Colin Sheridan: From living the American dream to fumbling it all
Los Pool, Ap React Jury J Courtroom Walk As The File Drama: Defendant And Simpson Pic: Into Team Members His O In Photo/reed Defense Of The In Saxon, 1995 Angeles Courtroom
“Well, it’s finally official,” the late comedian Norm MacDonald told Saturday Night Live audiences in 1995, “Murder is legal in the state of California.” It was an iconic line on an iconic American TV show that certainly contributed to MacDonald losing his job. The joke worked for nearly every viewer of the show besides the one that truly mattered: his boss at NBC West Don Ohlmeyer, who happened to be an extremely close friend of the subject of the joke, one Orenthal James Simpson. The Juice. O.J. The most famous man in America at a time when everybody wanted to be famous. A person of colour. An athlete. An actor. A celebrity. A man who stood trial for the brutal murders of Nicole Brown and Ron Goldman and who led the LAPD on the most infamous car chase in television history, drawing 95million viewers. That he emerged from that “epsiode” with his freedom was as absurd as it was an indictment of a country completely at odds with itself, beset by the legacy trauma of race division and police corruption.
Simpson died last week at the age of 76 from cancer, yet somehow everything we’ve come to know about him suggests he may yet reappear as a surprise guest on a late night talk show. His athletic prowess was phenomenal. His megalomania, preposterous. While it's hard to make an “at best” case for him, at worst, he was a double-killer with a history of violence who literally got away with murder. Those of us who remember the O.J. trial are unlikely to be the same cadre of people who even know how Simpson became famous in the first place. I grew up in 1980’s Ireland, and was vaguely aware of American Football in that I had heard of The Refrigerator and Joe Montana. I knew when the Super Bowl was on. I was of the Dicky Rock school of NFL interest. I can’t say I’d ever heard of O.J. Simpson before his muder trial other than recognising him from his cameos on various spoof movies, and so was interested to learn this week that, while most Americans knew him as a TV celebrity, few fully knew how he came to be one.
Writing for The Ringer, Bryan Curtis noted “I grew up watching the O.J. of the late ’80s and early ’90s. It was hard not to. O.J.’s career as a Heisman winner at USC and Hall of Fame running back in the NFL was long behind him, and while he had few acting parts outside of the Naked Gun movies, O.J. had simply become a media entity. He was a star of Hertz ads, an NFL commentator on NBC. During those years, it was possible to know that O.J. was famous without knowing exactly what he was famous for.” By the time Simpson’s white Ford Bronco led the LAPD down the freeways of Los Angeles, his football career was little more than a footnote. A Heisman Trophy winner at USC, he broke all records as a running back for the Buffalo Bills in an eleven year professional career that earned him the nickname “The Juice.” Post football, it was all about TV and his brand. Whether it was guest starring in Dragnet or becoming the first Black announcer on Monday Night Football, Simpson was ubiquitous. He was hired and fired more often than an artillery piece, and just as irrelevance beckoned, he was charged with the gruesome murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown and her boyfriend, Ronald Goldman.
There were many ironies about Simpson’s status in public life, but none rings louder than the fact his murder trial made him an icon for Black America, a fraternity he famously wanted no part of. It’s arguable he became the first person of colour to be found not-guilty based on his skin colour, when the opposite was so often the case. The man himself was happy to play the race card on the stand, but notoriously quick to eschew all associations with a community so desperately in need of positive representation in a country divided. The other irony is that, O.J. may well have been the most boring thing about the O.J. trial. The miscarriage of justice and moral bankruptcy of the media was almost always more shocking than yet another charismatic rich sociopath getting away with murder, at least after the car chase.
language often screams slouder than a klaxon, and in the case of the mortal Tiger Woods, it tells a story in very little need of editing. The greatest golfer that ever lived entered the record books on Friday after becoming the first player to successfully negotiate 24 Masters cuts in a row. If you watched him those first two days you could easily be forgiven for buying into his own assertion that he is simply not done winning yet. His driving especially oozed control, and even if victory at Augusta was far too lofty a thought, the man himself insisted he was only competing for one reason; to win. We should probably know better by now than to fall under the Woods spell. Father Time is beaten by no man. A ragged first nine of 42 was his worst at Augusta National. It did not get much better thereafter. Woods signed for an 82, his poorest Masters round by four. Both of those 78s came in 2022; Woods’s pattern now is undoubtedly one of general decline. When taking to the podium for post-round media duties – and it is fully to his credit that he did that – Woods looked emotionally and physically spent. Yesterday marked his 100th round at the Masters. There is no joy to be taken from watching him around a venue he once considered his own backyard. You get the impression from Woods he’s unlikely to ever accept the role of ceremonial golfer. His tired demeanor and broken body is an ominous sign that his days as a contender are finally done, and that the only thing within his control is how much more of the agony he’s willing to take.
Heartwarming goal celebration of the week goes to Dan Burn of Newcastle, who chose to mark Newcastle taking the lead against Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday by using the British Sign Language for "Love the fans." The big defender met with deaf fans before the match against Spurs, who taught himself and Kieran Trippier some BSL. They asked him to pull out the celebration, which involves crossing your hands, touching your chest and shaking your fists, and Burn kindly obliged. A small, but meaningful gesture that will matter to many for a long time to come.
What a difference a month makes. When Jurgen Klopp announced his intention to retire at the end of the season the script seemed written for him to leave with at least one of the Europa League, FA Cup or Premier League trophies in his possession. In the space of only a few days, it suddenly appears likely Liverpool will end the season with just the Carabao Cup, and Klopp’s famously short temper in times of stress is threatening to take the shine off what might have otherwise been a victory lap. Perhaps he’ll change his mind after all?