The NCAA is a cartel that exploits the unpaid labor of teenagers to make obscene profits for stuffy old people in suits. No one of reasonable intelligence disputes this. It’s been true, it continues to be true, and it will remain true until huge sweeping changes are made or the whole thing goes down in a spectacular fireball like the infamous hydrogen balloon pictured above. Good men and women have screamed about it from mountaintops for a while now (most notably Taylor Branch in his fantastic takedown in The Atlantic two years ago), and it almost, kind of, maybe seems like we’re finally getting to the point where the wood in all this has bent as far as its going to bend, and small cracks, creaks, and snaps are starting to become noticeable. Good.

Anyway, I bring all this up because the always excellent Charles Pierce has a piece up at Grantland today that is pure word-gold if you’re into this stuff. He starts off discussing the absurdity of playing the Final Four in cavernous domes (and really, you should read the whole thing), but the real fun part comes when he gets to NCAA president Mark Emmert’s recent statement that the NCAA’s “miscellaneous expense allowance” somehow doesn’t conflict with their stance that college athletes shouldn’t be paid. You. Read. Now.

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Yesterday, for no apparent reason, Olympic gold medalist swimmer and future Academy Award-winning actor Ryan Lochte gave his Twitter followers a huge gift when he announced that he’d be answering their questions for “#AskLochte” once again. Once Lochte Tweeted, “Let’s go!”, the gates were opened wide for his fans and critics alike to ask the most important, thought-provoking questions they could think of to get inside that complex brain of his. Questions like:

Hey @ryanlochte, is it true that you turned down The Bachelor because ABC doesn’t allow orgies? #AskLochte

— Ashley Burns (@MayorBurnsy) January 17, 2013

For one whole whopping hour, Lochte really gave us a glimpse into what makes that beautiful face of his operate. After the jump, I’ve included some of the best questions that people asked, as well as the questions that Lochte actually answered. And for some extra poops and giggles, I’ll let my favorite South Park characters walk us through it.

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You know how ‘South Park’s’ Eric Cartman is a 10-year old who hates Jewish people, slurs everyone and once chopped up a kid’s parents and fed them to him in a bowl of chili? And it’s funny because he’s a fictional character on an animated comedy and ridiculously exaggerated for effect?

Yeah, that becomes way less funny when it happens in real life.

An 11-year-old [Pee-Wee hockey] defenceman was targeted during a team outing for being Jewish, said his mother who is also the team’s manager.

“We all went to an Oil Kings’ game on Friday and on the bus, the goalie of our team called my son a “f**king Jew,” she said, adding this player later told her son that Nazis killed Jews.

A second player from the same team, an 11-year-old biracial forward, told his parents this week that the same goalie targeted him at the beginning of the month.

The goalie told him “Your mom should go back to Africa where she belongs.” (via the St. Albert Gazette)

So, uh …

“(The league) was notified yesterday afternoon of the incident in question and based on a review of the information we received, the decision was made to suspend the player pending further investigation and a meeting with the parent,” he said, adding two league executives will attend the meeting.

He would not comment on whether there have been prior complaints filed against the player, and said no further comments will be provided.

We at With Leather get up on a righteous soapbox from time to time, and we’re just as quick to field “YOU’RE THE PC POLICE KIDS CAN SAY WHATEVER THEY WANT NYEAHH,” so I’ll save you all that and give you the most objective, astute analysis I can muster: that kid who got derisively called a Jew should’ve kicked this little 11-year old asshole’s ass. Just wrecked him where he stood. Additionally, anybody using “go back to Africa” at 11-years old in 2012 IN CANADA has probably suffered through the most f**ked-up child-rearing ever and should be with one of the other 34-million-and-change Canadians who won’t raise him to be a weird cartoon villain.

Or, you know, feed him someone in a chili.

