On a day when one of football's star players is ordered to stay away from his team, an NBA referee is about to turn himself in to the FBI, and the commissioner of baseball refuses to show up to see the breaking of sport's most sacred record, we have have to ask ourselves: what the hell has happened?

Now, I'm not one of these people to say "Oh, athletes are nothing but rich, egotistical, bad examples for our children" or "Oh my god, Americans lack morals because there is so much sex, drugs, and violence in our culture", because, truthfully, other countries are much worse. On a recent trip to Munich I walked down a street lined with strip clubs that have posters of naked women on the OUTSIDE of the building. In Italy, after midnight, the local cable channel displayed live sex chats with women stripping based on the um, feedback of their callers. So I will not sit here and say "America is so awful", because its not, Europe is much worse. That being said, our culture's most important distraction, sports, has become the very thing it tries too distract us from.

Suddenly, the view of Barry Bond's alleged use of steroids as a despicable act takes a backseat to smashing a dog on the pavement. Needling up, to keep up with the Jones', pales in comparison to intentionally calling fouls to drive up the score. In any case, the three major sports all have a serious PR problem right now.

Vick, has the most serious of allegations. Dog fighting is one thing, but the fact that he would execute dogs that would not win him fights, is absolutely cruel and disturbing. Drowning, electrocution, and blunt force violence were his methods of making roster cuts. Makes the red tag Jake Taylor received in "Major League" seem pretty kind, right? Vick has been ordered away from Falcons camp, and the team will await more details before they inevitably will release him. What a nice story.

Tim Donaghy, the ref who bet on the NBA, is from my town and graduated Villanova University, my alma mater. Awesome. Glad he did Villanova proud...

That being said, I think the long-term impact of this is being overstated. Columnists and talking heads, including my favorite, Bill Simmons, have insinuated that this will have far reaching effects. That, every time we see a bad call in any sport, we will think the ref is gambling, or that the sacred trust of sports has been broken. Also being championed is this idea, that officials will be forever doubted.

To those who believe this, let me ask you something.

Every time a second baseman boots a ball, do you think he is throwing the game?

Every time a player hits a home run do we question if his bat is corked, or if he is on steroids?

No. In fact, with baseball, the steroid controversy had the opposite effect. We now assume that a player is not cheating since there was so much attention paid to it. We assume there is no way he would still have the balls to cheat.

The same thing will happen with gambling. Right now, it is the hot topic, and we will send out a lynch mob that will undoubtedly find more gambling in other sports. In a year from now, the topic will be so overblown and focused on, that any athlete, coach, official, or bat boy will be afraid to fill out their brackets, let alone bet on their sport. That is not to down play what Donaghy did, its terrible and makes you wonder how many games he affected, but it won't have the far reaching effects that many are predicting. He commited a criminal act, he didn't just do something that affected a recreational event like sports, he went out of his way to partner with the mob, bet, and blow calls - a lot of them. This is the exception, rather than the norm. Is it in the realm of possibility that this has happened before, or will happen again? Yes. But to think that aligning one's self with organzied crime, betting on, and throwing games in front of a national audience will become a common occurence, is a radical idea. And the argument that the referees aren't paid enough? Please. They make between 200k-300k a year and have the summers off. Using that logic, 95% of the population would be breaking the law to supplement their salary.

It ashame, this blog was founded on the principle of lauding and lampooning the elements around the game, but now we are talking about drugs, violence, and gambling. Hopefully this will blow over soon and maybe we can just get back to the game?

I am going down to Citizens Bank Park tonight and I am just looking forward to seeing Cole Hamels pitch.