Whither the NFL?

The 2013-2014 NFL campaign certainly left a bittersweet taste in my mouth. I had “no dog in that fight” (apologies to Michael Vick and to dogs everywhere) during the Super Bowl, though I do admire Peyton Manning and how he plays the game; but, I pretty much “flatline” success for the Denver Broncos, and you couldn’t call me a Seahawks fan. Like most everyone, the lop-sided score surprised me. Think of all the money that was lost by the plethora of betters certain that Peyton had this one “in the bag!” Consider all the money the Las Vegas casinos made on that game!

A lot of college football fans I know cannot fathom how I continue to follow professional football, given facts like the preceding paragraph. Truth is, I’ve always loved both levels of the game, if for no other reason than to follow specific players moving from the college ranks into the NFL. I am intrigued how difficult it is to predict how a given player will do in the pros based upon his performance in college ball. I won’t bore the reader with past examples, but true NFL fans out there know examples of which I speak. What I will do is give you a present/future example of what keeps me “coming back for more” each NFL season, regardless of the season’s success of my “beloved” teams I follow (Cowboys, Buccaneers, Vikings, Saints, Texans, and several “wild cards” that vary each season). (My “wild cards” last season were Dolphins, Patriots, Raiders, and Seahawks.).

Russell Wilson and his ilk of young QB’s in the NFL (conjuring ghosts of Doug Flutie and Fran Tarkington) have changed the thinking of what constitutes a successful NFL QB, and that bodes well for Johnny Manziel and his fans, one of which am I. What intrigues me is Wilson’s future career and whether or not Johnny will “make it” in the big time as a well-known example of the “new breed” of QB’s. Will “Johnny Football” go the way of Vince Young or Tim Tebow, or, will he emerge as the reincarnation of Fran Tarkington? I bet you can get odds in Las Vegas on that question, if you have any money to throw away! Only time will tell, and I will definitely “stay tuned.”

Because “my” teams did not do so well, my tendency is to have little to say about last season; I much prefer on-the-field facts as opposed to off-the-field facts. However, it is worth noting in passing that the Cowboys’ perennial off-the-field problem — their owner Jerry Jones — seems to remain constant. I seem to have developed, thanks to Jerry and the owners of the baseball Texas Rangers, a prejudice against the notion that professional sports are, above all, businesses. I still believe, all money aside, they are still games, and will never be, when all is said and done, any more than that. (I don’t know him well, but I want to believe Nolan Ryan agrees with me.) You cannot argue with Jerry’s business success with the Cowboys, but without the success of lots more banners hanging from the girders of the expensive roof of Jerry World, it’s just money. And money does nothing for me like the snap of a football and the collision of two huge lines; a well-executed four-yard gain, a “clinic” on how to do it from both sides of the ball, is worth far more to me than the increased net worth of the franchise with the starred-helmets.

The way the business success of the Cowboys is admired league-wide and the way the NFL front office is tinkering with the game both bother me. It is as if the front office leans toward the business definition of football.

You don’t have to wait to see Super Bowl ticket prices to know that the NFL game is becoming a game for rich folks. In the words of Jimi Hendrix in the song Hey Joe “That ain’t too cool…” Only rich families can have an “outing” to an NFL game, or you can only afford one game, or, you have to depend upon your company to have bought enough seats for you to attend. I know we can all see it on TV, and I am grateful I can watch my beloved games on a medium that seems to get better and better. But, with all the money brought in by TV and the jacked-up prices, the game is becoming a far-off fantasy for we “common people.” That ain’t too cool. I think players like Nitschke, Bednarik, Huff, Tittle, Unitas, and Capp would agree with me. You don’t play or own a team for money.

Yet, look at what the game has done to players with life-affecting head injuries. What has recently happened to Tony Dorsett is heart-breaking. Every year I have about a 30- to 90-second moral crisis over whether to buy my Texas A&M season football tickets, as I know I am feeding a system that can go on up into the NFL to physically ruin lives. As I said in “Confessions of a Cisco High School Lobo Football Trainer/Manager 1960-1963” [March, 2014], football is an agonizing combination of the good, the bad, and the ugly; probably only because my sons and I were not injured by football, I remain a fan believing the good overcomes the bad and the ugly at all levels of play.

Where is the NFL going with the head injury issue? Are they going to eviscerate to game of its violence and danger — the very reasons many players play the game in the first place? Cannot new technologies for equipment make up for the greater speed, quickness, and size of the players? The NFL can “protect” the players with so many new rules, the game will cease to be interesting to a lot of us fans. (Imagine if at the old Roman Colosseum, the fights were called off at the first sign of blood! That ain’t too cool….) Or, the NFL can morph into a giant Monopoly game that can only be played by rich gamblers and moneyed thrill-seekers, eventually using robot players as the “ultimate” in “head-injury” protection. I’m sure the reader can come up with even better, fanciful scenarios, but the “bottom line,” it seems to me is to preserve the humanity of the game — a brutal side of humanity, for sure, but very human nonetheless — the willingness to risk life, limb, and head because it seems worth the risk.

That brutal side of humanity is what I’ve seen watching the game played at the high school, college, and professional levels. The feeling I’ve had as a fan walking out of a Cisco Lobo State Championship game, walking out of another Texas A&M football bowl victory, or watching a Dallas Cowboy Super Bowl win all have something in common — they are to me beyond price.

Whither the NFL? Don’t follow the money! Follow the difference between strong- and weakside coverage by the defense; take a shot of your favorite beverage every time Peyton yells out “Omaha!” when he is under center or at shotgun.

RJH