I know...I know...Len's never EARLY with any column. But this year, I am. I'm going to write the column which I hold above all others I write, but before I go there, I need to speak on something.
(Trust me, it'll segue rather nicely to the column at hand.)

Saturday afternoon in a game that very few, if any cared about, Rutgers beat Army in OT. The top story in that game however, was Rutgers DT Erick LeGrand being paralyzed from the neck down. Okay, no big deal, freak occurence. Turn the clock forward a little over 24 hours later to the game of football where its competitors are handsomely paid to do it before packed houses and such.
Body after body it seemed was getting carried off, due to some Super High Impact Football style "Somebody get a BODY BAG!!!" hits. At the center of this storm in terms of hits were Dunta Robinson of the Falcons (his hit took out his intended target and himself to boot), Brandon Meriweather (can't say this guy wasn't watching classic NFL shit, he was headhunting Todd Heap in a way that would've made Jack Tatum smile) and most notably of the bunch, former Defensive Player Of The Year James Harrison. Ask Mossaquoi and Cribbs how interacting with him went this past Sunday, if they can recollect it. Both left the game with concussions. In light of all this, the NFL decided enough's enough. Well, enough's enough if we intend on these guys living through an 18 game stretch plus playoffs starting next year.

Because if you're thinking there's anything beyond that motive behind this sudden "enforcement" of rules that I wonder if they were even on the books from the get-go...you're either delusional, stupid or working for the league offices. Not to get all John Witherspoon here, but the whole damn world's gone sissified on me.

WWE's taking a hard stance on chair shots to the noggin and blood in its matches. (Nothing to do with Linda McMahon running for Christopher Dodd's Senate seat, by the way. Wink wink.) Vince is even doing his best to help, asking folks to "Take A Stand For WWE". Really Vince? You expect us all to just MIB clear of you having your son-in-law feign screwing a corpse? (It's late and I'm too lazy to look up the technical term for such a grotesque act. :P) You expect us to forget that you actually booked an I Quit match where it was you against your daughter Stephanie, a match that ended with you choking her out with a lead pipe causing your wife to throw in the towel? Yeah, I wouldn't stand for that shit if I had stacks of hundred dollar bills under me. Your wife deserves to lose, if for no other reason, subjecting us to that Billy and Chuck bullshit.

NBA's getting even more sissified, even though their measures are probably more Draconian than the NFL. Starting this year in what can only be deemed "The Rasheed Wallace Rule", any NBA player that so much as bad eyes a referee is getting T'd up. I'm going over 4 playoff series that end up getting tilted the wrong way because of this rule and I'm probably going to be wrong there. "So Dave, your refs may be crooked and have their own agendas. What are you going to do to crack down on this?" "Well, I'm going to give them the power to turn games to their own personal agendas by calling technicals on any player that gets a little too demonstrative after a foul call."

Brilliant! Well done, Commish. Bud Selig thinks that's fucking moronic and he's the guy who thought the best way to get folks watching the All-Star game, was to put homefield in the World Series on the line. Basically rendering the 2nd half null and void for reasons other than to decipher homefield within each league. Equally as brilliant, Commissioner Goodell taxing men for giving the fans what they pay to see (as barbaric as it might be) MONTHS before a possible lockout. Yet, we want MORE GAMES going into the next CBA. Look, I'll cover each of these potential Billionaires vs. Millionaires deals as such...

10/21/10 | Posted by Len | Category General Sports 270 comments | Permalink | No Trackbacks |