It’s not the first time a college marching band has played off an Internet meme. That does not make this any less awesome. It also gives me an excuse to post this photo of me playing with the N.C. A&T drum line.

They’re all Internet dorks like me now. This warms my heart.

If you’re unfamiliar with the meme, click here.

(Spotted on Every Day Should Be Saturday.)

I don’t pay much attention to the NFL pre-season, in part because it’s filled with games that don’t count, and I’m not that into watching practice squad (and UFL) fodder compete for jobs. These games aren’t anything to take seriously.

That said, Lions rookie Ndamukong Suh is clearly taking the mere presence of Jake Delhomme very seriously here. The more I watch this, the more I wonder if Suh had a wager on that Panthers-Cardinals playoff game a couple seasons ago — you know, the one where Jake threw four interceptions, somehow didn’t get benched, and then threw two more. If I were a broke college student, and someone cost me a hundred bucks, I might want to smack them down, too.

Then again, if I were a broke college student betting on football games, I might need someone to call Gambler’s Anonymous for me…

Here are some other things going on in the wide world of football:

• The NFL and CDC are teaming up to fight 6 decades of “You’re not hurt that bad!” thinking about concussions. Good luck with that, boys. (Playbook)
• Is there really any need to shorten the preseason, other than money? (Shutdown Corner)
• If you’re visiting South Africa, be sure to check out the grand white elephants. (Dirty Tackle)
• If you’re visiting New Zealand, saying the words “Rugby”, “World” and “Cup” together out loud might cost you. You’ve been warned. (Techdirt)
• An American rugby sevens player will take a crack at the UFL. It probably helps that he played football at LSU. (FanHouse)
• Like Boise State’s blue turf? Check out Eastern Washington’s red turf. (via EDSBS, who thinks that red turf is JUST SO METAL!!!)
• Wanna buy a share of Arsenal? Only 100 easy payments of £102.50. (Pitch Invasion)
• Harry Redknapp will not tolerate your insinuations. (EPL Talk)
• Your 2010 AFL Finals series Week 1 fixtures, which make me wish Time Warner Cable would stop being so stingy and give us our ESPN3. (AFL.com.au)

Also, for those of you participating in this site’s Fantasy Premier League competition, I’ll have a prize announcement later today.

(H/T to Will Brinson for the video)

Now that the gridiron game has proven to be rougher on its players’ brains than anyone realized, designers are taking another look at the football helmet and wondering if that’s the problem. An aerospace designer named Michael Princip thinks he might have a solution: a “multi-component anti-shock helmet design” that absorbs the energy of collisions and sends that energy away from the head.

From Wired Playbook:

Princip has spent the last six months redesigning the football helmet so it can better dissipate energy from collisions. The result is the Bulwark, a design that still features internal padding, much like current helmets covered by a solid shell. But the true innovation lies on top of that shell: a shock-absorbing layer of pre-molded foam. “It’s like an industrial-grade bubble wrap,” according to Princip. That padding layer would then be covered by four separate sections that comprise the outer shell.

The openings between those sections would act like crumple zones, giving flex to the outer portion of the helmet while absorbing a hit, thereby lessening trauma to the head. The design would also lighten the helmet’s weight by using new materials to reduce the force of impact in helmet-to-helmet collisions.

Not that the force if hitting your head against anything can prevent an injury. Eli Manning reminded us of that last Monday. Still, letting the helmet absorb shocks rather than the brain seems like a vast improvement for players who aren’t so eager to follow the NFL’s current policy on brain bruises. The question now is whether this design (or something like it) gets adopted by the NFL or NCAA in the near future.

(H/T: Playbook.)

All apologies to The Run of Play, of course.

Seriously, though, Brett Favre is making me hate the NFL. The more I hear about him, the more I want a full-season lockout in 2011. Just go away, old man.

(All you Baltimore Ravens who want to use this video as an argument, please sit down. We’re talking about hard-coded rules, not judgment calls, and if this World Cup has proven anything, it’s that judgment calls work both ways, often to devastating effect.)

Of course, a basketball player has to break a specific rule — in this case, goal tending — in order for the other team to be awarded the points. This rule exists in part to allow a more offensive game and to give both teams a fair opportunity to score.

Football codes don’t have a rule like this. If a defender illegally stops a player from scoring, the player and team are penalized, but points are not awarded. The onus is still on the offensive team to score. Period. That is simply how football works.

Let me set out an example for you:

The Ravens are leading the New England Patriots by 4 with just a few seconds left on the clock. The Pats are on the Ravens’ 8-yard line and have one play left. Brady drops back, sees Randy Moss open in the end zone and passes to him. Ed Reed, meanwhile, realizes he’s caught out of position, and he can’t make a play on the ball. So Reed grabs Moss and pulls him away from the pass as time expires.

The ref throws the flag. Of course, he does. That’s pass interference. Ed Reed prevented the touchdown illegally. The touchdown, however, is not awarded automatically. By rule, the ball is placed on the 1-yard line, and the Pats will get one more play, since the game cannot end on a defensive penalty. However, the Pats still have to score the touchdown. If the Ravens stuff them on the last play, the game is over, the Ravens win.

Did Ed Reed break a rule in order to help his team win? Yes. He committed pass interference and was penalized for it. The rules of the game, however, allow for this, just as the rules of basketball allow a team to foul its opponent constantly at the end of the game in order to get the ball back and try to erase a deficit. Points aren’t awarded for fouls, though; you have to make your free throws. Thus, if you know a team struggles at the free throw line, tactical fouling becomes a legitimate strategy in order to win.

Which brings us to Luis Suarez, who caused something of an uproar yesterday.

With Uruguay and Ghana tied at 1-1 in the 121st minute, the Uruguayan striker illegally stopped Ghana from scoring a goal by slapping it away. He’s not the goalkeeper, so he can’t do that. Like Ed Reed in our example above, Suarez was properly penalized as the rules stipulated — he was shown a straight red card and sent off. By those same rules, however, the goal is not given automatically. Ghana still has to put the ball in the net.

They did not. Asamoah Gyan missed the ensuing penalty kick, and extra time ended at 1-1. Uruguay won the game on penalties and advanced to the semifinals.

Some have reacted with outrage to what Suarez did. They claim he’s a filthy cheat, just like Thierry Henry, and that he should be ashamed of himself. They also claim that Uruguay should not be in the semifinals because of this.

Here’s the thing, though — unlike that France v. Ireland game, the laws of the game worked exactly as written here. Suarez was properly punished for his handball (red card and suspension), just as Reed was penalized for his pass interference in our example above. This was, in essence, a tactical foul — a deliberate breaking of a rule in order to help your team try and win a game.

So really, if you have no issue with basketball players fouling at the end of a game in order to try and win it, you shouldn’t have any issue with what Luis Suarez did here. Tactical fouling exists to give your team an opportunity to win when no other option is available. So you commit those fouls, because you want to win. Is it cynical? Yes. Is it cheating? No. You do what you have to do within the rules of the game in order to win the game.

Perhaps because of Henry’s handball is so fresh in our minds, Suarez’ handball is skewing our sense of justice. The difference is that in the case of Henry, justice was not served. France was allowed to commit a clear violation due to officiating incompetence, and Ireland was given no recourse. This is why the NFL has instant replay — to give teams recourse in case the officials appear to make the wrong decision.

