From Knee Caps To Salary Caps 1994 Was Strange Year Away From Playing Field

Goodbye 1994 and good riddance.

Are you o.d.’d on O.J.?

Strike weary? Locked out? Fed up?

Do your eyes glaze over when you hear about Tonya & Nancy?

The three big sports stories of 1994, none of them really about sports at all, destroyed any lingering illusions of innocence about the people who play games.

The bizarre and nasty overwhelmed mere victory and defeat.

Do you need a break from all the talk of murder, greed and assault?

Would it cheer you to get a video of the 0-0 World Cup final for Christmas? How about samba lessons?

Isn’t it still weird seeing Michael Jordan in a baseball uniform? Are you waiting for him to rip it off, reveal his Bulls jersey, say the whole thing was just a joke?

Can you believe George Foreman, fatter and funnier than 20 years ago, is heavyweight champion again? Think he’ll defend his title in Zaire?

Do you feel sorry for Matt Williams, Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey Jr. and Frank Thomas, stopped in pursuit of Roger Maris?

What about Tony Gwynn aiming for Ted Williams, or Cal Ripken stalking Lou Gehrig?

The players and owners didn’t care about the records or pennant races as much as they did about money, so why should the fans?

The New York Rangers won the Stanley Cup for the first time in 54 years and everyone talked about exorcised ghosts. A fan in Madison Square Garden held up a sign, “Now I can die in peace.”

Now they’re talking about an exorcised season, empty seats in every arena. A sign posted at the Garden this fall, outside facing the cold, gray street, “Hockey Lies Here, RIP.”

The few transcendent moments of the year, when the human spirit soared, were all the more poignant for the relief they offered:

Dan Jansen skating an Olympic victory lap at last, baby Jane in his arms.

Oksana Baiul, a 16-year-old waif, gliding elegantly to gold then trembling in tears.

President Clinton hugging sweaty Hogs in the Arkansas locker room after they won the Final Four.

Americans learning to like soccer and screaming “Goooooooaaaaaallllll!”

Martina Navratilova summoning the strength to reach one last Wimbledon final and plucking a patch of grass as she waved goodbye.

Andre Agassi, unseeded, winning the U.S. Open after just three tennis lessons from Brooke Shields.

Talk about odd couples and strange scenes.

How about Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones and coach Jimmy Johnson stabbing each other in the back while embracing after a second straight Super Bowl victory?

Or Family Feud, starring the Bodine Brothers playing bumper car at Indy in the Brickyard 400.

Was there anything that didn’t happen in 1994, besides the World Series and the NHL season?

A Mexican named German took a wrong turn into Central Park, escaped unscathed, and still won the New York City Marathon.

Jennifer Capriati dyed her hair purple, stuck a silver ring in her nose, and landed in drug rehab.

Monica Seles kept up her Garbo act.

And then there was the matter of respect, the demand for it, earned or not.

The year was framed with a hard edge and filled with meanness, the same incivility seen in the rest of society.

No one wants to get dissed. No one is willing to yield anywhere - on the highway, on the streets, on the field. And now there’s the popular idea that respect can be gained through violence, that we live in a culture of cruelty where nastiness pays off.

It could be seen in the taunting gestures in football and basketball, as if humiliating opponents had replaced merely beating them.

It was evident in baseball, before it disappeared, with batters charging pitchers at the slightest provocation.

It could be heard in locker rooms all over, athletes with attitudes.

Maybe the whole crazy year came down to respect.

Glenn Robinson, fresh out of college, wanted $100 million worth of respect from the Milwaukee Bucks.

Charles Oakley felt disrespected by the New York Knicks till he settled for an $8 million balloon payment tacked onto his $2.2 million season salary.

Chris Webber’s feelings were bruised so much by Golden State coach Don Nelson that he slipped out of his $74 million deal to pursue happiness in Washington.

Tonya Harding wasn’t getting enough respect from the figure skating establishment, so she and her husband concocted a scheme to grab that respect by clubbing Nancy Kerrigan to get her out of the way. It worked for a few days, until Harding herself became implicated.

O.J. Simpson? Who knows what’s lurking inside his mind? He battered his wife, Nicole, and on the infamous 911 tape replayed thousands of times he could be heard screaming at her, cursing her for talking about him.

And what exactly was going on in the most surreal image of 1994? There was Simpson pointing a gun to his head in the rear of a white Ford Bronco, his pal, Al Cowlings, driving and leading a caravan of squad cars in slow-motion pursuit along the San Diego Freeway while Simpson’s fans cheered.

Were those fans paying homage to a fallen hero, trying to save him, hoping he’d somehow make one last broken field run? Is this a weird world, or what?

Respect, or the lack of it, even became one of the central elements in the strike that wiped out the World Series for the first time in 90 years. If the dispute were simply about how to divide money, reasonable men might have come to a reasonable solution months ago.

But when it came down to personalities, the players had no respect for acting commissioner Bud Selig or the owners’ hired gun, Richard Ravitch.

Selig and Ravitch, in turn, took a dismissive attitude toward the union’s dour leader, Donald Fehr.

Between them, the talks went nowhere, and one of the greatest seasons in baseball history vanished in August.

It used to be that sports were an escape from the gravity of the real world, irrational in part but altogether worthy.

In 1994, that flight from reality was canceled.