rolling American football death spiral thread

Deadspin, as usual: Roger Goodell: No, It's The Fans Who Are Idiots

Let’s see: The NFL has eroded public trust by its handling of players accused of violence against women, its treatment of players suffering brain injuries during and after their careers, and treating the healthy players on the field as assholes for celebrating touchdowns. In the meantime, their product is currently terrible and they can’t figure out why ratings are way, way down. But it’s the fans who are misunderstanding things.

The Ringer: Is There Too Much Football?

blah blah blah blah link to a better story about baseball: http://awfulannouncing.com/2016/are-we-gonna-talk-about-how-good-baseballs-postseason-ratings-have-been.html

The NFL has blamed its ratings dip on competition with the presidential election. Well, that Jays-Orioles game, hardly the sexiest matchup you’ll ever see, went up against the VP debate and held its own, outdrawing CNN and MSNBC’s coverage while ranking behind FOX News. If cable news is dooming the NFL, shouldn’t it be affecting MLB even more, given that baseball is on every night, continually up against Megyn Kelly and Anderson Cooper? And yet, here we are, with baseball setting viewership records wherever you look.

But back to the Ringer story, so I can spoil the end for you!

Mulvihill said that in this changing world, he’s found himself wondering what the postelection ratings will look like. “The election is over after Week 9,” he said. “We have a gigantic game on Week 10, Dallas-Pittsburgh. Are we going to see the type of number for Dallas-Pittsburgh that we would have expected if this was a normal year?”

No, you won't. Your product sucks and your league is run by assholes from stem to stern.

I, for one, have invested more time in baseball over the last few years. Time that used to be spent on NFL.

ESPN is bleeding subscribers via lag8n on twitter

We're getting FIOS next month and they have a partial a la carte thing going on, but I don't think opting out of all the ESPNs is an option - yet.

http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/nfl-football-moms-kids/

http://www.gq.com/story/the-concussion-diaries-high-school-football-cte

Well that was a great way to start the morning. "Now what?"

feel a little bad for thinking it, but the dad is a piece of work

holy shit, that was brutal

I would be interested to poll who here would let their kids play high school football. There's no way I would allow it.

we have a nerf football i play soft-toss with, with our five year old. i already told him this is the only football i ever want him to play, though he does enjoy running me down and tackling me.

there is another football tbf

...rugby football! lol!

but seriously, give in usa. give in

gripping article btw

I'll let my kids competitive play flag football and that's it

acknowledgement that being able to choose to not let your kids play football is to some degree a privilege

how so

sports can be a "way out" for people from underprivileged communities when american society keeps them out of other fields

i haven't read the gq article yet but this recent new yorker article is also relevant: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/09/can-technology-make-football-safer

xp that's true, but most high school football players don't get college scholarships and vanishingly few will reach the pro ranks. and there are several other sports offering a 'way out' that are less destructive to mind and body

if your kid runs a 4.2 40 then i guess maybe you weigh the risks somehow, but that is basically never the case

i'm just saying if you've got a high school-age kid who's interested in playing football and has some talent, it's easier for you to say no if the perception is that he has lots of other opportunities in life to succeed than if it feels like one of the few avenues for them to succeed

this is specifically mentioned in the article i linked:

In “The U,” a 2009 ESPN documentary about the University of Miami in the late eighties, Melvin Bratton, one of Irvin’s college teammates, described football as “basically a way out of the hood.” Irvin agreed. Youth participation may be down in well-to-do communities, but the Upper East Side has never been a font of football talent. Wealthier Americans might ponder the future of football, Irvin said, but poor and middle-class kids were betting their future on football.

