Play It Green

“I lay so still against the tree branch I was just the same everything as the tree. I was like a green mamba snake. Poison. I could be right next to you and you wouldn’t ever know it.” –Ruth May, from Barbara Kingsolver’s A Poisonwood Bible.

Here’s what I learned today: Kobe Bryant gave himself the nickname “the black mamba” after the deadly African snake. Probably everyone knows this already, but these are the little tidbits that lead to unexpected internet search journeys that make the whole business of blog-keeping worthwhile. No doubt the nickname made sense on a couple levels—the snake is “very aggressive when disturbed or confronted” and “will not hesitate to strike with deadly precision.” Were it not for the King Cobra, it would be the largest venomous snake in the world. It’s scary and it’s fast—the fastest snake in the world, capable of up to 12 miles per hour. All very obvious stuff, and completely defensible from an I’m-an-oversized-ego-athlete perspective.

But also, the Air Jordan XIX design was inspired by the black mamba after Jordan’s third and final retirement. The Zoom Kobe III sneakers released by Nike last year also come in a Black Mamba edition, black sneakers with diamond openings like snake scales, presumably. Here’s the not very effective motto: Slice through the lane like a snake on the hardwood. I get caught up on word choice—does a snake slice? How about slither? Slide? Swish? (Type “snake and slice” into Google and you end up with things like the “Silly Snake Sandwich”     ).

There’s even an entire website dedicated to Kobe Bryant’s footwear—www.kobebryantshoes.com—because some people spend a lot of time thinking about what Kobe wears on his feet.

And what does it all have to do with The Poisonwood Bible, right up there in the upper reaches of best books I’ve ever laid eyes on? Just this: the green mamba, the quiet star of that story, has venom just as deadly as the black mamba, but it’s smaller and not quite so aggressive. This is the nickname for the un-Kobe, the subtle player, laying low, striking only when necessary, but still deadly. And the green mamba’s a lot cooler looking (the black mamba, despite its name, is not actually black) and would make for one hell of a striking sneaker design. You’re welcome, Nike (and future “green mamba”).

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Tonight’s the night for college basketball fans—a culmination of the seemingly endless stretch known as March madness, which has by now left many disappointed, burned out and several dollars poorer. Rather than debate the individual prowess of the two NCAA teams left standing—Michigan State and North Carolina, I’ll put a wager on the winner based on environmental initiatives alone. Here goes:

University of North Carolina:

The Tarheels have a fully fleshed out sustainability program, part of which focuses exclusively on the athletics department. What’s that mean? A lot of recycling for one. So far, the college’s Office of Waste Reduction and Recycling has focused mostly on the school’s football program. In fall of 2008, they launched a Tailgate Recycling Program, with volunteers passing out clear and colored plastic bags for dividing garbage. On the launch, when the Tarheels faced the Wolfpack of North Carolina State, volunteers collected .68 tons of trash. They also diverted over 45% of trash from their 2007 football games thanks to collecting bottles, cans, plastic and recycling. Other athletic initiatives? The school’s Student Recreation Center has rubber flooring—which is renewable and up to 50% recycled content, as do many other buildings on campus. In fact, the school as a whole plans to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by 60% by 2050—the town of Chapel Hill has made the same pledge.

Michigan State:

The home of the Spartans is considered one of the top five campuses in the nation for its green efforts by the National Wildlife Federation as part of the Campus Environment 2008 Report Card. In 2007, MSU announced that it, too, was beefing up its recycling efforts at football games, focusing on collecting and recycling all aluminum and plastic beverage containers. The school also has a nifty new site and initiative called Be Spartan Green that details all the ways the campus is getting their green on—recycling of course, energy-saving dorm wars, restroom upgrades—but none of the initiatives focus particularly on the school’s athletics. But they do keep regular updates on Twitter here, and have a tool for tracking energy consumption at any of the school’s buildings here.

The consensus?

Both schools are making serious commitments, around campus if not directly on the courts. But I call MSU, because they’re using technology better, laying the groundwork for a more interactive experience in monitoring campus energy use. Sorry, Obama. Editor’s Note: Oh, well. 50-50 shot. Good thing I’m not the gambling type.