There were no wrong decisions at the end of the Uruguay v. Ghana game. Suarez accepted his punishment as the rules stipulated. There was simply the tactical foul and, sadly for Ghana, Gyan’s blown penalty kick. Had Gyan converted, we probably wouldn’t be talking about this. Ghana had the opportunity to win the game after the penalty was committed, and there’s nothing really unjust about that.

Tactical fouling is simply part of football, as it is part of nearly every sport. This is how it should be, too. We should not get into the habit of simply awarding one team the game every time the other team breaks the rules, or else we open our games up to all sorts of ugly unintended consequences. Victory needs to be earned in our games.

Seeing an old fellow leatherhead led Uncle Johnny to tell us a few gridiron war stories. Most notable among them was one story about an opposing lineman who was one of the biggest, meanest kids in the area — and Uncle Johnny had to line up against him. It was pouring down the rain that day, and when they got down in their three-point stance, my uncle looked up and saw this ferocious beast of a man staring him down, breathing angrily, and looking determined to maul him and the quarterback.

So my uncle met his gaze and quietly grabbed a chunk of muddy turf in his hands. When the ball was snapped, he shoved that mud right into that big kid’s face. And he kept right on doing it until that kid couldn’t see straight anymore.

Uncle Johnny and I chatted a bit about the NFL. He lives in Tampa, and he’s as frustrated with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as everyone else down there is.  I told him about how the Glazers bought Manchester United with nothing but debt, found themselves in a bad spot when the economic downturn hit and probably diverted resources from the Bucs to avoid getting their debts called in. The next day at breakfast, we chatted about football again, and he repeated what I told him about the Glazers as if I hadn’t said anything about it the day before. I let him talk. It was good just to talk to him, and he deserved at least that much respect. Besides, he’s 80. Finding someone at that age who hasn’t had a mental slip or two is challenging.

The scary thought, however, is that my Uncle Johnny’s brain at 80 is probably still in far better shape than Chris Henry’s was at 26.

Whenever people talked or wrote about the long-term brain injuries of football players, the focus was always on the linemen — players who took the most hits and suffered the most physical abuse. Former Pittsburgh Steelers center Mike Webster struggled mightily with brain trauma before his death eight years ago. A coroner named Bennet Omalu got permission to study Webster’s brain and found large accumulations of proteins clogging his brain cells. Omalu called it Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, or CTE. His crusade to get NFL officials to recognize his work was chronicled in this must-read GQ story.

Webster’s brain was just the first one Omalu and his colleague Julian Bailes studied. They looked at the brain of Philadelphia Eagles safety Andre Waters, who committed suicide in 2006, and found CTE. They looked at the brain of Steelers lineman Justin Strzelczyk and again found CTE. For the most part, though, these were the guys in the trenches, guys willingly suffering repeated violent collisions for the glory we showered upon them. Many of them probably knew going in that they were trading years of their lives for that glory. It was their trade to make, so we let them, because we loved to watch.

Then it came out this week that Chris Henry, a wide receiver who played only two seasons of college football and a grand total of 47 games in the NFL, also suffered from CTE.

Chris Henry didn’t play in the trenches. He had a history of bad decision-making before he died, yes, but he had no known history of concussions. Receivers in general don’t suffer the sort of abuse that linemen and linebackers subject themselves to regularly — at least, we didn’t think they did.  Yet there’s the scientific proof that Henry had the exact same brain trauma that Mike Webster and Andre Waters had.

That begs the question — if football caused Chris Henry to suffer from CTE, just how many other football players have this condition? What about all the kids playing this game on the high school and college level? Hell, what about the kids in the pee-wee leagues? Is it possible that the gridiron game damages the brains of everyone who plays it?

It’s kind of question that makes even a lifelong football fan such as myself step back and think, “My God, what have we done?”

Football, in all its forms, is an evolutionary thing. Rules change. New tactics and strategies develop over time. The game that my Uncle Johnny played back in the 1940s is miles away from the game everyone plays today. These brain studies, however, suggest that American football has evolved into something very ugly, and as Omalu learned when NFL doctors initially rejected his report about Webster, getting the powers that be to change their ways, especially when billions of dollars are on the line, is never easy — especially when one of the biggest selling points of football is this:

This is what we, as fans, pay to see. We want to see the gladiators do battle. The NFL gives them to us. So do countless high schools and colleges. Never mind that the gladiators will all suffer from debilitating injuries that can eventually wreck their lives and the lives of everyone around them. These men choose to play football, and they willingly take everything that goes with it, good and bad. And we cheer them for it.

Chris Henry’s brain changes all that. If Chris Henry had CTE, then it’s possible that everyone who plays American football will develop CTE — and not just NFL players. The more people start to consider that information, the more parents will start asking, ”Should my son even be playing this game?” Sure, the powers that be will invest in new helmets and make new rules to soften the blows and ease people’s fears, but ultimately, those are cosmetic changes. American football players only know one way to play football.

American football, however, is not the only football in America.

Last week, when Landon Donovan scored the game-winning goal for the USA against Algeria, it felt like one of those pivotal moments in American sports history. It was as if people in this country all started to realize that, yes, the Association game is a great game, too, and we should watch it. Just one day after the USA-Ghana game smashed TV ratings records in this country, 18,755 people went to see the Philadelphia Union’s first game in its new stadium. You can sense the shift happening, even if it continues to move at a snail’s pace.

I wonder now if this revelation about Chris Henry might end up shifting things just as much. I wonder if the parents of the next Randy Moss will look at these CTE studies and start thinking, “You know what? Maybe we should look into this other football instead. Maybe there’s an opportunity here. Maybe we should direct him this way…”

That’s a simplistic notion, of course. As Juergen Klinsmann will be the first to tell you, U.S. Soccer still has yet to develop the resources necessary to attract inner city kids to that game. Still, these CTE studies seem certain to lead some talented young athletes from poorer backgrounds away from the gridiron game. Those kids will be looking for an outlet. They can’t all play basketball, and they’re not so interested in baseball. Why not soccer?

Perhaps 20 years from now, we’ll look back on this summer as the real turning point in the history of football in America — and not just because the USA gave us a couple of  magic moments in South Africa. Landon Donovan and Tim Howard brought the fans to the game, but it might be Chris Henry who ultimately brings the players to the game. Perhaps in death, Henry will have a far greater impact on football in America than he did in life. Wouldn’t that be something?

]]> http://www.davesfootballblog.com/post/2010/06/30/what-price-football/feed/ 2 http://www.davesfootballblog.com/post/2010/06/10/nflpa-throws-down-the-gauntlet/ http://www.davesfootballblog.com/post/2010/06/10/nflpa-throws-down-the-gauntlet/#comments Thu, 10 Jun 2010 19:00:15 +0000 Dave http://www.davesfootballblog.com/?p=5615 The FIFA World Cup may be front and center in our sporting minds today — even the boys at Shutdown Corner put together their NFL Starting XI (Randy Moss on the wing? Are y’all wakin’ and bakin’ with Santonio Holmes?) — but there is rather important news on the NFL front today. It appears the Players Association might have found a way to save the 2011 season after all.

As I’ve written here before, NFL owners have guaranteed contracts with the television networks for the 2011 season. That means they don’t have to play a single down of football that year, and the networks still have to pony up the cash. According to NFLPA boss DeMaurice Smith, that amounts to about $4 billion.

Smith, however, has formulated his counterattack, and it’s a big one:

On Wednesday, the players association filed a Special Master claim, contesting that the league took lower revenue (the kind that would be shared with the players under any agreement) in exchange for guaranteed money in the event of a lockout in 2011 (not a cent of which the players would see) in a renegotiation of television contracts. Smith and the players say that this is a direct violation of the fiduciary duty the owners are required to act under — they must seek revenue with an equal eye for the good of the players as for themselves.