This socioeconomic disconnect is not unique to football: in 1965, after the second heavyweight fight between Muhammad Ali and Sonny Liston, the Times columnist Russell Baker addressed the growing abolitionist campaign against boxing, noting, “Fighters usually came from the hungry classes and were risking their brains for the titillation of the overfed.” Irvin put it this way: “When we start talking about ‘Will parents stop letting their kids play?,’ well, some parents will have that opportunity. But many will not. They will say, ‘Son, this is your best chance.’ ” Even some of the St. Thomas players were growing up in dire circumstances: one had been living in a motel, after his family lost their home; another student, whose guardian had been a drug addict, was in foster care.

did roman citizens fight in the gladiator pits? fuck no! (well, some exceptions excluded, looking at you commodus)

feel a little bad for thinking it, but the dad is a piece of work

I think that's unfair, or rather, reductive. It's all too easy to read the dad through a lens of "Jeez can you be any more stereotypical?" but I see someone who, whatever his particular beliefs or outlooks across the board and how I might disagree with them, grew up with and in an ethos and code as translated into various actions and activities that, because it worked out for him just fine (football is great, I'm successful, got a loving family) made perfect sense to carry forward with his kids. Now he's got to grapple with what that all resulted in for the rest of his days, and I think the portrayal of someone who is stuck knowing something has to happen and yet unsure what's the best way forward strikes me as understandable. It's not like he's suddenly going to drop pearls of wisdom, nor should we expect it of him; he's got his own son's words telling him not to blame football even as he wished he never played it. That's a hard combination to maintain.

I thought the end of the article was particularly dark and sad, him putting on a brave face (and why wouldn't he, again based on what we know of him) but alternating between walking his dogs and quietly drinking huge amounts in his kitchen, isolated. The high school football coach clearly isn't who he was before either. In both cases I would put it as an example of what happens when someone loses an absolute faith or surety -- they're holding on hard to what they have. And I don't think either of them, especially the dad, could be any more hurt or upset by anything that might be said to them that they haven't had to confront in themselves.

His assumption that old NFL players commit suicide because "they blew all their money and aren't famous anymore" is kinda shitty but let's face it, like half the country believed that five years ago

Nowadays I'm pretty thankful I sucked at football - I played 3 years in HS but wasn't good enough to start for a year and a half. I remember having these exact conversations when hanging out with certain teammates - "these concussions are really scary and I'm not convinced there isn't some lasting impact here"

His assumption that old NFL players commit suicide because "they blew all their money and aren't famous anymore" is kinda shitty but let's face it, like half the country believed that five years ago

And again, feeds into a pattern/adheres to wider beliefs. "Hey I'm a regular guy, would never happen to me," etc. And clearly he doesn't think that any more. If he STILL thought that, then yeah, opprobrium and then some.

yeah, it is both unfair and reductive. i feel terrible for him, knowing the role he played in it, and i admire the way he stepped up when the kid admitted he needed help.

but i had a hard time getting around his enjoyment of both 'fucking people up' when he played and watching his sons 'fuck people up.' that's an ethos and a code, but it's a shitty one, and there are ways to play football that aren't necessarily based on it. and his prior dismissal of NFL veterans with CTE as deceitful pussies showed a lack of empathy and a willful ignorance i found disturbing -- probably because it sounds exactly like a trump voter about other issues.

Not saying it isn't shitty, etc. Just that him holding onto that for so long isn't surprising. This is our society and these beliefs are recurrent and their roots are clear enough. I'm not thrilled with that at all, and I think it's terrible that it took a personal tragedy for him to question that. But again, sadly not surprising.

I'm comfortable with my privilege and will continue to judge parents harshly for letting their kids play football, regardless of socioeconomic status.

that's an ethos and a code, but it's a shitty one, and there are ways to play football that aren't necessarily based on it.

not once you get past middle school. if you didn't have the genes and couldn't keep up an insane diet/workout schedule, the way to compensate was by being extra tough and nasty

http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/18454251/troubled-los-angeles-rams-rb-tre-mason-arrested-again-florida

What Bo knows now.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/columnist/bob-nightengale/2017/01/12/bo-jackson-football-cte-mlb/96492338/

the young people don't love capitalism?!? why could that possibly be?!?

http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/18618138/nflpa-steer-free-agents-signing-chicago-bears-senate-bill-passed

NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith says he will tell potential free agents not to sign with the Chicago Bears should new Illinois Senate Bill 12 SA #2 pass.

The bill would adjust the Workers' Compensation Act as it applies to professional athletes, who potentially are entitled to a wage differential award. The new bill would look to eliminate those athletes from being eligible for wage differential awards after age 35.

