It's completely over dramatic. I think this is like tobacco in the 70's, in that people "knew" it was bad for them, while the science continued to back this up over time. It's not news that pro football players live shorter lives. That's literally been known for a decade. Who is surprised by this CTE, concussion, or dementia news? I feel like these were known quantities.
But we're not killing the players. The players, making the decision to play the game for a variety of reasons, including fame and wealth, are killing the players. Football is a risk, but it's also a way for some players to make a tremendous living, a living that would unlikely to be replicated in any other field. And this is why some players make a lot of money in 5-8 years and then pack it in. Calvin Johnson being the latest example.
The price is right, bitch. His post was absolutely fantastic.The Price is Wrong is so right.
Ok, so...this is fine too.It's more than just compassion or empathy. At least the point I'm trying to make is. The question is whether you're actually part of the cause, or at least a significant part.
I get that some people think that's a ridiculous sentiment, and/or that it is simply empirically untrue. That's a fine debate, and one at least on this board I appear to be losing (although the truth is I'm not actually staking out that position yet, just trying to discuss it to see if it fits).
But that's different from saying, "even if I was part of the cause, I wouldn't give a shit because I like football." Maybe you're also saying that. And I guess that's ok too -- it's a personal decision and I'm not judging. At least not yet. But cognitive dissonance is a mother fucker, so I try to at least ask myself the right questions.
http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/football/colts-owner-compares-risk-football-aspirin-article-1.2580156"You take an aspirin and I take an aspirin. It might give you extreme side effects of illness and your body . . . may reject it, where I would be fine. So there is so much we don't know."
It was stupid.The price is right, bitch. His post was absolutely fantastic.
I remember that article, too. It was discussed widely on talk shows of the time. The public take away was that the players are brave, deserve our respect and that they play a tough sport. Not much was actually done in response to it as I recall.I can't find it after a bit of searching, but there was an article in Sports Illustrated, I think as far back as the early nineties, where they memorably said if you wanted to simulate what it was like being a football player at home, go into your driveway and fifty times a day, every single day, run head-first into the garage door from different angles and at different speeds and from different distances.
That really stuck with me and I have not been nearly as big of a football fan ever since. If anyone remembers the article I mean and can find it, I'd love to see it again.
Of course there's no way to know for sure what causes an individual's brain injuries, but Pete Frates played football as well as baseball, and another example is Alabama's Kerry Goode.Pertinent empirical inquirires:
Are there players who will come up well short with regard to their NFL aspirations who will nonetheless suffer lasting debilitation resulting from High School, College football experience?
If so, would the disappearance (or diminishment) of the NFL prevent this impact?
A Yes to both of the above gets us an awful lot closer to the slave gladiator pit, or at least to DDB’s Russian Roulette analogy.
Former Alabama running back Kerry Goode announced on Facebook Tuesday morning that he has been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — also known as Lou Gehrig's disease.
ALS is a neurodegenerative disease that, according to the ALS Association website, affects the nerve cells that control a person's muscles.
Go with what you know. In this case it's pills. Lots of pills.Yeah, I'm guessing your body has built up quite an immunity to aspirin, Jim. Really is remarkable how dumb some of these owners are.
Is it morally wrong to make a decision based off of morals and other factors?It was stupid.
soxfan121 wasn't complaining about people not giving up watching football. He was complaining about the people who are so shocked and horrified at the state of the game that they feel morally compelled to tell us that they feel morally compelled to give it all up . . . but right after Brady and Belichick retire.
He's right. It's a position that is the worst of all worlds.
The bit about watching the Patriots being analogous to cigarette, drug, and alcohol dependence was pretty special, too.
That's great for a black and white moral universe. I hope we can agree that the NFL, like most things, falls in a spectrum of gray. And in a world where there is room for things that are between "perfectly moral" and "perfectly immoral", or perhaps where (like KFP) you don't view professional sports in moral terms at all, there is probably also room for judgment calls on when you've had enough, what circumstances become a tipping point for you, and when you're prepared to give up something to which you have an emotional attachment.