[banner image via Flickr, story h/t to Prep Rally]

After a brief hiatus, the Sports On TV column returns with one of the most requested shows ever: Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s 16-season strong cultural landmark, ‘South Park’.

‘South Park’ has been around since 1997, and has changed along with the times. When it started, Parker and Stone were getting $1,200 to make video Christmas cards for Fox executives. In 2012, they are influential, Tony Award-winning, multi-millionaire media moguls. One thing hasn’t changed: in season one, Kenny was getting ripped apart by football players. In season 16, Tom Brady is guzzling a Gatorade bottle of a child’s semen. Sports are one of the weirdest, stupidest, most ritualistic and overly-glorififed things human beings can do, and ‘South Park’ has been in tune with that since the very beginning.

So, in the Interest of easing us back into regular Thursday columns, here are my choices for the 20 greatest South Park sports moments. Like a lot of the shows we do, there are a ton of moments we had to leave out, so a part 2 will probably happen. If we left out your favorite moment, or you have something to say about a moment we chose, be sure to drop down into our comments section and let us know.

As an added bonus, participating in the discussion and sharing the column on Twitter or Facebook (courtesy of one of those handy buttons at the bottom of the post) will net you the BAT DAD BADGE. You don’t want the Bat Dad Badge? I THOUGHT THIS WAS AMERICA.

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In the best NFL/children’s game story mash-up since Mario Williams accidentally Woke Daddy, veteran fullback Lawrence Vickers had to be helped off the pratice field during the Dallas Cowboys’ final week of organized team activities to be medically treated for Ants In The Pants. No, the actual ones.

The story, via Shutdown Corner:

On Wednesday, during the Cowboys’ final week of organized team activities, Vickers was seen leaving the field with head athletic trainer Jim Mauer, holding his right hand near his waist. Vickers wasn’t injured — he had been attacked by the nasty bugs while on the practice field.

“Fire ants got in my pants,” Vickers said. “I was freaking out. Oh, ants!”

At least he didn’t KerPlunk himself. Maybe he should tell that story the next time he has to Break The Ice.

The worst part is that Vickers is allergic to ant bites and already has to carry around an EpiPen in case the team isn’t near a hospital, something bites him and his neck swells up so badly he can barely breathe. That’s the worst part for most people, I mean. The worst part for Vickers is that women were around and he didn’t want ants to bite his balls in front of them.

“I was trying not to squeeze myself in front of women out there … I wanted to pull my pants down and run inside, but I couldn’t do that. When those ants get close to those testicles, there ain’t no laughing about that.”

Look on the bright side: at least you didn’t have to have an Operation.

This is basically what I look like when I’m watching ‘The Wire’. Somebody draw this guy a warm bath for Christ’s sake. (via Awful Announcing)

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Links

Potentially the 11 Most Crowd-Pleasing TV Deaths of 2012 |Warming Glow|

The 20 Best Ozzie Guillen Misquotes |With Leather|

Memes Do Come True: ‘Texts From Hillary’ Bros Meet With Hillary Clinton |UPROXX|

Donald Glover Talks About His ‘Amazing Spider-Man’ Easter Egg |Gamma Squad|

The Most Obnoxious Generation: An American Reunion Review |Film Drunk|

On Urban Meyer, Amateurism & Winning |Smoking Section|

The James Van Der Beek 6 Stages Of Fame |UPROXX|

The Incredible Portrait In Portrait Art Of Kim Dong Yoo |UPROXX|

The Start Of Your Ending: Mobb Deep Breaks Up On Twitter? Hav Calls Prodigy Gay? |Smoking Section|

Your Mid-Week Guide To DVD And Streaming |Film Drunk|

The Best And Worst Of WWE Raw 4/9/12: The One With The Three Stooges |With Leather|

Five “Science Reports” We’re Tired Of Seeing |Gamma Squad|

Chevy Chase on ‘Community’: It’s a ‘F*cking Mediocre Sitcom’ |Warming Glow|

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