Good writing is only possible when one of two things occur. The writer must be able to write very well, or the writer loves his topic. While this class has made me a better writer, I do not fit in to the good writer category; I belong to the category of loving the topic. My favorite thing to talk about, think about, and participate in is football. I played tackle football for six years, three of those being at the varsity level of high school, and one of those years including 12 starts. I am currently in a flag football league, and I constantly obsess with how we can become a better team. I play fantasy football as if my life depended on it, and if there is any football on TV, everything else is put on hold. It was a way of life, and still continues to be a main focus of my life.
As you well know, football means so many things to so many people. It can be school pride for the students and alumni who played there 50 years ago. If you are from a small town, it suddenly becomes city vs. city and all the businesses shut down to support. To some it’s a battleground and proving ground, to others it’s simply a playground. On the gridiron, you learn to sacrifice for the good of others; your character is revealed and then fortified due to the blood, sweat and tears. Guys who didn’t have a lot going on in their high school life found a family, a band of brothers, which would give their lives for each other. Football is more than a game for most of us: it was a preparation for life.
The higher the levels of competition meant better athletes playing. The more athletic football becomes, the more entertaining it becomes – especially for us who had to leave this love behind. When people get bigger, faster, and stronger, the game changes a long with it. It becomes more intense, with the greater possibility of big plays; but it also causes more big hits with greater danger to each player.
One of the reasons why football is so popular is because of the gladiator mentality and the possibility of big hits. There is a quote from Disney’s Remember the Titans that describes many high school youth’s opinion of football. When one of the players is asked if he has a future in football, he responds, “Heck no! I figured as long I'm going to be in school, I might as well hit some people while I'm at it.” There is something about that barbarianism that attracts us. Yet due to recent safety concerns, the NFL has heightened enforcement of its rules.
On October 17th, 2010 there was not one, nor two, but four violent hits on the same day by three different people. By violent I don’t mean someone got tackled hard and got the wind knocked out of them, but a concussion level, needed help walking off the field kind of hit. Due to the recent concern of player safety and the toll the game has taken on the players’ brains, the league has threatened to start handing out fines, suspending players, and changing the rules even more. The possibility has been met by criticism and support, even from former players within the NFL.
There have been several articles, radio shows, and TV shows which have made comments on this new change. Rodney Harrison, a former player known for his violence has said "Fines are a cost of doing business, but when a guy loses a game check and isn't available for his team, that hurts" implying that both are needed to get the point across to the players. Rachel Cohen, sports writer of the Associated Press, wrote an article on this situation two days after the big hits; in said article she reports what has happened and what may happen.
Before getting to the meat of the article, I would like to loot at how it is presented so that we know how we are being affected by the subtle things before we are even affected by the information.
After the title but before the article itself, we see two references that this article was produced by the Associated Press. Now if you are anything like me, you know nothing of what that actually means; however, I have done some research and found information about this group. The self-given, lengthy description can be found here, but can be easily summed up to say a large collection of contributing of news reporters, from writers, radio, TV and other outlets. Now you may be asking “why is this important?” It is simply because it provides credentials. This isn’t @steelerskickyourbutt twitters account, who would be a biased source that is just another fan who knows almost nothing about football. This is from a group of people who know what they are doing. Speaking of people, if you look at the bottom of this article, you see that another four people contributed to this story, two of them being AP writers also.
Throughout the article, you see quotes from a vast group of people. From players, agents, league officials, and team presidents, you read feedback and information from people whose lives revolve around this sport. These are people who have been around the block or two and know what they are talking about; the players quoted have the first-hand experience of being the hitter or being hit. The only thing this article is missing to show some more objectivity would be to quote the rule itself. Oftentimes, in any level of football, we are subject to the referee’s opinion and interpretation of the rules. Had the rule been presented in this article, we could have seen exactly how it applied (or maybe didn’t apply) in each of the situations.
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