For millions of Americans, football is as synonymous with Thanksgiving as turkey or pilgrims.
The product on the field however, has been far from perfect of late. With Roger Goodell as commissioner, concepts emulating those of liberal politics have crept into the sport and contributed to some significant negatives over the last few years.
Here are four liberal ideals that are making NFL football less entertaining.
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#1 – Parity
Or as Bill Maher once called it – socialism. Maher proclaimed that the Democrat conceptic of socialism is what has led to the sport’s popularity. He claimed that “sharing the wealth” via salary caps and shared revenue made for a better league.
What Maher fails to address is that the shared wealth model has eliminated dynasties in the NFL – something that generates interest in the product based on both fans and haters of those teams – and has led to a much more watered-down product.
Should the New England Patriots fail to earn a Super Bowl win this year, it would mark the eleventh straight year without a repeat champion. The Patriots themselves were the last back-to-back champions in 2003 and 2004, and the 11-year gap is the longest stretch without a repeat champion in nearly a half-century of Super Bowls.
Dynasties in football are dead.
The NFL’s parity platform has also led to some extreme examples of ‘anybody can win on any given Sunday.’ It is a concept that sounds good on paper, but has led to infuriating unpredictability on the field.
Simply put, parity – or socialism – is hurting the NFL.
#2 – Eliminating Exceptionalism
President Obama once famously proclaimed that he believes in American exceptionalism, just as “Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.” That is to say, he doesn’t believe in American exceptionalism at all.
So too, the NFL does not believe in individual exceptionalism. The league has been referred to as the No Fun League for several years, annually banning end zone celebrations that would dare to shine a light on the individual who is scoring, while possibly hurting the feelings of the opposing team.
Eliminating individual personalities and leveling everybody’s actions on the field is a distinctly liberal philosophy. Nobody should be allowed to rise above others. Wealth, whether it be monetary or statistically, is a source of shame, not to be celebrated.
#3 – War On Men
Rush Limbaugh calls it the “chickification of the NFL.”
Two years ago, Miami Dolphins player Jonathan Martin quit the team after accusing fellow teammate Richie Incognito of bullying him. In another incident, an offensive lineman for the Eagles accused quarterback Donovan McNabb of bullying him.
Limbaugh responded:
Good Lord, folks, what in the world is happening to this game? Players, hulks, 300-pound men running around crying, “He bullied me! He bullied me and he was spreading rumors about my sexuality.”
[…]
It’s just unbelievable. Let me ask you this: Is there somebody, anybody who’s played in the NFL, who’s not a bully, who’s not the victim of a bully, who isn’t gay, who hadn’t been accused of being gay, who’s not had a concussion, who has not had brain dementia, who has not had a hearing deficit, who has not been maimed? Would you please raise your hand? Is there anybody left in the NFL?
#4 – Over-regulation of defenders
The NFL has been eliminating what defenders can do in the act of tackling seemingly on a daily basis. The strike zone so to speak for a defender to actually make a tackle has become so confusing and so minimized that it has led to an adverse uptick in offense and an unfair detriment on the other side of the ball.
And they have done this through red tape – rules and regulations.
NFL Network’s Mike Mayock says of the litany of rule changes for tackling in the NFL that “you can’t legislate all contact.”
Those changes, from having to completely stop the fast and furious pursuit of a quarterback so he is relatively untouched, to having to tackle in a certain range on a moving target for other defenders, have become quite a problem. Quarterbacks and wide receivers have reaped the rewards of the NFL’s regulations, but at the expense of an inherently unfair advantage to the defense.
Mayock added, “At some point football has got to be football.”
Cross-posted at the Mental Recession
