As stated earlier this week, the initial shock of briefly bearing witness to “Kenny Loggins On Ice” last Sunday prevented me from being invested in any of the NFL playoff games that day. I kid. The Sunday paper was the real culprit. Apparantly, though, this whole Randy Moss episode has caused quite a stir. When I first heard about it, I really didn’t understand what all the fuss was about. To an extent, I still don’t. When I actually saw it, I just thought it was really quite funny. Sophmoric and crass, but funny. This should also give you, reader, an indication of the type of humor I appreciate, but that’s a subject for another time.
Now, word comes in that Moss has been fined $10,000 for the incident and now I’m thinking this is starting to reach ridiculous levels, despite what Joe Buck thinks. The NFL, despite it’s enormous popularity, fabulous business model and intelligent methods of maintaining parity (the latter two are intertwined, I suppose), continues to try and Orwell their players into becoming league robots. I suppose when this is really the only complaint about a professional sports league that one can think of, than an argument can be made that the league is doing a pretty good job overall, but really. Trying to mandate how players celebrate? It’s kind of makes the whole thing feel like Miss Garber’s science class in sixth grade (shout out to you Lancaster kids, yo). I wish the NFL would settle down a little bit. Personalities mean a lot. For the long term health of the game, I hope the NFL lightens up just a smidge and stops trying the whole “single-file line” stuff. Makes me think of the Ray Davies penned Kinks tune “Get Back In Line:”
҉۪cause when I see that union man walking down the street
He’s the man who decides if I live or I die, if I starve, or I eat
Then he walks up to me and the sun begins to shine
Then he walks right past and I know that I’ve got to get back in the line…”
An occasional funny celebration from T.O. or Moss isn’t going to kill anyone.
Now, if Moss had decided to actually drop trou, I can understand. Although I would have thought that to be even funnier, it would have been real cause for concern and certainly deserving of a fine. The whole story, however, took on some new light for me when I read this morning’s story about Moss’s reaction to the fine. His over-inflated ego and ignorance in commenting on the fine does more damage to the league, in my opinion, than a fake mooning does. Players have to be educated on watching what they say. Moss’s comments simply make him sound like an asshole, and the truth is that since the late 1980s, professional sports players live in a much different world than we do, one of untold and unimaginable riches, where pre and post-game attention is heaped onto them until they deem themselves completely worthy of anyone’s attention. That’s not a shocking statement, really – anyone with half a brain knows it. But to boast in public by reacting to a fine with the statement “What’s $10K to me?” among other things, that’s what should generate fines. $10K might not mean anything to him, but the amount of people that $10K actually does mean something to (see file: 98% of us), he’s turned them completely off. For those statements he made, I would have fined him again, only this time a cool million. See if he pays that in cash. Dumb ass.
In seperate news, I may have found my calling. Or not.