You can read the whole background on this claim here, but the long and the short of it is this: If the arbitrator of this case rules that the NFL acted in bad faith at the negotiating table, the NFLPA can effectively block the owners from getting their $4 billion until a new collective bargaining agreement is in place.

This, my friends, is some serious hardball. Smith is betting that this move will convince the owners to stop stonewalling and start negotiating. The owners are already claiming the NFLPA’s charges are “meritless,” and it appears the owners are digging in to fight this point.

If you want to see the 2011 NFL season happen, you will absolutely side with Smith and the NFLPA here. NFL owners don’t want the 2011 season to happen. Smith and the NFLPA do. The owners will piss all over you, and you’ll take it, because they have the product that you want, and they know you’ll shell out huge sums of money to get it, even after a whole season is canceled.

You and I won’t stop being football fans. The players know this. They’re on your side. They want football in 2011 just as much as you do. I would encourage all of you out there not to fall into that stereotypical “billionaires v. millionaires” argument that always pops up around labor negotiations in sports. This time around, it is merely  ”32 rich bastards v. everyone else.” Here’s hoping they don’t let the bastards win.

Ever since Harry Carson, the Hall-of-Fame linebacker for the New York Giants, dumped the contents of a cooler on top of Bill Parcells at the end of Super Bowl XXI, the Gatorade Shower has been one of the biggest clichés in American football. The practice started with Carson’s teammate Jim Burt a year earlier, but it was that Super Bowl moment between Carson and Parcells that made the Gatorade Shower an overused football celebration.

Perhaps the biggest surprise, then, is that it took almost 25 years to find its way into other forms of football…

The irony, of course, is that Tottenham Hotspur didn’t have a trophy to hoist yesterday, though symbolically, they got one of the biggest prizes on offer in English football. That’s probably worth ruining the suit.

(Spurs video spotted on EPL Talk.)

You gotta love designers. Tell them that it’s a World Cup year, and they’ll find a myriad of pointless ways to incorporate Joga Bonito into your life. Tell them that the World Cup is being hosted in Africa, however, and all the silliness goes away. They’re going to save the continent through football, dammit, and there’s no stopping them.

That’s not to say all their ideas are condescending, of course. Some, like the soccKet, seem quite useful. Created at Harvard University, the soccKet is basically a football with an inductive coil inside that can build up electricity as it gets kicked around. For many African university students studying on the curb near a street light because they can’t get electricity into their homes, the soccKet could allow them to do their homework under much better conditions.

Then there’s the Swirl (pictured above), which is basically a giant ball that you can fill with water and use to wash your clothes. It comes with handles so that you can roll it to the water, but you can also detach the handles, give it to the kids and let them have a kickabout while they’re doing their laundry. This is also a pretty good idea — right up to the point where one kid says, “Hey, let’s be like Wayne Rooney and practice our headers.”

We’re going to see more of these ideas as the World Cup approaches. Brace yourselves. In the meantime, here are some other football-related goodies from around the web:

• Ben Roethlisberger is expected to be suspended for up to 6 games for code of conduct violations. In other news… hey! It’s Byron Leftwich. [SB Nation]
• Terry Bradshaw’s one-man show is headed to Vegas. Vegas is saved! [Shutdown Corner]
• Joe Nedney takes on a robot in a placekicking contest. You might be surprised at who wins. [Playbook]
• The Australian Football Wars continue apace. This week’s battle front? Televised games on Anzac Day. [Herald Sun]
• Despite the Brisbane Lions roaring (sorry) to a 4-0 start, the life of new Lion Brendan Fevola seems to be going in the other direction. [Herald Sun]
• GolTV HD is coming to DirecTV. Fox Soccer Channel in HD? Not anytime soon, apparently. [EPL Talk]
• Football’s own Devil’s Dictionary. [Left Back in the Changing Room]
• Claudio Reyna is U.S. Soccer’s new Youth Technical Director, but will he address youth soccer’s biggest technical problem? [SignOnSanDiego]
• Is football better off without technology? [The Run of Play]

Finally, if you’re a soccer fan and you’re not reading Zonal Marking, you’re missing out on the best source of tactical analysis on the web. Go bookmark that site right now.

I’ve been quiet about the Pittsburgh Steelers’ offseason troubles thus far, in part because it seems what I wrote about Ben Roethlisberger four years ago…

It’s really difficult for any football fan to find out the hard way that your favorite team’s leader has all the common sense of 12-month-old. With colic.

…still appears to be true. Big Ben’s behavior over the last few months has suggested that his head has only gotten harder since his motorcycle accident. He got himself caught up in not one, but two cases of sexual assault, and while the Ocmulgee County District Attorney decided not to press charges against Roethlisberger for his stupidity in Milledgeville, it’s pretty obvious that the Steelers’ star quarterback needs to be smacked. We have a volunteer for this task, too.

But if Big Ben’s off-the-field woes were troubling, what are we to make of Santonio Holmes’ recent troubles, which led to the MVP of Super Bowl XLIII being dealt to the New York Jets for a meager 5th-round draft pick?

Clearly, there is more to Holmes’ dismissal from the Steelers than his public support for euthanasia on Twitter. The fact that he’s been accused of assaulting a woman in a night club — not the first time he’s faced an accusation of attacking a woman — and the fact that he’s been suspended for four games for violating the NFL’s substance abuse policy and, perhaps more importantly, made no secret of his taste for toking, all played a role in this trade. Any one of these incidents separately might have been overlooked. All of them together made Holmes unwelcome in Pittsburgh.

It wasn’t a message to Roethlisberger, but a message to everyone. Anyone who wears the black and gold must uphold a certain standard of conduct. Holmes stopped meeting that standard. That’s why he’s a Jet now. As our pal MJD wrote, this deal simply had to be done. The Rooney family doesn’t put up with this nonsense. These are the Steelers, not the Bengals.

So why was Holmes traded while Roethlisberger remains? That merely comes down to the money invested in them. Holmes only had one year left on his contract, while Roethlisberger is two years into an 8-year, $102 million deal. Plus, receivers are far more expendable in the NFL than quarterbacks. You will recall the Steelers made no attempt to re-sign Plaxico Burress and still won Super Bowl XL without him. Sure, Burress also caught a Super Bowl-winning touchdown pass himself two years later, but then he subsequently shot himself right into prison. That’s the sort of headache the Steelers strive to avoid.

What does it mean for the Steelers on the field? If you look at it from purely a personnel standpoint, you can understand why JJ Cooper would suggest that the Steelers have lost their minds by trading Holmes. Hines Ward is getting older. Mike Wallace was a good 3rd receiver, but he still has a lot to prove. Limas Sweed bears a striking resemblance to Keary Colbert. Antwaan Randle El is back, but he clearly lost a step during his time in D.C. Why would Pittsburgh dump its best receiver in that scenario?

Simply put, Holmes started acting like he was bigger than the badge, and we all know what happens when a player does that. The Rooney would probably send Roethlisberger away as well if his contract didn’t make him impossible to trade. That contract is the reason we Steelers fans are stuck with a QB whom many will tag, unfairly or not, as a sexual predator. Listen closely, and you might hear Steeler Nation’s silent prayers for Dennis Dixon to save them from an ugly 2010 season — not to mention from the continuing sideshow of hate between Big Ben and Terry Bradshaw.

