Oregon tight end suspended for bowl game for role in snowball fight

Oregon starting tight end Pharoah Brown has been suspended for the team's Alamo Bowl against Texas for his role in a campus snowball fight.

 The incident, which was caught on video and showed Oregon football players among a group of close to 100 students hitting cars and drivers with snowballs last Friday. Images also show players dumping containers of snow on vehicle windshields.

Head coach Mark Helfrich made the suspension on Sunday after speaking with the drivers involved.

Brown apologized for his part in the snow melee.

“I was one of the many UO students involved in the snowball fight on Friday and my actions escalated to an inappropriate level and for that, I sincerely apologize," Brown said in a statement released Monday afternoon. "We never should have engaged innocent people and I deeply regret my actions and will accept the consequences.”

Other players involved will face disciplinary action as well. Two drivers victimized in the snowball fight will not press charges.

Brown, a 6-foot-6 sophomore from Lyndhurst, Ohio, has 10 catches in nine games for 123 yards and two touchdowns this season.

Former MLB All-Star Magglio Ordonez elected mayor of Venezuelan city

Former MLB All-Star Magglio Ordoñez was elected mayor of Juan Antonio Sotillo, a municipality in the Venezuelan state of Anzoátegui.

Sotillo, in coastal northeastern Venezuela, is home to about 250,000 people — about the population of Orlando, Fla.

Ordoñez was among the winners in the 335 elections Sunday across Venezuela.

He’s a member of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela, which boasts more than 5 million members, and is a backer of President Nicolas Maduro.

Maduro became president in April after the death of Hugo Chavez.

Ordoñez’s victory was announced on the party’s Spanish language website at psuv.org.ve. It did not list the ballot totals.

Ordoñez, 39, earned $133.4 million in his major league career, according to baseball-reference.com.

The former American League batting champion returned to Venezuela after his retirement from baseball in 2011 and has been positioning for a career in politics.

Ordoñez was a six-time all-star and played for the Tigers from 2005-11. He played for the Chicago White Sox from 1997-2004.

In his 15 seasons, he hit 294 home runs, 426 doubles, and 21 triples, and had 1,236 RBI, 651 walks and 94 stolen bases. He was a career .309/.369/.502 hitter over 1,848 career games.

Ordoñez is perhaps best known in Detroit for his walk-off home run in Game 4 of the 2006 American League Championship Series against the Oakland Athletics, a blast that sent the Tigers to the World Series.

Tom Izzo to Michigan State students: 'Learn how to celebrate something with some class'

After Saturday night's stirring win over Ohio State in the Big Ten championship game, some students in East Lansing decided to take their celebrations over the top.

This has become a recurring theme in East Lansing as every time Michigan State comes up with a big win in football or basketball, celebrations turn into civil disturbances. The school has a reputation with setting furniture, and other things on fire.  

“It’s more tradition than anything,” Michigan State senior Joe Sheena told the Lansing State Journal. “We’re not a school of pyromaniacs.”

Michigan State basketball coach Tom Izzo would like to see that "tradition" done away with.

Izzo said he was "disgusted" at how the students celebrated the big win Saturday night. I can see why when there was a reported 57 fires and 12 students arrested.

Izzo later said that the students need to learn how to celebrate with some class.  

"If we really want to show the class that I think we are, then we better start walking it and learning how to celebrate something with some class, with some dignity," said Izzo, whose team's success has preceded couch-burnings in the past.

"If football wins a championship, I don't expect the players to be out causing all those problems. Why do we expect any less of our students?"

"We can't do something that puts an incredible star on our university and then do something two hours later that puts an incredible dent on our university," Izzo said.

I agree with Izzo. Celebrate, but do it responsibly. Every time the Spartans get a big win others figure that East Lansing will have a near riot. If the Spartans compete for a national championship in basketball all eyes will be on that city to see what foolishness they can catch on camera.

Another black eye for East Lansing and  Michigan State.