Steve Frey
Are you ready for some NFL football? It’s time to start making plans for tailgating at the Washington or Charlotte games and stocking up on munchies for Sunday afternoons filled with screams of delight or horror as your favorite team does or doesn’t perform up to your expectations.
Well, maybe not.
Along with the new football season comes the decision whether to boycott the NFL games because of player protests. Those (conscientious or traitorous, you pick the adjective) players are already testing the system by getting into pre-season protesting form.
This is in spite of new NFL rules that say protestors have to either stay in the locker room during the anthem or have their team fined if they do protest on the field.
Of course, the President has kept everyone intensely involved with regular tweets condemning the players. So, now we will relive all of the fun and contention of last season. Oh, joy.
But hey, there is an upside to a fan boycott!
There’s the wife who doesn’t entirely understand football (are “extra points” like getting cents off for gas at Kroger?), contently watching her husband working diligently on his stamp collection on a carefree Sunday afternoon.
Then there is another husband playing a placid Brahms concerto, gently conducting with his screwdriver (having finally just fixed the sink) as the melody fills the home with a sense of peace and tranquility.
It’s so much better than the old days when he’d be yelling and cursing at the television with popcorn and chips flying, veins pulsing on his forehead, eyes popping and blood pooling in his face like a crimson maniac (to be fair there are intense football wives, too).
From the pregame show through games one, two, three and the highlights on the 11 p.m. news, the constant Sunday focus was on football, fantasy football or some football-related topic.
But now, the dog sheepishly comes out of its hiding place (with the game on and the husband screaming, it usually quivered in its safe space) and hubby is playing Candyland with the kids.
There are other advantages. As fans stop supporting teams, the weak franchises will be forced into bankruptcy. That means all those marginally supported/viable teams like Buffalo, Arizona, Tampa Bay, Cincinnati, Detroit, Cleveland etc. will go bankrupt.
The league will be reduced from 32 teams to maybe 16. Survival of the financial fittest, right?
There will be fewer of those, what did the President call them, oh yeah, “S.O.B.s” playing, so there’ll be fewer possible protesters.
The surviving teams will be much more competitive because every team will have the “cream of the crop” from which to draft, and those lucky 16 will all be challenging for the Super Bowl every year. Hey, maybe even Washington will go all the way some season!
There is another benefit for the players. With half the teams, half the number of players will end up with dementia from being knocked in the noggin repeatedly.
In addition, fewer players will suffer from crippling injuries that prevent them from walking without pain at age 45.
There’ll be less traffic and parking problems, fewer beer-inspired brawls during or after games and less seasonal weight gain (beer and nachos do have calories).
Okay, everyone knows the issues. Half of America thinks the players should be able to protest against racial injustice and the killing of innocent black people by law enforcement (no, the stated purpose is not to disrespect the flag, military, anthem etc.) because it is the right of free expression and the American thing to do.
They cite a Supreme Court ruling (West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette) that asserted Americans can’t be forced to participate in patriotic observances/rituals.
The Court said that any “compulsory unification of opinion” was a contradiction to the values expressed in the First Amendment.
The justices wrote: “If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.”
The Supreme Court announced its 6-3 decision on June 14, 1943—Flag Day.
In a January Marist poll, 48 percent agreed with the Court and the sentiment that players should be able to protest.
The other half of the country thinks they should be required to stand because it is patriotic. They are on a job being paid by a private employer, it’s the American thing to do and darn it, Constitution-Smonstitution, they want them standing. In the same Marist poll, 47 percent said they should have to stand.
You can’t get much closer (48-47) than that. Notice that both sides feel they are supporting American ideals, and both sides think they are absolutely right.
So where do we go from here? Well, either the players will give up the protest because of team fines, owner pressure, suspension etc., or people will continue to boycott the games, and some teams, players and tax money will disappear.
Perhaps it is time to let this just play out. Not to sound trite, but maybe it’s time to let go of things we can’t control.
If players protest, then they protest. If people stop going to or watching games, so be it. If cities lose franchises, tax revenue, and team history, well, that’s the way the football bounces. We can’t control what others think or do; we can only control our own actions.
Besides, with the probable demise of professional football, more children may start playing soccer (the most popular sport in the world), and the United States may become more competitive in the World Cup (the most popular tournament in the world).
Maybe there will be less brain dead or disabled 50-year-old ex-football players as a bonus.
One thing is for sure: professional football may never be the same. But, then again, your boycotting husband can finally learn to play bridge with you.
You can watch your favorite rom-com on a rainy Sunday afternoon while hubby reads and contemplates “The Stranger” (deep philosophical discussions will surely ensue).
You may even go to the Lyric Theatre together instead of your husband spending the evening watching Monday Night Football at Rowdy Ronny’s Roadhouse with “the boys.”
The best part—the Lyric has free popcorn on Mondays. Just sayin’!
Steve Frey is a writer and CEO of Ascendant Educational Services based in Radford.
