Today I had a friend suggest to me that I should do a blog about Lance Armstrong. Since I was already thinking about Lance and his admission on Oprah that's set to air on Thursday and Friday, that will in fact be our topic du jour.
Except, Lance Armstrong presents me with a tremendous personal dilemma. In the past, I've gone on record as an Armstrong supporter. After the USADA revealed its initial findings regarding Armstrong, I was candid in my criticism of the organization and openly questioned its motives. One of my arguments was that maybe he was tired of continuing a fight he clearly wasn't going to win when everybody had already made their judgements about him. Well, it turns out I was wrong. And I feel like an idiot. Lance Armstrong played us all for fools. For 15 years. And I fell for it. Hook, line and sinker.
Now I know why he decided not to fight the USADA's allegations. Because they were true. Of course he denied it at first, just like he has for all these years. Then they released the full case file with its mountains of evidence, and it became pretty clear that he was guilty of something. Still nothing. Yet now, all these months later, after his Tour de France titles were taken away, he was banned for life from competitive cycling, he was forced to resign from his own company, he lost sponsors left and right, and whatever was left of his reputation was gone, we get this LeBronesque made-for-TV admission. And I'm left thinking, "Was this all part of the plan?"
By confirming what many have suspected for a long time, is Lance Armstrong trying to regain whatever's left of his dignity? Is it the first step in rebuilding a tattered legacy? Is it a sincere attempt at an apology/explanation? Or is it a carefully calculated move? Is coming clean the first, necessary part of a master plan that ends with his lifetime ban being reduced? More importantly, how did he come to this decision? When this whole saga started, was he planning on ultimately admitting his guilt all along? Or did he make this decision fairly recently? Did he feel he was left with no other choice?
The truth is, we'll never know. Even now, Lance Armstrong remains a mystery. ESPN.com asked a poll question earlier today regarding the public's perception of Lance Armstrong. While "mostly positive" will never be an option again (I'm not sure how much it was before), the vote was almost split between "mostly negative" and "both positive and negative." I can see why. Because disgraced former champion or not, it's impossible to view Lance Armstrong in a vacuum. His story of overcoming cancer is truly remarkable. And all the money that he helped raise for cancer research can't be ignored. But so many people will never be able to get over the steroids or the years of lying about it. I get that, too.
Even those of us who've been Armstrong supporters have to view him differently now. Unlike Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, there's no longer any dispute regarding Lance Armstrong and performance-enhancing drugs. But is a tainted champion in a tainted sport really the root of all evil like so many would have you believe? Of course not. And as much as some in the cycling community may want to, it's impossible to act as if Lance Armstrong never existed.
One hundred years from now, people are going to wonder why there was no winner of the Tour de France from 1999-2005. How do you explain why without bringing up Lance Armstrong? Likewise, in an era where cycling was such a dirty sport, how are we to know he wouldn't have won those Tour de France titles anyway. Most importantly, Lance Armstrong is the most important person ever to sit on a bicycle. And the most famous.
Lance Armstrong is a household name. Everybody knows who he is, and everybody has an opinion about him. Before him, the Tour de France was completely irrelevant in America. Now every stage is shown live in its entirety on NBC Sports Network. Talking about Lance Armstrong meant people were talking about cycling. As the old cliche goes, "There's no such thing as bad publicity." That's especially true for the sport of cycling. Where the options are usually bad publicity or no publicity.
That's what makes everything about the Lance Armstrong Saga so difficult. In more ways than one. He can no longer be viewed as a hero. But should he be seen as a villian? I have a hard time saying he is. It's not that simple. It never will be. I think Lance Armstrong will forever end up somewhere in the middle. In that gray area between hero and villain.
Maybe this admission is indeed the beginning of a journey to redemption. Who knows what the future holds for Lance Armstrong? Instead of his entire biography, the last few years might end up just being a chapter or two. Nobody knows. The only thing that we can be sure of is that Lance Armstrong will remain a polarizing figure. And picking which side you fall on is harder than it seems.
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