Meanwhile, Will Leitch reminds us that the Jets just became even more interesting in advance of their season on HBO’s Hard Knocks. Pro football in America remains as ugly as ever, but nobody denies that the NFL, like a big stadium implosion, makes for great television.

Well, if you need profound, just look at this photo:

You can almost hear soon-to-be-former ‘Skins QB Jason Campbell quietly whispering, “I’m sorry, man. I’m really, really sorry.”

If you’d like something more in-depth than that, I recommend checking out Enrico Campitelli’s long goodbye to McNabb at The 700 Level and Chris Mottram’s search for a silver lining at Mister Irrelevant. That should give you enough of a feel for how the blogs are reacting to this deal.

Incidentally, Daniel Snyder, the Redskins’ polarizing owner, was once rumored to be interested in buying Tottenham Hotspur. Of course, he was.

That said, I would take what Daltrey and Townshend gave us every day and twice on Sunday compared to this:

John Cusack, who is guest-blogging for Boing Boing this week (Hey, Xeni! Nice get!), decided that now was a good time to remind us of the horror that was Up With People. These were the Super Bowl halftime shows we used to get from the NFL, and as Mr. Better Off Dead himself reminds us, we should have been even more frightened of them when they were actually happening.

As you can see in this video now, watching the performance was like diving into an ocean of bad fashion and forced smiles. Dr. Pepper dancing and Mom Jeans from shore to shore… pre-Prozac in motion…. military ballet… Mandatory cheers and quasi-religious cult patriotics… the glory of the empire. A choreographed tribute to the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King. A celebration of diversity, unity, and fluorescent leggings.

Meanwhile, Reagan was dumping all the mentally ill and vets out on the streets to die,  as a direct result of his policies…

The idea that America would one day feel homesick for the ’80s was as alien to me then as that vast, choreographed grid of grinning dancers, goose-stepping to synthesizer blasts.

Cusack admitted in his post that he was tripping balls at Super Bowl XX when he sat in the stands and watched this. I’m not the least bit surprised that it didn’t make this halftime show any better. Perhaps the real shame of that day is that he didn’t offer any of his stash to Tony Eason before the game.

Did the San Francisco 49ers mistreat Joe Montana when they traded him to Kansas City? Did they mistreat Jerry Rice when they cut him and let him go to Oakland? Did the Dallas Cowboys mistreat Emmitt Smith when they cut him and let him go to Arizona?

Please. First off, we all know why our pal MJD doesn’t want to see the McNabb-to-Oakland trade happen. He’s a San Diego Chargers fan, and Chargers fans love pointing at the Raiders and laughing. That was a little harder to do last season, when the Raiders looked good on defense and showed some improvement on offense when they had some semblance of a real quarterback (i.e., not JaMarcus Russell) under center. McNabb in a Raider uniform might actually pose a threat to MJD’s beloved Chargers in 2010.

Second, this is how the National Football League has always been. Great players get older, management changes, fans get restless — and do they come more restless than fans in Philadelphia? — and before you know it, great players who spent their entire careers in one place finish their careers in another.

No one player will ever be bigger than the shield. Anyone who pursues a career as an NFL player needs to know this from the jump. Joe Montana won four Super Bowls, and the 49ers traded him away in favor of Steve Young. What makes Donovan McNabb, who lost the only Super Bowl he ever played in, any more special? He can be traded just like anyone else. Loyalty is a something close to illusion in this league. Winning is all that matters, and even the winners get sent away when they’ve used up their usefulness.

So let’s not pretend it’s some great insult to McNabb if the Eagles end up trading him to Oakland or any other team. This is business as usual in the NFL. Move along, people. Nothing to see here.

I’ve written in the past about the Green & Gold protests at Manchester United and whether a bunch of scarves and songs would be enough to convince the Glazer family to sell that fabled club to someone who won’t saddle it with debt, then use it as a personal ATM machine. Those protesters are kicking it up a notch now, as many of them have decided not to renew their season tickets in an effort to hit the Glazers in their wallets and force them to sell.

It appears that fans of the Glazers’ other football club are doing the same thing, but for slightly different reasons.

Citing a weak economy and lagging ticket sales, Tampa Bay Buccaneers co-chairman Joel Glazer said Wednesday there is a “real possibility” the club will face home television blackouts during the 2010 season.

The Buccaneers have not suffered a home blackout since Raymond James Stadium opened in 1998. Every game was televised in the local market last season, despite Tampa Bay’s 3-13 record and thousands of empty seats at most home games.

Keep in mind that the Buccaneers won the NFC South in 2007 and just barely missed the playoffs in 2008 with the same 9-7 record. After that 2008 season, however, the Glazers fired head coach Jon Gruden and GM Bruce Allen, dumped a number of big salary players and started rebuilding with low-paid players and coaches. After watching the 3-13 season that resulted, Bucs fans pinned the Glazers as cheap and began staying home in droves.

Of course, the Glazers can fix their image in Tampa with a good draft and a few wins in September. Sports fans in Tampa tend to be front-runners, and they’ll come back if it looks like their team is a contender.

The Glazers’ image problem in Manchester, however, has bugger all to do with the club’s performance on the pitch. United is in the running for its fourth consecutive Premier League title and its third consecutive Champions League Final appearance; the number of green & gold scarves in the stands, however, just keep right on growing. Even David Beckham famously sported one after AC Milan’s Champions League tie in Old Trafford. No amount of spin control can save the Glazers’ reputation after that.

You have to wonder if these things would be happening had Malcolm Glazer not suffered multiple strokes in 2006. If he were still capable, he’d probably be navigating these waters far better than his children are right now.

A century from now — assuming the world isn’t hit with a series of nasty EMPs that wipe out everyone’s hard drives and destroy the electronics we need to read discs and flash memory — we’ll have pristine HD video of football matches that will show people just how incredible Lionel Messi and Wayne Rooney really were. Clearly, technology has come a long way in 109 years, which is how old this footage of a Newcastle v. Liverpool match is.

This footage comes from something called the Mitchell and Kenyon Collection, which depict English life in the earliest days of film. The British Film Institute has been digitizing and uploading to YouTube, and their clips are among the oldest surviving footage of early 1900s football in England. Other clips feature a Merseyside Derby from 1902, footage of Sheffield United’s celebrity goalkeeper Fatty Foulkes, Manchester United playing its first season with that name — rather than Newton Heath, the name that’s been referenced in the supporters’ “Green & Gold” protests against Malcolm Glazer.

If these old film clips reveal anything, though, they reveal this — while video technology has changed dramatically, Association football has remained pretty constant for the last 110 years. The athletes and the tactics might be more impressive these days, but the game itself remains pretty much the same.

Rugby also hasn’t changed too much, as this Oldham v. Swinton “Northern Union” match from 1901 demonstrates. Interestingly, though, this match took place five years before rugby league’s “play-the-ball” rule was instituted, and instead of the tackled player heeling the ball back to a teammate, there was actually a scrum after every tackle. In a way, it was a bit of like American football in 1901.

I haven’t been able to find any American football videos quite as old as these, although this footage of the 1915 Rose Bowl between Washington State and Brown should give you an idea of how much different the gridiron game is compared to 95 years ago:

(Early soccer vids spotted on EPL Talk.)

The NFL Players Association is certainly acting like it is. Owners have told the NFLPA that they’re losing money. NFLPA chief DeMaurice Smith responded by asking the owners to show him their financial ledgers so the union can have a starting point in their negotiations. Thus far, the owners have said no.

