TMQ generally does not publish outside of the NFL regular season (though Easterbrook does do a couple of columns around draft time). But as soon as the Saints scandal broke, we were expecting TMQ to say something, because:
- Gregg Easterbrook has been out in front about player safety issues in the NFL, especially concussions.
- The scandal intimately involves the man TMQ refers to as “the tastefully named Gregg Williams”.
We’ve been watching Page 2 for a couple of days now, but oddly, the first notice we had that Easterbrook’s commentary was up came by way of Pope Jim the First on his Twitter feed. We’ll get to that in a moment. Let’s get started with this special edition of TMQ:
Actually, we commend reading the whole thing to your attention. Easterbrook’s column is short for a TMQ (about 2,500 words) and gets right to the point. Here’s what we think are the highlights:
- “Spygate was cheating, but caused no one harm. Sinnersgate is about being paid to cause injury, which takes a beautiful sport and makes it a low, filthy thing.”
- “It was a few years ago, and I was standing in a high school football locker room in Montgomery County, Md., where I live. A favored school trailed a perennial loser at halftime, and the coach of the favored team was screaming — I’ve deleted the many obscenities — that he wanted his boys to intimidate the other team by injuring players.” This is how TMQ made Jimbo’s blog: Jeff Bercovici of Forbes picked up on this part of the column and ran a story late yesterday about the ethical issues invovled. Bercovici’s article does clarify that Easterbook did take action (something you would not have picked up just from reading the column). But should he have done more? The consensus at Forbes seems to be running against TMQ.
Say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism, dude, at least it’s an ethos.
- “The deeply troubling offense of Sinnersgate is that the pros, who are looked up to by the young, are setting a terrible example for the high school players and coaches who emulate what they see on Sundays in the NFL.”
- “Encouraging — and rewarding — dirty play changes the intent of football in a repulsive manner.”
- “Michael Vick went to prison for nearly two years for harming dogs, which he should not have done. Williams offered players money to harm people. And there was no misunderstanding: Williams told the league Friday, ‘We knew we were wrong while we were doing it.’ The situations are not directly analogous. But if prison was the fair punishment for causing harm to animals, the punishment Williams faces must be severe.” Frankly, we find this bit of TMQ’s column to be confusing. He seems to be conflating Vick’s actual crimes – offenses against the state – with the acts Williams committed. So far, Williams has not been charged with any criminal acts (though, as we will see later, there is speculation about possible criminal charges). We agree that the punishment of Williams should be severe (and we still do not think a lifetime ban is out of order) but we’re unclear what point TMQ is trying to make in conflating Williams and Vick. Do our readers have the same problem?
- TMQ does make a good point about the frequent discrepancy in treatment between players and coaches. Buried in there is another point: “Williams, along with Sean Payton and New Orleans general manager Mickey Loomis, who the NFL says did nothing to prevent the bounty system, thumbed their noses at NFL integrity. Why should they be allowed the privilege of remaining in the league?” Indeed. It isn’t just that they paid money to players to hurt other players. It isn’t just that they broke the league’s rules on paying players. They lied to the NFL and tried to cover up their actions. The cover-up is always worse than the crime.
- TMQ claims to have observed four “instances in which unnecessary roughness should have been called against the Saints but was not” in the Vikings-Saints NFC game.
- “Some are asking, if NFL players earn millions of dollars, how could a $1,000 bounty alter their behavior?” Yeah, we’ve also seen a lot of folks asking that. TMQ’s key to this is that it isn’t just the money; $1,000 by itself may not be a lot to many NFL players, but that $1,000 also comes with implicit approval by their coaches. And that makes it worth more than just the money.
- TMQ is onboard with the NFL Network/Saints-Vikings conspiracy theory. (That is, the NFL Network cancelled their previously scheduled rebroadcast of the game in order to keep folks from scrutinizing it.)
- “I told their little league coaches my kids will play fast, they’re going to play nasty, they’re going to play tough. Tell the rest of the babies around them to speed up.” My God, did Gregg Williams really say that?
- “Annual reminders are sent to teams about several important league policies over the course of a year, and the reminder about bans on bounties is one of them. It would not be plausible for anyone in our league to say, ‘I didn’t know about that rule.'”
- “But other people are doing it!” If other NFL teams jumped off a bridge, would you? (Well, maybe if you’re the Cleveland Browns. But normal NFL teams?) It is a shame, from our point of view, that it had to be the Saints that got caught, rather than a team we hate. But now that the Saints are caught, the NFL has to make an example of them in order to stop all the other teams from engaging in this behavior.
- “Whether paying players to injure others within the context of an obviously dangerous game can lead to prosecution, or is actionable in the civil sense, remains to be seen. State laws in states in which NFL games are played, and the exact wording of player contracts and collective bargaining agreements, may determine whether legal action occurs.”
- Taint.
- “That’s the way they teach Pop Warner kids,” says Troy Aikman. “…and that is why football must be reformed, from youth leagues up to the NFL, to eliminate the encouragement of vicious play. Spygate threatened the reputation of a coach. Sinnersgate threatens the entire sport.”
(As a final, unrelated side note: We have never cared much for any of the Mannings. But Peyton redeemed himself somewhat in our eyes with his SNL United Way commercial. Say what you will about the man, he was a talented foe. We wish him all the best in whatever he ends up doing, especially if he ends up going to the Texans.)