Fair-weather fan is an epithet people use to condescend to others who are unwilling to watch a losing team. Maybe throwing it around makes you feel better about your own fandom, I don't know. On a site full of sports fanatics who watched the Red Sox in the early 90s and in 2012, one which gathers NFL fans who faithfully follow the Redskins, Raiders and Browns, it probably rings a little hollow. But if you think the plans some people have here to stop watching when they can no longer marvel at the greatness of Belichick and Brady have to do solely with not wanting to watch a losing team (when everything about Kraft's history suggests the team will probably continue to win, though perhaps not as spectacularly), rather than it being a natural breakpoint for their emotional attachment, well, I think you're not seeing the whole story.
It's not either or. As a fan of football, my interest in watching the brilliance of Brady/Bellichick outweighs my discomfort with a game that results in its main participants being impaired for life. However, the mafia-like running of the league, and the utter disregard by the game's stewards for player safety (Jerry Jones, Jim Irsay, Roger Goodell, etc) leaves me looking for a convenient out. Brady's/Billichick's retirement is that out.Being a band wagon fan isn't a bad thing. It's the denial I find amusing. This caring about player safety once Brady retires is truly ingenious.
Speaking only for myself:Being a band wagon fan isn't a bad thing. It's the denial I find amusing. This caring about player safety once Brady retires is truly ingenious.
http://www.capitalnewyork.com/article/media/2016/03/8595089/nfl-demands-retraction-times-article-player-concussionsThe National Football League is demanding The New York Times retract an article published last week about the league's research into concussions among pro football players.
In a letter that was sent to the Times' legal counsel Monday and obtained by POLITICO, an attorney for the NFL, Brad S. Karp, called the story "false and defamatory" and issued a "demand that the story immediately be retracted."
In a line that seemed to threaten the possibility of further legal action, he wrote: "We also request that the Times's reporters and editors who worked on this story preserve their notes, correspondence, emails, recordings and work papers and all other electronic and hard copy documents generated or received in connection with their work."
In an exhaustive front-page story on March 25, journalists Alan Schwarz, Walt Bogdanich and Jacqueline Williams reported that the NFL's concussion research was flawed, likening the league's "handling of its health crisis to that of the tobacco industry, which was notorious for using questionable science to play down the dangers of cigarettes."
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Sports editor Jason Stallman said the Times sees "no reason to retract anything."
In a statement to POLITICO, Stallman said, "Our reporting showed that more than 100 such concussions — including some sustained by star players — were not included in the [NFL's] data set, resulting in inaccurate findings." He also noted that a co-owner of the New York Giants has direct ties to the tobacco industry and that "the N.F.L. and the tobacco industry shared lobbyists, lawyers and consultants."
The NFL attorney argued in his letter that the Times piece was based on a "grand total of five pieces of circumstantial evidence, none of which—taken together or individually—comes close to establishing any meaningful 'tie' that reasonably can form the basis of the Times's knowingly false and incendiary charge."
Asked whether the NFL would sue if its demand for a retraction is not met, Lockhart said, "We won't prejudge the reaction of The New York Times. We make a strong argument for a retraction, one we expect to them to take seriously."
High-profile investigative pieces like this one tend to invite intense push-back.
Last year, a Times exposé on the treatment of New York nail salon employees brought angry protesters to the paper's headquarters on Eighth Avenue in Manhattan. And after its investigation into the workplace culture of Amazon, company spokesman Jay Carneyposted a rebuttal on the publishing platform Medium, to which executive editor Dean Baquet responded in his own point-by-point Medium post.
It's amazing what would happen if the NFL took to the Wells Report the level of scrutiny it has taken to the NY Times article. Just take the NFL lawyer's quote: "[the Times took a] grand total of five pieces of circumstantial evidence, none of which—taken together or individually—comes close to establishing any meaningful 'tie' that reasonably can form the basis of the Times's knowingly false and incendiary charge." and apply it to whether or not Tom Brady was involved in a scheme to deflate footballs. It's an utter joke that the Brady litigation exists.
Seems to be the general consensus. As I said, I'm not sure I agree, but I'm still thinking about it and I don't think your position is unreasonable.I see it this way. Our continued support as fans contributes to NFL players' brain injuries about as much as our continued existence as taxpaying Americans contributes to the US government's programs of extraordinary rendition and torture.
