Didn't watch a single playoff game this weekend and I couldn't be happier.
I'm realizing more and more that the NFL is losing me. I'm a Rams fan, but less of an NFL fan.... and as the poor and biased officiating continues to both remind me of the NBA and the lack of integrity of the NFL, it pushes me away as a fan.
I don't want to buy any gear, I don't want to spend money supporting it. I'm rapidly getting to that "fan of my team only" spot where if the Rams lose me or I lose interest in the Rams, I'm pretty much done with football because of what I said a long time ago. (This is EXACTLY how it went with the Lakers, btw)
Sports is the crucible in which we distill human virtue. The distillate remains are human vice.
Well, the NFL ascended because it appealed to us after the virtues of Baseball were overtaken by its vices and the virtues of Basketball were overtaken by its vices.
Well, I think the NFL is on that precipice now, if it isn't already on the descent. I really don't care what size economic concern the sport is, it will ultimately die a quick and unceremonious death when the virtues that drew fans in (and are often unspoken) are overtaken by the vices that keep fans away or dissuade new fans from becoming interested.
Seattle and New England?
With the poor and suspect officiating, does it matter who's playing? I'm finding that it matters less and less. I used to be glued to the set if I saw a football. I'd watch a Div III college game with poor lighting and ESPN interns calling the games if I could find it.
Now I find myself having missed one of the best weekends of football and feeling great about it.
I'll go into this off-season doing research on players for the Rams as I always do. But... I can't say I'll watch another NFL game until fall.
My ultimate point is this: if the games matter, you show they matter in every way possible. The NFL puts more money into marketing than refereeing, unless I really messed up some napkin math... and that's a disgrace.* So, they say 14-16 times a week that getting the fans money is more important than the integrity of the game. How do we know that? Year after year, games are ended with faulty outcomes...with ZERO change. In other sports in other countries, they actually CHANGE the outcome if they got something wrong. Not the NFL. Every year, they KNOW they miss interior line calls. They acknowledge that games are affected. It changed the outcome of this latest playoff game (the (non) hold on Suh would have put Dallas in a 4th and 16 and changed things significantly). But year after year, no changes are put into effect that would improve the integrity of the game. We hear about half efforts towards player safety, some of which actually put player's careers in jeopardy while simply altering the safety profile (meaning while trying to protect offensive player's heads, the net effect is that it puts defenders at greater risk).
We're not seeing a game where the outcome is determined by the teams, their players and coaches, their schemes and execution according to the rules as articulated by the NFL and consistently and uniformly administered by the NFL referees.
If that was the NFL product, I'd still be a huge fan. The virtues are still there. However, the vices exceed the virtues....and the product we see today produces inconsistent outcomes based on factors too murky to truly extract. Is there a conspiracy? Simply poor refereeing? Corporate influence? Owner corruption? Referee tampering? A combination? Something else? To what extent? Or is it simply random neglect that accompanies excessive success? I dunno. All I know is that the product isn't palatable anymore and while I still have a taste for the one dish that remains my favorite, I no longer have a taste for the NFL "cuisine"... the taste is....off. The fact that the NFL is putting out "special" dishes... playoff dishes... doesn't seem to change anything. They are still plagued with all the same problems. Even more so, it seems.
The older I get, the less often I seem to want to ASK for heartburn... certainly not during the consummation of some NFL game in which I couldn't care less who wins... seems the better answer is to simply push the plate away until they either fix it... or find another place to eat.
Having said all that... the Patriots will give you Ptomaine (aka food poisoning)...
just sayin'...
*($180k x 150 referees or 16 crews x 7 + backups = $27M. Even at $40M, it's not even CLOSE to what the NFL spends to market itself, and frankly, it should be able to spend that much on full time refs, not accountants and retirees)
