Second thoughts

— Hair issue for Johnson on Survivor

Jimmy Johnson has won two Super Bowls and one NCAA championship as a head coach, but those credentials - and all that hair - might work against him in his latest undertaking as a contestant on the TV show Survivor.

Johnson is in San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua, where filming began in June forthe CBS show that will begin airing in September.

Count Greg Stoda of The Palm Beach (Fla.) Post among those who don’t expect Johnson, a former Arkansas Razorbacks playerand assistant coach, to last all 39 days of filming.

“He’s 67, which is ancient by the show’s standards, and old people just don’t win the $1 million prize. And he’s rich and famous, traits that might not endear him to the others,” Stoda wrote.

“It will be interesting to see if the once-volatile Johnson can curtail his temper while sleeping outdoors in a tribe-made shelter and living on a diet consisting mostly of rice.

“Here’s hoping he can keep under wraps his often-abrasive personality and squash his desire to be a bossy britches, which never flies with a bunch of men and women who grow more irritable by the day in a jungle. They get wet and exhausted and famished and they get frequently mean.

“Mostly, though, here’s hoping he cut off that gelled head of gray hair before taking on Nicaragua, ’cause he isn’t going to like what happens to it even if he’s the first one gone. One of those Nicaraguan bugs - a leaf-cutter ant, perhaps - could make a home in there.”

This isn’t the first time Johnson planned to outwit,outplay and outlast the competition, according to Stoda.

“He was going to be a player a couple of years ago, but a physical required for wouldbe contestants revealed total blockage of one artery to his heart and significant blockage of another artery,” Stoda wrote.

“So, the question is: Does he consider Survivor a life-saver of a show?” Bad decision

Television producer Don Ohlmeyer, who serves as ESPN’s independent journalism watchdog, tookESPN to task - on ESPN.com, to boot - for its one-hour special on LeBron James’ decision to leave the Cleveland Cavaliers for the Miami Heat.

In airing the special, it was perceived thatESPN “pandered to a superstar” and gave in to a “celebration of greed, ego and excess,” the ombudsman wrote in a 4,600-word column posted Wednesday.

“ESPN can brush off concerns raised about The Decision, but it does so at its own peril. A major component of ESPN’s appeal - a value the network has cultivated for three decades - is that the audience trusts what it’s watching,” Ohlmeyer wrote. “Viewers want to believe the network is treating them respectfully, openly, fairly and honestly. If not, why should they bother watching ?”They said it

Greg Connors of the Buffalo (N.Y.) News, envisioning the name for atwo-hour ESPN special on Brett Favre’s ankle surgery: “The Incision.”

From Brad Dickson in the Omaha (Neb.) World-Herald: “We’re at the midpoint of theWNBA season.

This is the time of year the typical sports fan traditionally asks, ‘The WNBA is still around?’ ”Quote of the day “Our plan is this December. I’ll be honest, I don’t look at our schedule and say,‘We’re going to lose that game.’ ” Mississippi State Coach Dan Mullen on when his team will make it to the SEC Championship Game

Sports, Pages 20 on 07/24/2010

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