Spelling Is Not a Sport, It's Better

Two major sports stories broke Thursday. Oddly enough, both involved spelling.

The NCAA is looking into major violations at Memphis. When Derrick Rose took the SAT test to get eligible, somebody apparently spotted him the S and the A.

Meanwhile in Washington D.C. , Kavya Shivashankar won the Scripps National Spelling Bee. And I know what you're saying.

Spelling is far too nerdy to be considered a sport.

Hear me out if that's possible. And if you're like a lot of sports fans, it isn't. To quote Jack Nicholson, you can't handle the truth.

Spelling is as sporty as pursuits like baseball, golf and NASCAR. All are competitions requiring minimal physical skills.

I define minimal physical skills as "any sport you can excel at while smoking three packs a day."

Your definition is probably different. I'd like to hear it, though the last time I questioned NASCAR's sporting manhood I was flooded with comments calling me an "embecil."

It's the Pavlovian reaction anytime a person's favorite sport, team or player gets scrutinized. So before you turn into soccer fans and get all huffy that I'd even compare Shivashankar to David Ortiz, please consider the similarities of their tasks.

Stamina – By the time Shivashankar correctly spelled Laodecian at 10:17 PM ET, she'd been on stage for about 12 hours. The average Major League game only seems to last that long.

Pressure – Dwight Howard thinks making fourth-quarter free throws is hard? Try standing alone in front of microphone on national TV and being asked to spell Psittacosis.

Money – Shivashankar got $41,000 in cash and prizes for one night's work. Terrell Owens makes that per dropped pass, but it's still not a bad haul for a 13-year-old.

Boredom – After two hours of finals, it felt like a NASCAR race. Instead of repetitive left turns, it was repetitive correct spellings of words you'd never heard of. I was just praying for a crash to liven things up.

Convinced yet?

I didn't think so. The fact is you could take almost any pursuit from darts to shuffleboard to hot dog eating, throw in Erin Andrews and it could be called a sport.

ESPN turned poker players into cult heroes, and Phil Hellmuth makes the spelling bee kids look like Olympic decathletes. That's saying a lot since the only athletic requirement for spelling is being able to take a wedgie from the school bully.

I shouldn't poke fun at any kid whose brain is five times larger than mine. But where is it written that something must have sweat, torn ACLs and paternity suits to be considered a sport?

The sad fact is it's been etched in the subconscious of the average fan. I really can't blame them for scoffing at the notion that spelling is a sport. Consider what they didn't see at the spelling bee.

Tattoos – I can't be sure since none of them were wearing muscle shirts, but not a single competitor appeared to have a barbed-wire tat circling their bicep.

Test tubes – After Shivashankar won she was not immediately escorted to the bathroom and required to produce a urine sample for steroid testing. And chances are she will never appear before Congress and blame her trainer for unknowingly injecting her with Human Spelling Hormone.

Ads – It was not the Home Depot National Spelling Bee presented by Tiger Beat Magazine. If it were NASCAR, Shivashankar would have worn a jumpsuit covered in patches and thanked 18 sponsors while accepting the trophy.

Perspective – One competitor wore a t-shirt Thursday that read "I Love Nerds." Spellers know what they are, but they can handle the truth.

Agents – If she were a basketball player, Shivashankar would have been whisked away by her AAU coach and peddled to the highest bidder.

That probably would have been John Calipari, who somehow would have maintained deniability in five years when the NCAA starts investigation why Shivashankar drove a Mercedes SL 500 around Lexington before bolting for the National Spelling Association.

If the preceding paragraph riles Kentucky basketball fans, my apologies. I realize this sports comparison thing is treading on some sacred ground.

The real truth is the National Spelling Bee probably shouldn't be considered a sport. It's too good for that.

If that bothers any of you Shivashankar fans, I welcome your comments. At least I know if you call me an imbecile you'll spell it right.