Andrew Smiler asks: If a man tries to promote better treatment of men (and women), can he ethically watch professional football?
It’s football season! The NFL returns this week. Officially, they start Thursday, but I don’t buy this gimmick. The season starts Sunday.
I have to admit that I’m not as excited as usual. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not about my team. I’m optimistic for the Eagles this year, although I don’t think they can go all the way. I’m much more optimistic than I was last year at this time, when Chip Kelly had no track record at the pro level and the quarterback tandem of Michael Vick and Nick Foles had lots of question marks.
I’m an Eagles fan, always have been. I remember going to games with my dad when I was young – like 8, 9, 10 years old young. Back then, Ron Jaworski was the – MY – quarterback, not just a TV commentator. I haven’t lived in Philly for 15 years now, but they’re still my team. I watch the Eagles when I can, but I don’t pay for the NFL’s cable package. Online, I read the Philly papers every day during the season.
My conscience and my inner fan have been arguing for weeks. It goes something like this.
Conscience: You can’t watch football anymore. You spend a lot of your time talking about and helping male victims. Sure, some of them are simply victims of bad luck, but many of them are victims of a system that often throws men away.
Inner Fan: Huh?
Conscience: Pay attention nimrod. In order to get to the NFL, teens and college-aged young men have to give up almost every other career or educational goal despite ridiculous odds. There are only enough professional roster spots for something like 7 out of every 20,000 high school players. Even for a guy who plays Division I NCAA football, only about 1 in 10 can get drafted, and half of those guys won’t make their teams. Just ask Michael Sam. I can show you the math.
Inner Fan: Later on the math [see bottom]. So what about the odds? The odds of a high school senior getting into any high prestige and high money career must be pretty slim.
Conscience: Probably true, but if you’re trying for law school or medical school, then you’re definitely getting an education along the way, and you’re probably working hard and have good grades. That’s a lot harder for DI football players who have 20 hours of practice, plus weight room time, plus travel, in addition to their fall semester courses.
Inner Fan: That’s a brutal schedule. I didn’t know that. It’s no wonder there’s a new scandal or two about “tutors” who do the work for student athletes.
Conscience: Don’t forget that guy in your Intro to Acting class senior year. (Yes, I took Introduction to Acting. For non-majors.)
Inner Fan: I remember him. He could barely read. Dude could return kicks though, and did play a few games in the NFL.
Conscience: Think that was a good deal for him? One year of glory, but no education to fall back on and no other career possibilities. If 2014 were his first season, he’d make a minimum of $420,000.
Inner Fan: His choice, even if it didn’t work out for him.
Conscience: His choice? Really? When you got paired up with him to for acting class, he could barely read a 2 page script. You think he was a good student in middle and high school, good enough to earn Cs or better? You think he could have gotten into college with that reading level? But hey, if I’m that guy and you offer me a chance at a 6- or 7-figure income, I’m going to take it. What’s the other choice, flip burgers?
Inner Fan: No one said life is fair.
Conscience: The league certainly hasn’t acted fairly when it comes to concussions. They spent years denying the impact of concussions, saying they do no long term harm. Now we hear about guys like Jahvid Best who are forced to retire in their early 20s or risk more substantial brain damage. The retired players had to sue the league. Sue them. In court. To get the league to admit what it knew.
Inner Fan: That’s just the price of playing. They get paid very, very well to take those risks and many enjoy a tremendous amount of celebrity.
Conscience: But many take those risks and never make it to the NFL. Besides, are you saying we’re basically paying men to risk serious injury for our entertainment? How civilized.
Inner Fan: At least it’s a fair fight. It’s not like the Christians and the lions.
Conscience: As long as it’s on the field, it’s fair, sure. But now we’re hearing about NFL players who beat their partners. And seriously? A 2 game suspension for Ray Rice after he beat his girlfriend when players get a minimum 4 games for illicit drug use?