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Sports are full of inspiring individual stories, but tend to be slower on collective movements. Social justice and environmental awareness seem a little outside the realm, but that’s changing as the public perception of success and toughness expands to include respect for others—and for one’s own impact. Witness the deference given to the Phoenix Suns’ Steve Nash, who’s dedicated to supporting healthier kids and sustainable living through his foundation versus the skepticism toward the Lakers’ Kobe Bryant, who may be a stellar athlete, but hardly a winning role model.

The company Fair Trade Sports is witnessing the revolution-in-the-making as they’re selling out of their eco-certified, fair trade, union-made, vegan basketballs bearing the simple message: Respect. They direct would-be buyers to Gaiam for immediate orders or to sign a backorder list on their site. They have footballs with the message, and soccer balls, and ultimate disc frisbees, rugby balls, and more. In fact, the Seattle company was the first to launch fair trade sports balls in 2006, and to later add eco-certification, using 100% FSC-certified rubber. Design-wise, the balls are cool—not in-your-face-green, but stylish enough to stand out on the playing field. Getting the Nash kind of positive attention.

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So “Bruins” are bears. Not a particular type of bear, just another word for one. And it’s interesting, when comparing the various mascots of the Final Four teams, in terms of the importance of their respective species, that only UCLA’s Bruins and Memphis’ Tigers have any animal kingdom importance. UNC’s Tar Heels refers to the area’s vast pine forests, and some Civil War quip, though the mascot itself is a ram. The Jayhawks (Kansas) are mythical creatures. Tigers (including the school’s mascot, the Bengal) do face the greatest threat ecologically—there are only 5-7,000 left in the world, thanks mostly to poachers who trap and hunt them for their supposed medicinal properties. Tiger whiskers alone are thought to be a poison (in Malaysia), an aphrodisiac (in Indonesia) and a childbirth aid (in India and Pakistan).

But it’s the Bruins that have captured my attention in the Final Four battle. The Yellowstone grizzly bear just lost its endangered species status last year when the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service removed them from the list as the bear population there is thriving—with over 600 living in the area. The success story doesn’t reach to the four other grizzly populations that are endangered. UCLA first adopted the grizzly as its mascot in 1920 (an improvement over a fuzzy campus dog named Rags), but had to contend with the same mascot name by the University of Montana in their Pacific Coast Conference. So they became the Bruins, and all of their mascots in the early years were actual bears. And actual female bears, to boot. The original “Josephine Bruin” was a small Himalayan bear that was later moved to the San Diego Zoo when she grew too big. The school wisely switched to costumed mascots that could actually appear in front of fans without danger of accidental dismemberment. And by 1967, they had a Josephine “Josie” Bruin alongside Joe Bruin getting the crowd going. For women, environmentalists and sports fans, it’s a win-win-win.

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Turns out there really is a mascot that’s about as environmentally friendly (and widely ridiculed) as a mascot could be: The Stanford Tree. The mascot has more of a storied past than most, including its surprising birth following a protracted battle over a mascot to replace a color (the Cardinal, not referring to the bird). The university community came up with a succession of would-be mascots to replace its offensive Indians in 1972, including the Robber Barons and the Thunder Chickens, but by 1981, they were stuck again with a deeper shade of the color red. Stanford’s marching band apparently wasn’t satisfied and when it introduced the tree, the mascot resonated with fans.

Each year, a new tree is created and the unofficial mascot has become a favorite target for opposing schools—particularly University of California Berkeley—who have stolen the costume and held it hostage and broken the tree’s branches during football games. And while the tree looks more male than female, it’s often donned by females, not all of them sober. In February 2006, Erin Lashnits was suspended for public intoxication while wearing the tree costume (and seen drinking from a flask). Replacement Tommy Leep was thrown out of the Stanford women’s basketball team’s NCAA tournmanet against Florida State University for dancing in the wrong place and hurling himself across the basketball court on a rolling chair. Stanford women take on Pitt March 29, and it’s the first time since 2001 that the Stanford men’s team has made it to the Sweet Sixteen—playing the Texas Longhorns on March 28. I’m rooting for the tree.