Is there some dark, dirty secret hiding in those ledgers that the owners don’t want anyone to see? Did they buy up a lot of toxic assets? Do they reveal some scandalous ties to sports betting companies and Canadian drug traffickers? Do they not want anyone to find out just how much it costs to keep Al Davis alive? Is Jerry Jones spending millions on “snacks”?

Here’s the thing, folks — the ledgers are a MacGuffin. The only thing these ledgers are obscuring is a simple fact that’s already out in the open, and that’s a clause in the NFL’s contract with the big television networks that states that even if the league doesn’t play a down in 2011, the networks still have to pay the NFL all the TV rights money they agreed to pay.

Let’s ponder that for a moment, shall we?

First off, how powerful is the NFL that it could not only ask for a deal like that, but get it? “If we don’t play, you still have to pay us.” I’m sure there are several other entities capable of getting a deal like that, but certainly not for this much money.

Now let’s examine the men on the receiving end of this windfall. What are NFL owners? They’re wealthy old white guys. Wealthy old white guys did not obtain their wealth by doing things that made them making less money. If their financial advisers are telling them that they could make more money by not playing football in 2011, then that’s what they’re going to do, and nothing the players or the fans say or do will stop that.

What, you think the NFL owes you something because you’re a fan? Please. NFL owners will throw a whole season away because they know you’ll come back. Canceling a World Series didn’t kill baseball. Canceling a whole season didn’t kill the National Hockey League. This is the National Football League we’re talking about here. They could rip you off however they want, and in the end, you’ll still return to the stadiums, turn on the TV on Sunday afternoon, and shell out for the jerseys and trinkets and such. Because you crave pro football, and they have what you want.

Unless there’s an alternative.

If those Twittering upstarts of the United Football League can manage to survive into their 3rd season and expand to eight teams as planned, they could fill the gap that the NFL leaves behind. What’s that? No NFL football this Sunday? We’ll play on Sunday. Come watch our league.

Keep in mind the UFL would only have 8 teams at this point. That means they could schedule one game on Thursday night, two games on Sunday at 1:00 PM and 4:00 PM, and the fourth game on either Sunday Night or Monday night. That allows all those disenfranchised NFL fans to focus on one game at a time. Whether that’s good or bad is up to you. It would certainly be good for Versus and HDNet.

What’s more, if there’s an NFL lockout, any NFL players who are out of contract could probably find work in the UFL. So could any players coming out of college, because there wouldn’t be an NFL draft. Would they get paid as much? Of course not, but if there’s no NFL, does that matter? The rookies would have decent-paying jobs, and they would make the UFL that much more entertaining to watch.

And if the product on the field is good, some fans out there might decide they really don’t miss the NFL all that much. So might one or two of those TV networks who gave millions to the NFL for a season full of nothing.

And if that happens, how do NFL owners react? Do they stay the course and keep making the TV money owed to them? Or do they decide that keeping this upstart league in its place is more important than maximizing short-term gains, thus saving the 2011 NFL season?

Right now, the UFL seems content with its current position a minor league. If, however, there’s no major league 18 months from now, the UFL could very quickly move up from “minor league” to “alternative league,” sign some good quality players and offer a pretty good product to fans who are angry with the NFL work stoppage. That might put some real heat on NFL owners to re-open the shop. Even the USFL wasn’t in nearly as enviable position as this.

Thanks to Bodog for sponsoring Dave’s Football Blog.

That’s how bad this man was at his job in 2009. He opened the calendar year by throwing six interceptions at home in a playoff game, then followed that up with a five-turnover performance, also at home, in his first game in September. Somewhere in between those 11 turnovers, though, the Panthers saw fit to give him a 5-year, $42.5 million contract — a deal which made him the official captain of the Ski-Mask All Stars.

Maybe all that guaranteed money was a thank you of sorts. After all, Delhomme did help this franchise get to a Super Bowl that it almost won, two NFC Championship games and three playoff appearances in 7 seasons, which would make quite a few NFL fan bases pretty happy. Still, Delhomme always seemed to be more lucky than good, and as any gambler will tell you, bad streaks are inevitable. That bad streak finally hit Jake last year, and the Panthers had to consider whether they were willing to take the salary cap hit to let him–

What’s that? NFL owners got rid of the salary cap? Well, that makes it a little easier, doesn’t it?

The question now is which way Panthers GM Marty Hurney will go next. The initial thought is that he’ll stick with Matt Moore for now. Matt Moore is not a great quarterback. Some would argue he’s not even a good quarterback. What cannot be argued, however, is that he is a winning quarterback. Moore is 6-2 as a starter for the Panthers, including a 4-1 stretch at the end of last season that saw him complete 61.6% of his passes, throw 8 touchdowns and only 2 interceptions, and compile a passer rating of 98.5.

That said, Moore doesn’t exactly light Charlotte on fire, and that’s going to lead to a ton of speculation about the Panthers’ off-season strategy. Ron Mexico started that speculation last week when he suggested he might like to play for Carolina - a notion that must have had owner Jerry Richardson rewriting his will to ensure that any Panthers GM who acquired Mexico over his dead body would be relieved of his duties immediately.

Plus, as of today, Mex is still an Eagle, so it seems Philadelphia is entertaining trade offers. Despite what Andy Reid says, though, the question remains which QB the Eagles will trade, and Carolina might be in the best position to make a deal here — not for Mexico, but for Donovan McNabb.

There are several factors at play here. For one, McNabb has worn out his welcome in the Illadelph for just about everyone not named Andy Reid, and while Kevin Kolb and Ron Mexico don’t exactly excite anyone, they would at least be a fresh start.

More importantly, however, the Eagles cut Brian Westbrook last week and are now shockingly thin at the running back position. Carolina is not so thin there. They have a strong 1-2 punch in DeAngelo Williams and Jonathan Stewart, plus a guy named Mike Goodson who has what the pro types call “upside.” Panthers head coach John Fox prefers a running back like Stewart over Williams, who has a bit more power on the line. Stewart shined in Williams’ absence late last season, rushing for 5.7 yards per carry and 4 touchdowns in Carolina’s last five games.

Williams, meanwhile, is dangerous in the open field, which is exactly where Andy Reid liked to put Westbrook when he had the chance. Thus, it stands to reason that the Eagles could offer McNabb to the Panthers in exchange for Williams, and it would be the sort of blockbuster deal that benefits both teams. The Eagles get their new starting running back, and the Panthers get a strong veteran presence in the pocket to run their offense.

Personally, I hope such a deal doesn’t happen, as Williams is one of my favorite Panthers of all time, and I would hate to see his big play ability leave the state. Plus, Williams are Stewart are not only a great tandem at running back (and both better than anyone on the free agent market right now), but they have one of the coolest fan clubs in the NFL. Furthermore, Fox and Hurney are fairly conservative types who have a system that doesn’t put much value in a star QB, and they have to shore up their defense this off-season after Julius Peppers left for Chicago.

Still, business is business, and the bottom line is that a McNabb-for-Williams deal would get more season tickets sold in Charlotte than the prospect of a full season of Matt Moore. The mere notion of McNabb throwing to Steve Smith every week is pretty buzzworthy. What’s more, McNabb would give the Panthers a legitimate passer to fall back on if their running game falters. All Jake ever gave them was a gambler’s chance, and as any poker player will tell you, shouting “One time, baby!” gets old in a hurry.