The law currently allows players to get paid for the term of their natural life, which is set at 67 years old. Those wanting change contend pro athletes seldom play beyond age 35, so paying them until 67 because of injury is unfair and expensive.

The main read I'm seeing on the result of the big game is that it was a metaphor for the triumph of Nazism.

http://deadspin.com/lawsuit-nfl-teams-repeatedly-broke-federal-drug-laws-1793146570

I mean, it's a slapped-together rundown of some stuff from the full court document, and not really anything we didn't already know, but I wonder how much of the DEA / NFL relationship is responsible for the league being such a bunch of hardliners about marijuana, does that get them karma points to make up for handling Schedule 2 substances like breath mints?

http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/18895640/former-te-jordan-cameron-lot-guys-really-love-game

The scouting season for free agency and the draft is a time when players are asked a common question: Do you love football?

Former Cleveland Browns and Miami Dolphins tight end Jordan Cameron, who recently announced that he will retire after he incurred four concussions in six seasons, called that "a great question."

"I don't think a lot of these guys love football, to be honest," Cameron told ESPN. "A lot of them don't. You play for other reasons, and every guy has their own reason. They know why, and as long as your why is really important, you keep playing without really loving football.

"Because really, who loves to get hit in 10-degree weather by a 280-pound person? Really, no one likes that. 'Do you love football?' I couldn't stand when people asked me that."

...

But though he loved his teammates, he can't look back and say he loved the game.

"Do you really love football?" he said. "A lot of guys don't really love it. There's a few guys that love it. Ray Lewis loves football. Peyton Manning. They love it. But a lot of guys don't really love this game, and there are players that will read this who will understand exactly what I'm talking about."

Yeah but these YOUNG PLAYERS man they LOVE IT that guy HE'S OLD not like these YOUNG GUYS plus he played for the browns and the dolphins I'D HATE IT TOO if I went there

looking forward to the hot takes

Jordan Cameron claimed that a lot of current NFL players "don't love the game." Oh really?

His words. Not theirs.

Hearsay isn't allowed in a court of law, so why should we allow it in the court of public opinion? Why allow one player to make claims that are unverifiable? Especially one who was, at best, the tenth ranked player at his position. Who, during his "best" season, played for the worst franchise in the NFL? Who moved on to a perennially underachieving team, one that hasn't been relevant since the peak years of Dan Marino?

What if he'd won a championship with the Patriots? Made it to the Super Bowl with the Cardinals? Made the championship game with the Packers? Heck, made the playoffs with the Chargers?

Perhaps if Jordan Cameron had played for another team, he'd be singing a different song. But right now, he's just singing like a canary.

Like any informant, his word comes from a bitter place. As believable as Sammy Gravano. And just as innocent.

What, you think he didn't give out a few concussions of his own?

Think again.

plaschke?

oh good my mimic skills are intact ;)

haha

Ah yes, THAT guy.

I fucking hate this sport so much

I didn't even bother to link the latest on Deadspin about the Redskins firing their GM for "drinking" when it's obvious the rest of their organization's upper echelon is a minimum of two sheets on any given Monday

I apologize to all other organizations for using that noun to describe the thing that Dan Snyder owns

http://deadspin.com/the-amount-of-toradol-nfl-players-use-is-scary-as-fuck-1793173870

http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/18955466/san-francisco-49ers-legend-dwight-clark-diagnosed-als

Clark said he doesn't know if playing football caused the disease but he suspects that is the case. ALS has in recent years been linked to chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, the degenerative brain disease that studies have linked to athletes and others with a history of repetitive brain trauma, including concussions.

"I've been asked if playing football caused this," Clark wrote. "I don't know for sure. But I certainly suspect it did. And I encourage the NFLPA and the NFL to continue working together in their efforts to make the game of football safer, especially as it relates to head trauma."

oh and now Gale Sayers has announced he's battling dementia, and so on ad infinitum

http://www.sbnation.com/a/future-of-football

good read, thanks. none of that is going to happen, though.

idk if we're in a talent drought in 5 years b/c nobody wants their kids to play high school football, the NFL might try all sorts of goofy shit

either way if you feel guilty for watching football too much may I suggest making basketbal your main sport. the playoffs are on right now and they're really dope