Do people really think of watching sports in moral terms? (I'm more of a "huiman drama of athletic competition" kind of guy.) And I'm not sure what any of this has to do with pushing any personal beliefs on players, either. When I stop enjoying it -- or when the enjoyment of watching is outweighed by something else -- I'll stop. (I already listen to more football on radio than I used to if its still daylight and the weather is nice.) I think all this morality stuff is BS.I think KFP (making my assumptions based on basic libertarian views) and I both view sports in moral terms and that's why we can enjoy it without feeling any guilt. NFL players are adults who can make their own decisions and risk assessments and because those decisions don't negatively impact others it would go against our moral code to push our personal beliefs on them regardless of how altruistic our beliefs may be.
I think its possible to agree with the premise (which I think is close to undeniable; if everybody just said "not gonna watch, listen, bet, etc." the NFL would have a problem.) without being considered morally deficient if the end of the BB/TB era marks the end of serious fandom. People get into watching sports for a million different reasons. Interest wanes for a million different reasons. Ranking those reasons -- or the weight people give to them -- on some sort of morality scale seems a little heavy-handed. It's pretty close, IMO, to ranking who the "real" fans are.[DDB] floated the proposition that maybe we are complicit in players hurting themselves and that we, the fans, now have the information to be aware that our continued support is causing serious brain injury. It was in that context that SF121 made his point. Effectively, that if that's one's position, waiting until Brady retires is cowardly and reflective of some moral deficiencies. I think that's surely correct, if one accepts my premise.
What the NFL maybe is playing for here is some kind of face saving that allows them to claim victory. They have to know this story probably received extensive editorial scrutiny, and so the chances of a retraction are probably low, but maybe what they will get is that the Times publishes some sort of rebuttal to the NFL's rebuttal, which allows the NFL to pick out a sentence here or there and claim victory. "See, they admit it's circumstantial."Will NFL follow up this demand by suing NY Times for libel?
I agree with all your points, especially this one. You're also right on that the NFL isn't very scared because they have their own propaganda machine: embedded network, embedded reporters, the ability to put out whatever message they want, unchallenged, and repeat it until the public believes it.Plus, they gain something very significant, which is what I think this is really all about. A lawsuit is a warning shot across the bow. This is a message to the Times and anyone else that if they keep digging into this issue and criticizing the NFL, a well-funded and cohesive behemoth is going to bring its full weight down on them. The Times can take it. Others? Not so much. If they sue, it's either because they really do have some evidence catching the NYT in a naked lie, or because they are trying to chill further reporting on this issue.
But if you threaten to sue, and the NYT doesn't back down, do you think the threat alone is enough? I know fuck all about PR, but it seems to me it completely cuts in the opposite direction -- the "why didn't you sue" folks still have the same question.This is just another PR move by the NFL. Threatening THE NEW YORK TIMES will convince a sufficient number of people that the NFL hasn;t done anything wrong to keep the NFL in clover. When the victim of a smear campaign goes public, the knuckle-dragging response is "Well, why didn't you sue?" *That's* the audience this move assuages. Not the audience that looks at facts.
The NFL wont sue the Times because it doesn't have to.
It would seem that by this definition, it is impossible to knowingly commit an immoral act, on the basis that carrying out that act means it must not have been against your moral code.Essentially it sounds like you're not a football fan, due to the degree of violence, but the fact that you were part of a community that had a perennial winning football team, that dislike was dwarfed by positive feelings and memories, which you suspect won't be the case when they're no longer perennial winners. That's like saying you're morally against murder, but when I offer you $100 million to kill somebody, you do it. Murder was never against your moral code, but before you got paid to do it, the cons outweighed the pros. Morals, by definition, aren't as flexible as you want them to be.
It would be absolute legal malpractice to sue the NY Times for libel in this case. Therefore, I expect this to happen.Michael McCann @McCannSportsLaw 15m15 minutes ago
Michael McCann Retweeted Stephanie Haberman
Will NFL follow up this demand by suing NY Times for libel? Would love to see what's revealed in pretrial discovery.