Matthew Stafford is the starting quarterback for the Detroit Lions. The Detroit Lions are terrible. Yet even a QB for a terrible team gets to be a scratch-and-sniff plaything for a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model. In public. And the whole episode gets recorded for posterity. Must be nice.

Of course, Stafford probably deserved to have a moment like this happen to him just by virtue of being drafted by the Lions. He might never experience a win this epic again.

(H/T: The High Definite via @unsilent)

If Super Bowl commercials had not jumped the shark before, they certainly did this year. Even the “good” ads were severely lacking in entertainment value, and the misogynistic streak that ran through this year’s ads was unnecessary and self-defeating.  106.5 million Americans watched this game; at least some of them were bound to be women. Why air an ad that makes your business seem like a comic book store?

What’s more, as the video above shows, this year’s ads used a hell of a lot of gag violence to try and keep people’s interest. A few of those spots were entertaining — the dog collar ad was good for a laugh, and watching Betty White and Abe Vigoda get tackled was funny — but the more you look at this montage of slaps and pratfalls, the more it seems today’s mad men have fewer ideas than Hollywood.

My favorite spot? EA’s ad for Dante’s Inferno, simply because you don’t expect to hear Bill Withers in a video game ad. And I like that song. Well done, EA.

(Hat tip to Boing Boing for the first video.)

We cannot leave this city. Not now.

That’s essentially what NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue told New Orleans Saints owner Tom Benson in 2006 after Hurricane Katrina ravaged the Lower 9th Ward and left us with painful images of a shattered Superdome full of desperate people. Benson spent several years prior to Katrina demanding that the city and the state of Louisiana build him a new stadium on their dime. He threatened to move the Saints to another town that would buy him a shiny new stadium.

Lest we forget, even after Hurricane Katrina, Benson fought with the fans, assaulted a cameraman, and flat-out lied to the world about the condition of his facilities in Louisiana. He was itching to ditch Bourbon Street for a richer, sunnier city. Even San Antonio would have been just fine for Benson.

Paul Tagliabue said no. He saw what Katrina did to New Orleans, and he all but ordered the team to stay. He knew the message it would send. If the NFL abandoned New Orleans, then America had abandoned New Orleans. Someone had to be there to stand up for this city and its people. Who better to do that than the man in charge of America’s biggest sporting obsession?

Last night was Paul Tagliabue’s gift to the people of New Orleans and the survivors of Katrina. Decades of heartbreak, frustration and empty promise finally faded into the background. Sean Payton rolled the dice and won. Drew Brees played the game of his life — a game that the leadership in Miami or San Diego didn’t think he could still deliver four years ago. And in one fell swoop, Tracy Porter and his terrible haircuit turned the Super Bowl on its head.

If Paul Tagliabue had not stood up for New Orleans, would we have all lived through this Twitter-smashing moment? Would we be celebrating with a city that was nearly left to die four and half years ago and is still rebuilding today?

In the last four years, the Saints have come to embody the spirit of New Orleans. That spirit might not be there today if it weren’t for the NFL encouraging us to “Be a Saint.” That is Paul Tagliabue’s legacy. His leadership made last night’s celebration possible. With so much talk of the NFL disappearing in 2011, perhaps Tagliabue’s successor would do well to remember the importance of that kind of leadership.

Of course, just as soon as I make some exceedingly inane remark about shiny trophies, we get this monstrosity from the Russian Football Federation. This trophy, which goes to the club who has the best combined finish in the Russian Premier League and its equivalent youth competition, is made of almost 44,000 diamonds and 2.5 kilograms of gold. Yet somehow, it cost only $1 million to make, prompting Kobe Bryant to feel a sudden pang of buyer’s remorse.

And the bald dude in the reflection? He judges. Quietly.

This information comes to us from Yahoo’s brand-spanking new soccer blog Dirty Tackle, a gig that Brooks Peck got because A.) he’s very entertaining, and B.) I’ve been phoning it in for the last 18 months and still don’t have a plan for the future. But pretty much A.

Since I’m still phoning it in, though, here’s some other football-related stuff you should be reading:

• Every possible storyline for Super Bowl XLIV, and then some. [NFL Fanhouse]
• The annual Madden sim has the Saints winning by 10. No word yet on what Tecmo Super Bowl predicts. [Shutdown Corner]
• The Colts’ biggest fan? Jared. Way to go, Indianapolis. [The Sporting Blog, which, by the way, is all over this Super Bowl like white on Zenit St. Petersburg rice.]
• Memo to bakeries: don’t give the icing gun to people who know nothing about football. [Cake Wrecks]
• Anthony Bourdain takes on Miami cuisine. Sort of. [Kissing Suzy Kolber]
• Jason Whitlock thinks NFL owners are foolish for even considering a lockout. He missed the part where the TV networks have to pay the owners in 2011 whether there’s a season or not, and wealthy men don’t stay wealthy by doing things that make them less money. [Fox Sports]
• Online betting in the USA is still technically illegal. And really sketchy. [Shutdown Corner]
• Drew Brees points out how the NFL is attempting to use the courts to become a single entity, rather than 32 separate teams. Kind of like Major League Soccer, come to think of it. [Washington Post]
• A complete list of soccer podcasts. And there’s a whole hell of a lot of ‘em, too. [EPL Talk]
• Royal Bank of Scotland has apparently had it up to here with Tom Hicks and George Gillett. [The Independent]
• The head of the Confederation of African Football banned Togo from the African Cup of Nations, just weeks after Angolan separatists sprayed machine gun fire at the Togolese team bus, killing 3 people. Here’s why he should resign after such an appalling decision. [Pitch Invasion]
• That whole thing John Terry getting his teammate’s girlfriend pregnant? He was just following John Harkes’ lead. I suspect it’s far less likely that England’s World Cup gets ruined over this. [Dirty Tackle]
• Brian Phillips is working on something awesome. Can’t wait to see it. [The Run of Play]
• Oh, by the way, the NAB Cup begins in a week. Are you ready for some footy? [AFL.com.au]

You might have seen my name pop up on EPL Talk recently — specifically for this piece about the Green & Gold protests at Manchester United. I’ll be contributing a bit more to EPL Talk and its sister site, Champions League Talk, over the next few months. My first piece for Champions League Talk takes a look at why the Champions League Final has become a bigger game than the Super Bowl — although the gap between their average audience figures (109M to 106M) is actually pretty small.

Check out those shiny trophies, though. Who wouldn’t want to leave their fingerprints all over either of those?

One day, we’ll have our grand underdog story again in a major football final. Just not right now. The stars have all aligned once again to give us another all-Goliath final.

It happened last May in Rome, when Spanish champions Barcelona met English champions Manchester United in the UEFA Champions League Final.

It happened in Melbourne last September, when the St. Kilda Saints and Geelong Cats, quite clearly the two best clubs in the AFL all season, gave us an epic Grand Final.

And it will happen again in Miami, when Indianapolis Colts, clearly the best team in the AFC, meet the New Orleans Saints, clearly the best team in the NFC, in Super Bowl XLIV.

Don’t think for a moment that these aren’t the two best teams in the NFL, either. There were no worthy challengers in the AFC, and whatever argument the Minnesota Vikings had vanished in a haze of fumbles and turnovers. Back in November, when these teams were both 8-0 and we absurdly spoke of runs at history, there was plenty of talk that Colts v. Saints would be the best possible matchup, the game we wanted to see.