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The NCAA tournament is upon us, and it’s not all about basketball. It’s a fine time to notice which of these conference leaders is doing something green off-court, too. Colleges are in a constant battle of one-upmanship when it comes to greening efforts (just see my article on the subject) and a electricity supply company called Juice Energy is following the teams to see where the schools stack up. The college with the top rankings on the court, University of North Carolina (who plays Mount St. Mary’s tomorrow night), has committed to making its campus carbon-neutral. They’re the first school to partner with the U.K.-based CRed, a community carbon reduction program that reaches beyond the campus to seek a 60 percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions for 2050. To illustrate this, they use the concept of hot air balloons: each person releases about 9 tons of carbon dioxide a year in the U.K., equal to 5 hot air balloons. Everyone needs to shed 3 of these balloons to reach the goal.

Number 2 seeded Duke is the fifth largest purchaser of green power among universities, buying 31% of its energy from renewable sources. They’re taking their green power position against the Belmont Bruins tonight.

While all Big East teams have made eco-commitments, UConn is the first school with a LEED-certified NCAA athletic facility, the nine-story Burton Family Football Complex:

which includes a 120-yard synthetic turf field and energy efficient infrared heating units. They’re up against San Diego tomorrow afternoon.

Georgetown—who plays the Maryland-Baltimore County Retrievers tomorrow—is home to an impressive, tiered 300 kilowatt solar roof that represents the longest running project of its scale in the country.

And according to the EPA, the Big Ten is ranked 2nd among green power purchases by conference, totaling 134,000,000 kWh per year.

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The nonprofit organization WildAid has set out to “end illegal wildlife trade in our lifetime,” one celebrity endorsement at a time. A whole host of notables have filmed public service announcements for the group, including director Ang Lee and movie star Jackie Chan and a bunch of athletes. The two basketball players among the lot are Denver Nuggets small forward star Carmelo Anthony and tallest NBA player (at 7’6”) for the Houston Rockets, Yao Ming. Turns out Anthony has a soft spot for tigers, as he’s quoted on the site saying: “I was shocked to learn that my favorite animal, the tiger, may be down to less than 5,000 in the wild and they are still being poached for their skins and bones.” And with the spots likely to air in China during this summer’s Olympic games in Beijing, there’s a lot of Chinese star power from the likes of Ming. Elephant poaching is a huge problem in China, where thousands of African elephants are killed for their ivory tusks each year through an efficient organized crime circuit.

All the spots are handled with movie-level quality. The Anthony spot is clever: he tells an off-camera group they’re getting killed and have to pick up their defense, and the camera pans to his audience: a lion, elephant and tiger. But the Ming spot is flat-out great: the player races into a speeding bullet and smacks it down, preventing it from hitting a huge, wrinkly, sad-eyed elephant.

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Michael Jordan is an icon, but the Air Jordan basketball shoe empire he’s created is un-fricking-believable. Note the drama of such quotes as this in the esteemed cultural journal USA Today: “The Air Jordan franchise created the most coveted basketball footwear in the world and changed the basketball landscape forever,” says Nike Brand President Charlie Denson. The rebel black and red shoes first launched in 1985 and brought $5000-per-game fines from the NBA for Jordan for breaking from white shoe conformity, which Nike gladly paid. Each new edition spawned mass hysteria in inner cities, where kids started getting mugged and even killed for the high-priced high-tops. The shoes have brought patent leather and elephant print to the sneaker world, and the latest edition—the Air Jordan XX3—comes with the greatest fanfare of all. This is the 23^rd edition of the Air Jordan—Jordan’s jersey number—and it’ll be made with green in mind under Nike’s “Considered” line, in which the company claims it has “done everything possible to create less waste and use no toxic materials.” The nationwide launch is February 23, with a suggested retail price of $185. Or you really go green, and continue wearing last year’s edition.

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