Sports Illustrated: “What they’re trying to say – ‘We’re protecting the integrity’ – no, you’re not,” Bears cornerback Charles Tillman said. “It’s ruining the integrity. It’s not even football anymore. We should just go out there and play two-hand touch Sunday if we can’t make contact.”
One weekend, one. That’s all it took for the Pansy of an NFL Commissioner, Roger Goodell, to continue the Tom Bradyfication of professional football. Now the players can’t hit people a certain way. Have you ever played football? Well, I have, and I can assure you it IS NOT a contact sport, ballroom dancing is a contact sport, basketball is a contact sport, football is a collision sport, and if you can’t handle the physicality of the sport you should get out. Two of the three hits on Sunday were pretty serious, and should be penalized, and the players fined. The third however, I don’t know about that. I’m talking about the hit to DeSean Jackson of the Philadelphia Eagles. Was the hit violent? Yes, it was. Was it illegal, no, I don’t believe so. While the tacklers head was down he was clearly offset. He made contact with his right shoulder into the chest of DeSean Jackson. Do you think his head isn’t going to eventually collide with something? Sure it is. Ok, ok, so he was defenseless. I’ll agree with that, but you shouldn’t fine Dunta Robinson. He’s a football player. You’re taught at a young age to knock the snot bubbles out of people, do you think a player can just turn that off? No.
Pretty soon they will be playing flag football, and who wants to watch that? I certainly don’t. I like American Football. It’s a great sport. Hits like this are rare, and are going to happen, but you can’t stop it. Not even with rule changes.
The thing that’s so frustrating about this is the further imbalance it sets up between defense and offense. If they’re going to stop the defenders from hitting, they need to start calling some of the crap the offensive linemen do more closely, too, especially things like high-low chop blocks. And get rid of the rule that quarterbacks can just chuck the ball away when they get outside the tackle box. Make it intentional grounding if they do that. There’s no need to protect the quarterbacks any further given the other rules that prevent real hits.
Tommy,
I couldn’t agree more. If they do this to defenses, the offense gets an “unfair” advantage. Did you see when Umenyiora of the Giants had Vince Young, for an easy sack, and let him go? Go to the 35 second mark of this video, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJ12p3uLk3Y , to see what I’m talking about. Now, think what players will have to do to NOT hit receivers running crossing patterns? What, stop, and let the receiver hand out the punishment, or let them run by?
My brother had something to say about the rules a few weeks back in a weblog post. He posted before the controversy. Scroll to the bottom paragraph. He makes great points.
http://jerryfahrni.com/2010/10/“whats-i-miss”-week-of-october-10-2010/