Great fighters are already great, but an amateur must earn it. With nothing to gain, but recognition and forward progress an amateur lays it all on the line. There is no room for comfort or complacency, there is only hunger and desire...
Michael Phelps and Aaron Peirsol were the old reliables on a night that saw a few of their Beijing teammates fail to qualify for the World Championships.
One\'s a rising soccer star. The other\'s a self-described jealous boyfriend. One had no physical evidence linking him to a rape. The other had matched DNA and teeth marks. One\'s black. The other\'s white. One was convicted. The other was never a suspect.
The Phelps-bong scandal seems to have been safely put to bed, and now that it has, it\'s worth asking, what have we learned? The consequences to Phelps -- actually, the lack of consequences -- suggest that something bigger than mere endorsement dollars is in play. It seems Phelps has moved the weed needle.