Spanglish

VThe best thing on TV last night was the NBA game between the Chicago Bulls and the N.Y. Knicks. Actually, according to the jersey logos worn by the teams it was between "Nueva York" and "Los Bulls". In an effort to expand their fan base to the Hispanic population (and to sell more jerseys), the marketing geniuses at NBA headquarters dictated that all teams have "Latin Night" games with the special uniforms.


This is about as insulting to Hispanics as those ubiquitous bumper stickers that read "If you want to stay in my country, speak English". Using Spanish adjectives and articles with English proper nouns implies that either Spanish speakers can't figure out where "New York" is or that English speakers don't know that "Toro" means "Bull" not to be confused with "expensive lawn mower". Give us sports fans credit for some intelligence, NBA.


Is the next step to expand the Spanish modifiers on English nouns to play-by-ply broadcasts? "There's a salto (jump) shot by Kobe and los Lakers take a grande siete (big seven) point lead." "Garnett drives to el basket for a corriendo (running) uno (one) hander and it's bueno (good)." Will Spanglish become the lingua franca for sports broadcasts?


If nothing else, it will help struggling high school Spanish students have a painless (sin dolor) immersion into the language. And they say that sports aren't educational.