d.: I’ll get back to the storyline tomorrow. Today, I want to get something off my chest.
I just read that Texan’s running back Joe Mixon was fined $25,000 by the NFL, for something he didn’t say. When the “powers that be” were informed that the quote was attributed to one of Mixon’s former teammates, the NFL decided that something else Mixon said was worth a $205,000 fine; something that, according to the NFL’s strict rules, was legal (SMH).
We do live in America, where our first amendment rights are supposed to be protected. Mixon was only voicing what everyone else, including the television commentators who were covering the game were thinking, So why didn’t Troy Aikman, a former quarterback who commented on the officials’ questionable calls of roughing the passer get fined, also? Because he isn’t subject to the same rules that NFL players are.
Many years ago, one of the NFL players tried to file a suit against the NFL claiming that, since the players are obligated to play for the team that drafted them, it amounted to slave labor. The only problem is that NFL players make ridiculous amounts of money, so the suit was thrown out of court.
I like Joe Mixon, and I think he’s gotten a bum wrap for something he did in college that, according to those closest to him, was out of character. I’m not here to defend Joe Mixon, though. What I want to say is that, according to the unique polices of the NFL, players and coaches must be aware of the rules the NFL has for speaking to the press. DeMeco Ryans, the Texans’ coach and former player, understood this and phrased his protest carefully. He refused to elaborate when a reporter tried to goad him into it. DeMeco was a smart player and an excellent coach, as well as a class individual. For him to be upset enough to indicate that the game was officiated poorly caries a lot of weight; especially since the television commentators were saying the same thing he was saying without saying it.
The problem is that the Kansas City Chiefs, and their two star offensive players make the NFL a lot of money. I look for the Chiefs to make it to the Super Bowl for the third straight year so that the NFL can brag about having “people of all ages” (i.e. nine year old girls who are ‘Swifties’) watch the game. It would be a good story if the Chiefs are the first team ever to three-peat (win the Super Bowl three years in a row). No team, not the Packers of the ‘60s, the Steelers of the ‘70s, the Cowboys of the 90s. or even the New England Patriots of the early 21st century were able to do this, but I look for the Chiefs to be the first team ever to accomplish this, and they will have help, because of the “Jordan Rules.”
When he was playing in Chicago, Micheal Jordan was not subject to the same rules that other NBA players were, and everyone knew it. Neither I, nor any other avid sports fan I quizzed can ever remember Jordan ever fouling out of a game after his rookie year. In fact, none of us could ever remember him playing in a game and having more than two fouls called on him; and he was a three-time defensive player of the year. That sounds impossible to anyone who’s vaguely familiar with basketball, but he made the NBA money. In fact, he, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, (and later Ralph Sampson and Hakeem Olajuwon) are credited with saving the NBA. That’s because even playoff games were relegated to late night tape delay before these players were drafted into the league, making it worthy of prime-time television.
The Jordan Rules in football aren’t unique to Mahomes, though. When he was garnering his seven Super Bowl rings, everyone knew that, if you hit Tom Brady, it was an automatic penalty. Bill Belichick’s offensive players didn’t need to be set for a full count before the ball was snapped, either. This was true even though this is, a rule that it drilled into every player’s head from pee wee flag football to the NFL. And it didn’t matter that the Patriots were filming the other teams practicing, because everyone else was doing it, too. That sounds familiar for some reason.
Oh yes. Did you notice that, after one hundred plus years, Major League Baseball changed the way catchers and pitchers communicated? Hmm..it seems that, if only ono team was stealing signs electronically, that team’s opponent would be the only team who was allowed to use the “pitch com.”
Let’s face it, if a batter who was facing Nolan Ryan or Billie Wagner (congratulations on finally being inducted into the Hall of Fame, Billy. It was long overdue), and had a full count, he knew that he was going to have to try to hit a 100+ mph fastball. The only question was the location (and, in Ryan’s case, even he might not have known where he was going to throw it. Being “effectively wild” is advantageous if one can throw a baseball 108 mph).
The only thing that I think has improved in sports in the last twenty years is the NBA using timeouts to review plays on instant replay and correcting the referees’ mistakes. While I’m not a big NBA fan, I do applaud this, as well as calling out those plays that the referees made mistakes on after being reviewed by the NBA’s commissioner’s office; and admitting their mistakes (are you listening NFL and MLB?)
Cal.E. will be back tomorrow, and we’ll have a lighter storyline then, but that’s all the time I have for today. Please join us tomorrow for another episode of Cal.e.’s Korner.
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