Thursday, October 10, 2013

Down. Set. Strike?

Growing up, football to me meant dad's Eagles sweatshirt and the sound of a Sunday afternoon nap. I grew fond of the sport itself during college at my SEC school and my love has continued to blossom.

Recently, there has been a lot of discussion about safety in football and who is responsible for what. I read something that listed what "futbol" was in various countries around the world (soccer) and then what it is in the U.S. - the argument being that this shows Americans are innantely violent creatures.

I then browsed over this link on CNN today and had myself a little read. The article is about how we shouldn't support the NFL because it "causes harm to its players."

Breaking news: I have an opinion.

Has any mother ever put Little Timmy in little league thinking that football is a safe sport where he will be left alone? When looking at no-contact options like soccer, swimming, or track, mom said to herself, "Football seems the safest!" Hell you even have the option to put a variety of NETS in between Timmy and his opponent if safety is the number one concern.

Can we, as Americans, use our brains for a second? Let's be responsible for our choices and actions, people. We all seem very concerned about finding someone else to blame when we should be putting that energy into something more fruitful like electing new congressmen.

Now I'm not saying that the NFL is fully innocent - they have some admitting of their own to do - but football players used to wear a piece of leather over their heads back in the day. We've obviously come a long way already.

Also... are we just ignoring the entire sport of boxing?

The legitimate goal of boxing is to knock your opponent unconscious. THAT IS HOW YOU WIN. We're worried about minor concussions in our football players when boxers are trying to blunt force trauma each other into next Tuesday.

Are we all ignoring this? Or are we just saying "well yeah that's boxing." Because...yeah...it is boxing. Boxers expect to get hit. And football is football. Players should expect to get hit. Cause that's how you play the game.

This is how it would go if I played football: We'd line up, start the play, I'd crash into somebody in some form of tackle, stand up, and say something like, "Hey...that hurt. I don't like being hurt." And I would QUIT. Because that's my prerogative and this is America and we can do Land-Of-The-Free things like that - things like NOT play a sport when we think it hurts.

If you don't want to smack into someone every 30 seconds of a game, football isn't for you. Don't spend 20 years flinging your body head-first at other 300-lb men and then wonder why you have brain damage.

Grow up, America. Put your big boy panties on, accept consequences for your decisions, reopen the government, and quit blaming the world for your priority of a paycheck over health. As my favorite movie Remember the Titans says, "Y'all are acting like a bunch of sissies! Quit it"