Fair Game

Rainy day at the Hoops
Originally uploaded by somebonnie.

Check out this article about 11 year old phenom, Kevin Ferrell. Apparently Kevin can really handle and shoot a basketball and apparently he really enjoys the game, which is great. Unfortunately publications like The Hoop Scoop and companies like Adidas have decided to use Kevin and other young players to increase their financial gains. Clark Francis, publisher of The Hoops Scoop, is quick to defend the magazine's practice of ranking 4th graders. My favorite line is Clark asserting that "If parents put the kids out there, they're fair game." So basically if parents put their kids in a youth basketball league, then the kids are fair game to be exploited for the purpose of other people's financial gain. The kids are 10 and 11 years old - let them learn their times tables before you rank them nationally and offer them shoe contracts. There's nothing like taking one of a kid's last pure experiences with a great game and turning it in to a business transaction. Just as a side note: when I was spell checking this post, the spell checker identified "Adidas" as misspelled and recommended replacing it with "idiots."

http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050428/SPORTS/504280463