And you know what?  We do want this. For all our big talk about Hoosiers and Joe Namath guarantees and Bloody Hell! Wimbledon beat Liverpool!, there’s something just as appealing in seeing the two best teams battle it out to determine who will be champion. Yes, we as fans have our allegiances to teams that ultimately fell by the wayside on this path, but we’re also fans of these football games, and what could be more compelling to us as fans than #1 v. #2 for all the marbles?

We will still dream of the improbable and revel in the glories of past upsets, but if we’re honest with ourselves, we’ll tell you we want to see two Goliaths battle it out, too. The spectacle is just as grand, and ultimately, it makes us appreciate the underdog stories just that much more. Besides, if upsets happened all the time, wouldn’t they start to smell a little funny?

Let’s be fair. This is not the worst thing Prince has ever written. If you dig around the Crystal Ball collection or The Rainbow Children for a while, you’ll find a few things more unbearable than this. Plus, the man did give us the best Super Bowl halftime show ever.

That said, is this a “fight song”? Is this supposed to rally the troops? Would this make a Vikings fanatic like, say, Drew Magary want to run through a brick wall? I’d say no. Fight songs have some energy to them. This is more like an alma mater, complete with alma mater-ish lyrical oddities.

the eyes say ready 4 battle
no need 4 sword in hand
we r all amped up like a rock n roll band
ready 2 celebrate every score
ready 2 fight the elegant war
ready 2 hear the crowd roar
that’s what we came 4 and so much more
in the name of the purple and gold

It’s a bit more modern that “Gloriana, Frangipana, e’er to her be true,” but the vibe is pretty much the same. I get more pumped up hearing Brett Favre sing “Pants on the Ground.”

Prince seems better suited toward writing party songs, love songs and the occasional socio-political commentary — no fronting on “Money Don’t Matter 2 Night,” please — than a fight song for a football team. Let’s just hope he doesn’t try to put this up against what U2 & Green Day did in New Orleans a few years ago. Bono’s a total dick about copyright, but at least he picked a song that got the crowd completely psyched:

(Hat tip to Joe Ovies for the heads-up. Video from The Huffington Post.)

My interest in the NFL playoffs seems to have hit an all-time low.

I’m still paying attention, of course, but aside from being utterly transfixed by that shootout in Arizona, I haven’t actually been watching all that much. Saturday’s Wild Card playoffs were mostly background noise in my living room, while the Ravens’ win over the Patriots on Sunday seemed like a good time to go run errands.

And why not? I’m a Steelers fan. The Ravens and the Pats are the last two teams I want to see in a playoff game. If my team were playing one of them, that would be a different matter, but the Steelers’ season is over. I’m pretty sure most Washington Redskins fans weren’t so interested in watching that Cowboys-Eagles game on Saturday night, either. (Assuming Daniel Snyder hasn’t browbeaten their love of football out of them all together, of course.)

Football has always been tribal like this. This is our club, and these are our colors, and we will fight to beat your club and your colors. We love the Packers, screw the Vikings. We support Arsenal and want to kick Tottenham arse. Carlton rules, Collingwood drools. It’s a battle without a war, games in the place of guns, a fulfillment of primal urges that doesn’t leave massive scars upon civilization. This is why we express so much shock whenever real guns come into play, either by choice or by circumstance. We don’t want actual war to intrude on our tribal skirmishes.

It’s also why I was puzzled at some of the comments I read on blogs discussing the whole USL-NASL brouhaha.

It seems there’s at least a small contingent of people out there who think that there should be no other soccer league in America except Major League Soccer. Here are a few samples taken from MLS Talk and The Kartik Report:

“MLS is still trying to build itself into one of the top leagues in the world. We are getting there, but aren’t there yet. The NASL by invoking nostalgia for a failed league that bought big foreign players but left behind tons of debt threatens that. USL threatens that by signing MLS players to contracts that include free loaner cars and paid rent/apartments.

“MLS is the league we should all be following and investing our time and effort into. The investors that put money into USL or NASL are hurting MLS. Can you imagine if we could bring that money into MLS as well? It could be such a fantastic league.”

“MLS is our league and only by supporting the established brand does soccer get stronger. USL has always been an annoying little neighbor with fans who say “look at us, look at us.” but finally instead of continuing to dress up an ugly step sister, we are rejecting her entirely and sending away for good.

“I also call on CONCACAF to suspend all current and former USL clubs from the Champions League. We do not need a hard earned MLS spot being taken away again by an annoying Puerto Rico Islanders team that played 180 minutes of anti-football to defeat a superior TFC side.”

“Neither league ought to be in business and it would be good if those who have supported USL for years focused on MLS this year, with viewership and attending games. Together with one league we can move forward.”

Now, on some level, I suppose I can see this tribalism extending to leagues. It happens with college conferences in America — ACC v. Big East, Big Ten v. Pac-10, etc.

That said, I cram to understand why soccer fans in America are supporting leagues over clubs, or why these MLS fans feel so threatened by the existence of another league. Is the Premier League threatened by the existence of the Coca-Cola Championship? Hell, is the NFL threatened by the existence of the UFL? There are multiple football, baseball, basketball and hockey leagues all over this country. But no, MLS should be the be-all and end-all of soccer in America.

These people annoy me, because they’re basically saying that my local club, the Carolina Railhawks, doesn’t deserve to exist, and neither do any of the other pro soccer clubs in North America — unless they pony up $40 million and build a stadium to join MLS. They’re basically saying, “I support this specific corporate structure over yours,” oblivious to the fact that there’s plenty of room for both.

If the NFL suddenly went bankrupt tomorrow — I know, I know, work with me here — do you think its member clubs would just give up and go out of business? Of course not. The clubs themselves would reform and figure out a way to keep going, and their fans would continue to support those clubs. They wouldn’t say, “Oh, no, we support the NFL, and if you’re not in the NFL, you don’t deserve to exist.” Well, what happens if the NFL doesn’t exist anymore? Does pro football just die? Of course not. It remakes itself and moves forward, just as it always has.

I don’t care what league my team plays in. I’m going to support my team. The league itself is merely the structure that facilitates the tribes, not the tribe itself. That’s why I care about what’s happening in the lower divisions of American soccer, because that’s what impacts my club, and I want my club to succeed. The league in which they play is ultimately irrelevant. Why try to force people to be fans of a race in which they have no horse?

It’s also I’m not paying much attention the NFL playoffs this year. Maybe if I had an urge to gamble on games, I’d care more, and I’ll still watch the Super Bowl, but as it stands, my tribe’s season is over. I’m waiting till next year. So it goes.

And the best part about it? I didn’t buy it. It was a Christmas gift.

Sure, I did have to buy all my HDMI cables and throw $100 at DirecTV to get my set-top box upgraded, and my satellite bill will jump as well, but the TV itself? Didn’t cost me a dime.

There’s a lesson in this for Chris Johnson. Going into the final week of the NFL regular season today, the Tennessee Titans running back needs 128 yards to reach 2,000 rushing yards in a single season. Johnson, however, may or may not be hedging on the gifts he buys his linemen this year. Last year, he bought his linemen 55″ flat-screen HDTVs for helping him gain 1,200 yards. This year, he reportedly said he would buy them all cars — except then he said he wouldn’t.

“I never promised any cars. I said the offensive linemen wanted cars if I got 2,000 yards. I never promised anything like that. I’ll have to think of something nice.”

You can imagine why he’d be hesitant. Even if he only spends $25K on each of his five starting linemen, that’s a $125K outlay — no small chunk of change, even for the future first pick in every fantasy draft next season.