Please file a libel suit NFL.... I want to see what comes out in discovery
Likewise, I don't think taking a strong moral stance against an inherently violent sport that ruines lives is unreasonable either. My father, as I said, gave up boxing for such reasons, and doesn't watch football for such reasons. I get it. People can make different calculations about where they come down on how to weight it all; that's why I objected so strongly to SF121's blanket characterization.Seems to be the general consensus. As I said, I'm not sure I agree, but I'm still thinking about it and I don't think your position is unreasonable.
Possibly. But you may be in the minority in ever believing that "every last word" in a NYT article could *ever* be true. And I think the NFL (Lockhart) is capitalizing on that.But if you threaten to sue, and the NYT doesn't back down, do you think the threat alone is enough? I know fuck all about PR, but it seems to me it completely cuts in the opposite direction -- the "why didn't you sue" folks still have the same question.
And actually, though it may be antiquated, I'm kind of in the camp that thinks when a story comes up to not sue, at least in some cases, is an admission -- especially if the entity is well funded and can afford it. Maybe they say, "actual malice is too tough." But now that the NFL has drawn this line in the sand, if they don't sue, my working assumption would be that every last word in the NYT article is true.
You know, then, what morality is? By definition? Such that you can explain it to us?I can't tell you what your morals are, but from your actions (watching NFL games), one would conclude that grown men playing football is acceptable to you, otherwise you wouldn't watch it.
There are plenty of amoral people playing and running the league and some of their actions distress me more than they should, but I find nothing immoral in regards to adults willingly playing a professional sport and being paid to do so. I think KFP (making my assumptions based on basic libertarian views) and I both view sports in moral terms and that's why we can enjoy it without feeling any guilt. NFL players are adults who can make their own decisions and risk assessments and because those decisions don't negatively impact others it would go against our moral code to push our personal beliefs on them regardless of how altruistic our beliefs may be.
People have limited time so I personally don't view being a fair weather fan with negative connotations, so my apologies if you thought I was insulting you. I don't like the NBA, but I like the Celtics and watch them more often when they're winning so I consider myself a fair weather fan. With that said, please reread your quote below and tell me again how I'm throwing the term around to make myself feel better rather than calling somebody out for trying to take a moral highroad that doesn't exist.
"Personally, I think there is a pretty good chance that I will stop watching football once the Patriots stop being good. If I had been raised in a part of the country where the local team sucked, I don't think I would have gotten into football in the first place."
Essentially it sounds like you're not a football fan, due to the degree of violence, but the fact that you were part of a community that had a perennial winning football team, that dislike was dwarfed by positive feelings and memories, which you suspect won't be the case when they're no longer perennial winners. That's like saying you're morally against murder, but when I offer you $100 million to kill somebody, you do it. Murder was never against your moral code, but before you got paid to do it, the cons outweighed the pros. Morals, by definition, aren't as flexible as you want them to be.
I'm not sure what stipulates "stop being good" so I just inverted last season's record as 4-12 would definitely not be good. And again, I don't think there's anything wrong with that, but I don't think it falls under taking a moral stand either. I think I'm just hung up on the "I'll stop watching the NFL when the Patriots are no longer good... for moral reasons" as obviously the posters make a lot of good points in regards to the issues with the sport and especially with the league. So I'll assume I'm just an idiot arguing semantics and this will be my last post on the subject to avoid further adding to the noise.Personally, I think there is a pretty good chance that I will stop watching football once the Patriots stop being good. If I had been raised in a part of the country where the local team sucked, I don't think I would have gotten into football in the first place.
So that's where we're at now, Rev? You blow through for a little quickie? A little, wham bam thank you m'am (or sir), drop a little Socrates on the masses, and then you're like leaves in the wind?You know, then, what morality is?
I like you and all, but this post is a disgrace. Leaves in the wind?So that's where we're at now, Rev? You blow through for a little quickie? A little, wham bam thank you m'am (or sir), drop a little Socrates on the masses, and then you're like leaves in the wind?
Guess it's better than nothin'.
It's allergy season. Just trying to be considerate.Dust. Wind. Dude.