Columnist Dean Juipe: If ballroom dancing is a sport …

Dean Juipe

Wednesday, Aug. 22, 2001 | 10:32 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@lasvegassun.com or 259-4084.

If you're reading USA Today and looking for the results, they're in the Sports section every day.

Tuesday, for instance, the winning numbers of no fewer than 34 state and regional lotteries were listed on the scoreboard page. It's a standard feature, tucked into the bottom corner of a back page amid such items as Major League Lacrosse standings, Today's Line and Women's United Soccer Association scores.

The implication: A lottery is a sport.

And the World Series of lotteries is scheduled for tonight when the 20-state Powerball lottery is held with something in the neighborhood of $200 million at stake. If there is a winner, he or she can take roughly $112 million in a pre-tax lump sum, or collect $8 million a year for the next 25 years.

So there's big money and uncertainty involved, but, come on now, is this a sport? There are two sides to the argument.

It's A Sport: Years ago when auto racing was just getting started, newspapers were initially perplexed as to where to run the results. Eventually they settled on including them within the Sports section, where, today, auto racing results and stories are staples. Some day we may look back at lotteries in the same light.

It's Not A Sport: If there's no ball, no stick, no leader board or no finish line involved, then it's not a sport.

It's A Sport: The jostling for position in a lottery line is physical enough to be used as a trial run for would-be National Hockey League enforcers. It's said that Tie Domi got his start muscling fellow lottery ticket buyers before making his mark as an NHL thug.

It's Not A Sport: If pure luck is the single biggest factor in determining a winner, then it's not a sport.

It's A Sport: Given that pure luck determined last weekend's PGA Championship in Atlanta when David Toms' hole in one was the key stroke in his eventual one-shot victory, either the previous argument is invalid or golf is not a sport.

It's Not A Sport: If they neither play nor consider playing the national anthem before the event, then it's not a sport.

It's A Sport: Not only can a winner mimic other sports' champions and proclaim "I'm going to Disneyland," in this case he or she can buy Disneyland.

It's Not A Sport: If you neither have to wear a uniform nor conform to an acceptable standard of dress during the event, then it's not a sport.

It's A Sport: If a baseball manager is required to wear a uniform, all rules pertaining to dress standards in sports -- including the previous argument -- are irrelevant.

It's Not A Sport: If no training of any sort is required in order to participate in the event and the winner might well be a fat guy from Des Moines, then it's not a sport.

It's A Sport: Any planet that has synchronized swimming and now ballroom dancing contested at the Olympic level has, by definition, suspended its right to distinguish between what is and what isn't a sport.

It's Not A Sport: No press box or media tent at the site? No sport.

It's A Sport: The Summer X Games are on TV this week, right? If skateboarding has evolved into a sport, need we say more?

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