This is proof, however, that Johnson has yet to learn the first rule of being rich: Don’t spend your own money to get stuff.

This is how rich people stay rich. They get other people to buy stuff for them. You think those Hilton and Kardashian girls spend their own money on those expensive clothes? Hell, no. They convince designers that they have influence in the marketplace, and those designers fall all over themselves to give them free stuff.

Take a look at Malcolm Glazer. When it came time for him to buy Manchester United, he didn’t spend a dime of his own cash. He financed the whole deal, and he’s letting the fans pay for it. Sure, the fans aren’t happy about it, but did that keep them away from Old Trafford today for a 3rd-round FA Cup tie? Of course not. Glazer knows the fans aren’t going to stop supporting a club that’s in contention for major and minor trophies every year. Why not let those fans buy the club for him?

(Of course, the fans won’t be there for a 4th-round FA Cup tie, but there you go.)

Johnson is on the verge of becoming only the sixth running back in NFL history to rush for 2,000 yards in a single season. That’s easily worth at least a million in endorsement cash. That is the money that would pay for those Escalades for his linemen, and there would be plenty left over to help him through the seemingly inevitable 2011 work stoppage. All he has to do is show up for a few commercials, and voila! The linemen get theirs, Johnson keeps his paychecks, and everyone’s happy.

That’s how you do it in the 21st century, folks. You build your reputation, and other people will pay for it. 2,000 yards is all the reputation Johnson needs to get that sweet, sweet endorsement cash — and if he can’t turn 2,000 yards into seven figures, he needs a new agent. The economy might be bad, but it’s not that bad.

So let me get this straight.

Jim Caldwell leads the Indianapolis Colts to a 14-0 record, a rarity for any NFL head coach, let alone a rookie head coach, and he remained anonymous. Caldwell could have walked into the White House wearing a Colts hat and a sandwich board that read “HI, I’M JIM CALDWELL,” and even President Obama would have asked, “Who?”

Then, once the Colts had clinched home field advantage in the AFC playoffs, Caldwell decides to bench his starters midway through the 15th game, and the Colts lose.

And now everyone knows who he is? And they’re all blasting him for not chasing history?

Sure, there’s a part of me that hates his decision, too, since it made the Pittsburgh Steelers’ improbable shot at the playoffs that much more improbable. (Then again, does a team that lost to Cleveland, Oakland and Kansas City, three teams that are a combined 12-33, really deserve a playoff berth?) Houston Texans fans are pissed, too, as are all those football fans who would love to see Mercury Morris shut his mouth for once. Plus, at least one crazy Jets fan is probably wishing he had kept his mouth shut…

But let’s at least be honest about a few things here. For starters, Mercury Morris won’t stop yapping until he’s dead. Plus, how much did going 16-0 help the Patriots two years ago? Did they walk away with the Lombardi Trophy? In the end, what matters more — winning every single game in a season, or winning that one big game at the end of the season?

We know where Michael Irvin stands on this, but I suspect he’s in the minority. In the end, history will remember those 2007-08 Patriots as losers when it mattered most. Show me a Pats fan who wouldn’t trade that 16-0 regular season for a Super Bowl ring, and I’ll show you someone who doesn’t understand the NFL. Without looking it up, can you say how many teams had better records than the Steelers the season they won Super Bowl XL? I can’t, because it doesn’t matter. In the NFL, the destination matters far more than the journey.

If Caldwell’s Colts had won every regular season game and lost in the playoffs, we’d all say, “Same old Colts, always winning the regular season and nothing else.” By ending it now, Caldwell can refocus the Colts on the real goal, which is winning the Super Bowl. If he accomplishes that, all this 19-0 nonsense will be forgotten. There’s a big difference between perfection and greatness. If you can’t see which one is more important in this league, then I can’t help you, man.

At the age of 36, Ryan Giggs should probably be out of club football and in the announcer’s booth with Jon Champion by now. Yet there he is on the pitch for Manchester United, still scoring, still setting up his teammates and still contributing at the highest levels. He’s even winning awards for his longevity.

So what do these two geezers have in common beyond thriving past their expiration dates? Would you believe it’s yoga?

As the Guardian mentioned yesterday, Giggs has been practicing Hatha Yoga since 2003, and many believe that this has healed Giggs’ dodgy hamstrings and prolonged his career. Some have also suggested that yoga has helped shift Giggs’ reputation from typical party-boy footballer to mystical Premier League shaman — even though Giggs himself calls it “just stretching really.”

Williams, of course, would suggest it’s a little more than that. After all, he stumbled upon yoga when he disappeared into the California hills a few years ago, and he became a dedicated yoga practitioner and instructor. When he made his comeback two seasons ago — mostly because of that $8.1 million judgment the Dolphins held over him — he showed he hadn’t lost much of the rushing power that won him the Heisman Trophy at Texas in 1998. Perhaps he’s more centered now. Perhaps his body is just that much bendier than everyone else’s and can take the punishment. Either way, he’s making an impact at an age when most running backs (*cough* LaDainian Tomlinson *cough*) are too beat up to compete anymore.

When Williams has no further debt to the Dolphins, he’ll probably disappear into the hills again, where he can teach yoga — and perhaps resume smoking weed — all he wants and not worry about any billionaires’ lawyers knocking on his door and asking for a refund. Giggs probably won’t follow him up there, but if the two of them ever meet for a salad and a toke, someone really ought to be there to film the conversation.

Maybe I should have a chat with my buddy Elsie about this. I could use something to help me be a better blogger in 2010.

Meet Nyrel Sevilla. He’s six years old, and he’s here to knock your sorry ass into next week, bitch. And unlike Ben Roethlisberger, he’ll never have any trouble playing with a concussion.

Here’s a quick glance at some other stories worth reading:

• The Saskatchewan Roughriders lost the Grey Cup when Montreal’s missed field goal was negated by Calgary having too many men on the field. Montreal made their second field goal attempt, and the quest is on to scapegoat the 13th man. [Canada.com]
• Hines Ward’s comments on concussions makes the Steelers look far worse than they’ve looked on the field lately. [The Sporting Blog]
• Merrill Hoge has a slightly different take on concussions. [NFL FanHouse]
• Premier League CEO Richard Scudamore wants to kick your filthy pirate ass off the Internet for using Justin.TV to watch Stoke v. Burnley. Don’t expect him to offer a legal alternative anytime soon. [Techdirt]
• Can legal gambling and football co-exist in the wake of match-fixing scandals? [Pitch Invasion]
• Grahame Jones lays into the FIFA executive committee, calls them “rogues and villains,” tells us nothing we didn’t already know and can’t really change. [L.A. Times]
• Lionel Messi wins the Ballon d’Or. Predicting the sunrise was tougher than predicting that. [The Offside]
• MLS will give commissioner Don Garber a sweet contract extension on one condition: he gets the new collective bargaining agreement done during the offseason. Any more grenades y’all wanna toss on that powderkeg, MLS owners? [WVHooligan]
• The Rochester Rhinos have bolted USL for the new NASL. This is rather big, and I will write more about it very soon. [Triangle Offense]

And since this site still has extensive links that cover football’s origins and evolution, here are a couple of interesting pieces about that.

• Aston Villa pays tribute to William McGregor, the Scotsman who came up with the idea of a “football league” back in 1886. I’d say that idea was a success. [BBC]
• Here’s another look back at the gridiron game a century ago, when nobody wore any padding and players were killed regularly. Hines Ward would have loved it. [Every Day Should Be Saturday]