use HGH a few times.

There has been so much lying we hardly believe anyone. Who thought LSU coach Les Miles was telling the truth when he said he wasn't going to Michigan?

And there's the Grand Ole Cheating Scandal at Florida State, the one that looms as Bobby Bowden's Last Stand, and I've got Not Standing in the office pool.

Dozens of Seminoles football players decided to lie and cheat, and FSU looked into it, and the NCAA told FSU to look harder, and FSU accepted a bid to the Music City Bowl anyway, and Bobby awoke from his nap and said he knew nothing.

It's small and shabby. I wasn't a fan of FSU dropping out of its bowl game at this late date, since non-cheaters would suffer and the Music City folks and Kentucky would be left hanging. But I can't wait until NCAA investigators find that FSU knew the extent of this mess before accepting the bowl bid.

That's dishonesty.

That's 2007, folks.

We can only hope 2008 is more truthful.

Fat chance.

It's a presidential election year.

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