Can 'baseball unicorn' Bryce Harper bring magic back to the game?

q's sports culture panel thinks beyond the play-by-play to weigh in on the societal impact of sports stories. Not a fan? Not a problem. Our panel watches much more than the scoreboard. 

Today the Toronto Star's Morgan Campbell, CBC host and reporter Sonali Karnick and Globe and Mail baseball columnist Stacey May Fowles join Shad to discuss the biggest and strangest stories in sports. Today: 
 

• Baseball's bad boy Bryce Harper was suspended for confronting an umpire. Is he baseball's fun saviour? Or kind of a jerk? Fowles certainly seems pro-Harper: "He's a fabulous baseball unicorn ... he's performing for himself." But Campbell is a bit more skeptical, noting that players of colour get a lot more flak for similarly colourful behaviour. 
   
• It's the 20th anniversary of the WNBA so why does women's basketball seem to be leaving America en masse? Can superstar player Skylar Diggins stem the tide? Campbell argues that every few years, the WNBA celebrates a promising player who might just elevate the entire league. But that's "a bit too much of a burden to put on one person," says Campbell. 
   
• Russia is once again under fire for "state sponsored doping". Karnick details the extent of the scandal, adding "this could be the turning point where the rest of the athletic world says, 'why isn't this stopping?'"