Oh boy, ESPN is under fire yet again.

No, not because the four-letter network is the 24/7 LeBron James Channel heading into the NBA playoffs. This is all because the network is supposedly snubbing a 12-year-old boy.

Oh, those evil television executives.

How dare they deny a sixth grader – who used his dad’s email address to enter a contest for participants 18 and over – a prize when his ineligible entry finished in the Top 1 percent of the entire pool.

That’s right, 12-year-old Sam Holtz of Hawthorn Woods, Ill., outperformed all the college basketball experts – such as Dick Vitale and Jay Bilas – taking part in ESPN’s bracket challenge. Holtz missed six games on the entire bracket. Yes, he only got six wrong. He tied for first place by outpicking more than 11.5 million other entrants.

He posted a perfect score in the Sweet 16, Elite Eight, Final Four and the Championship (which Duke won 68-63 over Wisconsin on Monday night).

The prize he would have been in line for: A $20,000 Best Buy gift card or a trip for two to Maui – winner to be chosen in a random drawing among the 115,000 entrants who finished in the Top 1 percent.

Let’s stress “would have.”

Holtz is ineligible to even be considered for the prize. Remember, he’s only 12.

There’s a good number of folks out there are crying foul. They’re saying the kid won and he should be in the running for the grand prize. A few have even started a “gofundme” pages to raise $20,000 for the kid. Why?

The prize money – technically a gift card – isn’t even guaranteed to a person. It’s all a random drawing.

Seriously, people are clueless.

Perhaps all the children out there, and the few adults with good taste in classic musicals, will understand this better as if it were dialogue between Grandpa Joe and Willy Wonka:

MR. HOLTZ: Mr. Skipper?

ESPN PRESIDENT JOHN SKIPPER: I am extraordinarily busy, sir.

HOLTZ: I just wanted to ask about the money and that trip to Maui, for Sammy. When does he get it?

SKIPPER: He doesn’t.

HOLTZ: Why not?

SKIPPER: Because he broke the rules.

HOLTZ: What rules? We didn’t see any rules, did we, Sammy?

SKIPPER: Wrong, sir! Wrong! Under Section 1 of the official rules agreed to by him, it states quite clearly that all offers shall become null and void if – and you can read it for yourself in this photostatic copy – you are not 18 or older as of the date of entry. It’s all there! Black and white, clear as crystal! So you get nothing! You lose! Good day, sir!

HOLTZ: You’re a crook. You’re a cheat and a swindler! That’s what you are! How can you do a thing like this?! Build up a little boy’s hopes, and then smash all his dreams to pieces?! You’re an inhuman monster!

SKIPPER: I said good day!

Good day, indeed. For today, little Sam Holtz learns that rules are rules.

Of course, that’s not good enough for little Sammy.

“I’m irritated,” Holtz told the Daily Herald, a daily newspaper in the Arlington Heights suburb of Chicago. “Yes, I’m still proud of my accomplishment, but I’m not happy with the decision.”

The ESPN bracket challenge is a form of gambling. While I’m a proponent of certain games of chance, including ones that pertain to sports wages, it’s nothing for a child under 18
to be involved in.

Make it right, the critics cry out. Let the kid participate in the drawing and if he wins, put the money in a trust fund for his 18th birthday.

No. That’s still condoning the rules being broken and an underage participant in a gambling pool.

It’s not as if ESPN has totally denied the kid’s amazing accomplishment.

According to the Chicago Tribune, he’s been offered an opportunity to anchor an episode of SportsCenter.

“The great thing is that this kid beat all these experts out there,” ESPN spokesman Kevin Ota said. “He beat all of our commentators, all these celebrities, all the college experts. That’s what makes this so awesome. The prize really is secondary.”

ESPN is absolutely right in this instance.

The prize is secondary to the fact that Sam Holtz is learning a valuable lesson. Mommy and daddy may bend the rules at home, but that’s not how things operate in the real world.

George Scione can be reached at 594-6520, gscione@nashuatelegraph.com or
@Telegraph_BigG.