Violence rears its ugly head.

• Author: Barrett, Wayne M.

Last spring, for a record 24th time, the Montreal Canadiens raised the Stanley Cup in triumph. A couple of weeks later, the Chicago Bulls captured their third consecutive National Basketball Association championship. This sounds like cause for celebration. Instead, riots erupted north of the border and in America's heartland. What should have been a euphoric festival of cheering and hero-worship deteriorated into an ugly imitation of the Rodney King aftermath. Can the creeping, sickening ills infesting society be linked to the wonders of athletic competition? Apparently, there's no denying the fact: It's an angry (and so-sad) in-your-face universe that has been created, and the sports world gleefully has jumped into one of its primordial orbits.

Not that there is any conceivable justification for what happened in Montreal and Chicago, but the calculated mindlessness in these particular instances is hard to understand. These are not championship-starved cities ready to lurch out of control at the thought of a long-awaited crown. Les Habitants perenially are the toast of the hockey world. The Canadiens never have gone more than seven years without winning the Cup. Moreover, Montreal remains the only sports franchise in North America with at least one title in every decade since the 1910s. The Bulls, meanwhile, led by the All-World Michael Jordan, practically rewrite the record books every time they take the floor. How does so much talent and good fortune end up causing a three-ring circus of looting, vandalism, and brutality in the streets?

Why have shaking fists replaced shaking hands? How could bashing heads be preferred to feting one's favorite team? The answer, at least in part, is found on the field. Basketball players routinely are hailed for their boorish habit of breaking backboards and bending rims with flamboyant "look-what-I-can-do" slam dunks. In between, there's enough trash-talking and gutless gesturing to fill a skid row bar. In football, the vanquished ball carrier or receiver routinely is humiliated by the tackler with both verbal and physical taunts. On the diamond, meanwhile, there's a new joke making the rounds: "I went to a baseball game and a hockey game broke out." Only it's no joke. The beanball wars are on, and so is the endless assault on sportsmanship's sensibilities.

Yet, no matter how vicious the violence, the only reaction elicited seems to be "Ho-hum." For one thing, the individuals running sports don't think...