Inner Fan: Yeah, that was absurd. But give the NFL credit; the penalty is now a 6 game suspension for the first offense and banishment for a second offense.
Conscience: That is progress, and they get points for changing that rule quickly. But if they really wanted to promote equality, they could get rid of cheerleaders. If the game is so interesting, why do they need eye candy on the sidelines? Maybe it’s because there’s only about 11 minutes of actual playing time per game, less than any other professional sport (including soccer)?
Inner Fan: Yeah, that is exploitative. Does it help that the league is exploiting the bodies of both men and wome…no, I guess not.
Conscience: Then there’s the whole Washington Redskins thing. How insulting and demeaning. And the fact that the team has been using the name for decades doesn’t make it any less offensive.
Inner Fan: I know. Sweetie is flummoxed. That’s her hometown team and she’s always been a fan. She finds the racial epithet offensive and has vowed not to use it. I keep telling her she could just become an Eagles fan, but she’s not buying it.
Conscience: Nice. But dude, with all this stuff, you can’t watch. You’d be supporting an industry that sells young men a dream, knows the odds of fulfilling that dream are ridiculously long, and makes them risk their bodies to get it. How is that moral? And then there’s the sexism and racism, stuff you actively work to reduce and eliminate.
Inner Fan: Look, I know it’s bad. But all I’m doing is watching TV. I haven’t been to a game in years and, except for the onesie for the kid, haven’t bought any official (or unofficial) gear in three decades. What’s the harm?
Conscience: The TV networks that air football games will pay the NFL a total of $3.1 Billion this year, and every year through 2022. They can only make money off that if literally millions of people watch each and every week. The league holds the game, the networks air it, and you watch. And because you – and many, many more people – watch every week, the league gets a huge pay day.
Inner Fan: Hmmmm, I hadn’t really thought about that.
Conscience: So, are you going to stop watching?
Inner Fan: I don’t know. That’s what I do on Sunday afternoons and it’s what I’ve done for decades.
Conscience: But only for part of the year; there are certainly other things to do on Sunday afternoons.
Inner Fan: But, dude, it’s what I do. I’m a guy and I love football. They’re MY team, just like my Sweetie is mine. I know their history as well as my own, the highs and the lows. The stars of my youth (Jaworski, Montgomery, Carmichael, Bergey) and since then (Randall Cunningham, D-Jax, “Shady” McCoy, among others). The coaches, good and bad (Rich Kotite anyone?). I don’t know why, really; it’s not like football loves me back or gives me presents or anything, but I love the game. Maybe it’s because it’s one of the few good memories I have of my biological father. Wherever it comes from, football has always been there and it feels like a part of who I am, a part of my identity.
Conscience: That’s why giving it up is hard. But what’s more important, your one-way love for the game or your values?
SOME MATH
There are just over 14,000 high school football teams in the US (playing 11 vs 11, not 5 on 5 or 7 on 7). For simplicity, assume each team graduates an average of 22 players per year, a full offensive and a full defensive squad. Nearly all NFL players come from Division I NCAA Football programs; there are 127 DI teams. The NCAA allows 85 players per team; to simplify the math, let’s assume that there are 22 open roster spots every year. Numerically, a high school player has a 127 in 14,000 chance of making a DI team, or 1% chance. It’s literally 1 in 100.
The numbers are a little easier from there, but not great. Staying with our assumption of 22 “graduates” per year from each of the 127 DI teams, that’s 2794 players. But the NFL only drafts 210 of them (30 teams, 7 rounds), for odds of 0.07, or 7 in 100. For the 22 seniors on any of those 14,000 high school football players, the odds of any one of them being drafted are about 7 in 10,000. Approximately half of draftees don’t make the cut, reducing the odds of playing even one NFL game to about 3.5 players in 10,000. Said differently: of all the seniors on those 14,000 high school teams, approximately 5 will play at least one NFL game.
-photo by Daniel X. O’Neil/flickr used under Creative Commons 2.0 licensure.