Wednesday, October 01, 2003

Here's hoping Jennifer Maddox doesn't get a radio show anytime soon.

The Steelers can live with her husband throwing interceptions, even ones that are returned for touchdowns. They can't live with her going public and calling Bill Cowher a liar or ripping Dan Rooney for not coming through with more cash for her man.

You laugh.

It's happening in St. Louis, where Brenda Warner has become a bigger media figure than Marshall Faulk, Albert Pujols and even Mark McGwire.

The shame of it is that she's ruining her husband's career there.

This story is so bizarre, you couldn't make it up.

The latest is that Brenda Warner went on her weekly radio show Monday and opined, in response to a question, that her husband, Kurt, probably would ask for a trade if he had to finish the season as the backup to Rams quarterback Marc Bulger. Her timing couldn't have been worse. The Rams -- a popular preseason choice to win the Super Bowl -- were coming off a big home win against the Arizona Cardinals, had evened their record at 2-2 and were just starting to feel good about themselves heading into their open week.

Shame on Brenda Warner. For one thing, why does she have a radio gig? Who cares about what she has to say about the Rams or football?

"I don't have any experience of a wife having a weekly radio show," Rams president John Shaw told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Now, there's a sports executive with a headache. It's bad enough he has to answer tough questions about his players. But a wife?

And shame on Kurt Warner. Why is allowing his wife to speak for him about his career? Especially when his career is worth millions? You would think he would have learned last season after his wife called a talk show unsolicited, berated the hosts for criticizing her husband and then, as a topper, questioned Rams coach Mike Martz's integrity by all but calling him a liar.

You don't think that made front-page news in St. Louis, do you?

Kurt Warner brushed off that incident as a case of a wife standing by her husband. But that's not how it played out in the Rams' locker room. Many of the players, already sick of Brenda Warner's media exposure, lost respect for him. He's their quarterback, their leader. Theoretically, he's supposed to be their spokesman, not his wife. Many felt she should stay out of matters relating to the team.

And they were right.

It can't be easy being a player's wife. It has to hurt to go to the games and hear the fans boo your husband or turn on the radio and hear "Bubba from East St. Louis" calling him a bum. It has to be hard to bite your tongue, no matter how many times you tell yourself that criticism goes with the territory and is another reason your hubby brings home that big paycheck.

It also can't be easy being a happily married man -- which Kurt Warner clearly is -- in the locker room. It's just not cool. If you can't drink and chase with the boys after practice, at least go home and keep your warm, sensitive feelings about your wife to yourself.

It's a man thing.

No, it's not something to be proud of.

But that doesn't mean it's not true in every locker room.

We've seen it here to a lesser degree with the Bensons, Kris and Anna. One reason he's not very popular among his Pirates teammates is her high visibility. It doesn't matter that much of it is good. The Bensons live in Pine year-round and do some marvelous charity work in the community. Their revealing interview in the May 2001 issue of Penthouse was just too far over the top. Publicly, the players made light of Benson's admission that he videotapes their lovemaking and takes the tapes on the road. Privately, many didn't find it all that funny and think less of Benson because of it.

An athlete's wife -- just as much as the athlete himself -- can't be too careful in public these days.

Pittsburgh's most prominent sports figure knows.

In June 2002, Nathalie Lemieux gave a rare interview at her husband's charity golf tournament. Asked if she had bragged to him about beating him by seven shots the day before, she said, quite innocently, "He was so drained and tired and his back was out of whack and his hip was giving him trouble, so I didn't really want to talk about my game."

This was at a time there had been much speculation about her husband's health. It also was at a time the Penguins were trying to sell tickets and needed the public to believe he could play in at least 60 games that season.

"That's why she's not allowed to talk to the media," Mario Lemieux said a few days later.

Yes, he was grinning. But he wasn't joking.

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