A Kinder and Nicer NFL?
Are any of you buying the new crisis management public relations campaign by the NFL, “Together We Make Football”? The NFL has been pushing commercials that make them look like AT&T or Hallmark. Problem is, I don’t think many are falling for the new kinder and gentler NFL. The whole reason they have to clean up their act is that there have been so many bad actors in NFL with behavior stretching from bad to criminal that they had no choice but to look like they cared. And rather than really take a look at the behavior and get rid of bad players, they have them do the classic “mea culpa” like Ray Rice after he beat his fiancée unconscious, they go away for a little while either by due process or the NFL hides them until they can bring them back. Keep in mind this is only done for the high price tag players. If you are Joey, the water boy your butt burns on its own with no help from the team or NFL.
I believe the crisis management team that was probably hired by the NFL believes all they have to do is air some touchy feely commercials and fans, in particular women, will ignore the horrible record the NFL has when it comes to dealing with real issues such as spousal abuse in the Ray Rice’s case where he beat his wife until she was unconscious in the view of an elevator camera. Or we have the alleged cheating coming out of the New England Patriots with Brady’s Deflategate. The Vikings have had to deal with Adrian Petersons scandal when he was indicted for beating his 4 old son until he was bloody, under the auspicious of corporal punishment. And nobody, no matter how much they try, has forgotten about Michael Vick and his abuse of animals in his dog fighting scandal.
And you know what every one of these men have in common? They are still working in the NFL. They are still getting paid the big bucks and they are still bad role models. Women make up 45% of the people watching football every week during the season. Do you think any of us are saying, “Thank God they saved him from a nasty court case, the team would have suffered badly if he was gone”. With all of the huge sums of money in professional sports these days, the owners and coaches and yes the players seem inept at making stronger changes to their behavior clauses in their contracts and really throw the bad out. Have one or two of these guys lose their jobs for good. Fire them! I bet that sends a message! Because now the message out of the NFL is, if you get caught doing an illegal act like shooting your buddy or beating your kid or girlfriend, we will get you out of the mess and write you check for playing.
I can’t think of any other employment circumstance that would keep men like this on their staff. Oh yeah except Hollywood but that’s a whole ‘nother Oprah.
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