This Is Not A Column About Sports

Let's get this straight right now: I'm a Pittsburgh Steelers fan and the only reason I'm watching the NFL Playoffs now is because I'd like to see my brother's team, The New York Giants, make it to the Super Bowl.

So when the Giants played the Dallas Cowboys this past Sunday, I was naturally rooting for the Giants, but in the days leading up to the big game, I did get a little interested in all the attention paid to Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo and his trip to Cancun with the blond one, Jessica Simpson. For those who don't know the full story, the trip occured the weekend before last Sunday's game. Following the story as closely as I did, I noticed every sports reporter and analyst would shoot down this idea that Romo's trip with his new wifey would affect his performance come gametime. And for a while, I felt the same way. But after seeing the Cowboys get whooped on by the Giants, and the scatter-brained play of Romo himself, I am convinced that some, not all, but some of Romo's bad game had to do with his rendevouz in Cancun. And that sports analysts don't get laid enough.

As Terrell Owens said at the post-game press conference with a quivering bottom lip, one could say Romo's trip did have something to do with why the Cowboys lost, but it's not fair. Well, T.O. and Cowboys fans who are reading this, I'm not going to be fair. If the Cowboys make the playoffs next year, somebody better lock Tony Romo up in a jail and keep him as far away from the ladies as possible because after seeing Romo blow a game-winning opportunity in the playoffs for the second year in a row, I think it's fair to say Simpson's pleasure box sacked Romo before anybody on the Giants defense got a hold of him.

In last year's NBA playoffs, Tony Parker, the point guard for the San Antonio Spurs, was forced to abstain from sex throughout the entire playoffs by his then-fiance´Eva Longoria. Parker and the Spurs went on to win the NBA Finals, and Parker himself received MVP of the Finals honors.

It's been said that before big fights, Muhammad Ali abstained from sex throughout his training. I don't know where I read this, and I could be wrong, but someone look that up for me. If I'm wrong about him, I still know that a lot of boxers use a similar tactic during their training.

When I was in high school, one of the star baseball players I knew told me he avoided sex at least three days leading up to a big game because he felt it gave him an added advantage on the field. He hit a lot of home runs.

Anyone seeing a pattern here? Now I'm no athlete, but I'm no stranger to the pressures of performance. Whether it's on the field or in the office, there comes a time in every man's life when he must deliver a big game and for a lot of men, the biggest mistake they make is laying down with a woman close to game time.

This is not to say women are the sole cause of a man's sub-par performance in big game scenarios. It's also not to say abstinence will give you an extra edge over the rest of the competition. But some men may want to try it out a couple of times, Romo included. You don't have to be a scientist to know sex releases more energy than it rejuvinates, assuming you're doing it right. And even if you do have more energy after sex, you probably don't want to apply it anywhere else but right back in her.

For my money, the most challenging discipline for a man to undergo is the resistance of sex, so if you can do that, you can do just about anything. But if you can't do that, well then, there might be a lot of other things you can't do, including win the games that matter most.