Football Doesn't Have To Be This Violent, And Still Be Exciting

This book has a dual personality....but more on that later... I recently asked a fellow football nut: Do you watch football for the outstanding talent/plays, or the violence-and he immediately said the outstanding plays-and, indeed, the NFL has some of the most gifted athletes in the world-Who can forget the miracle one-handed catch by Odell Beckham Jr., just to name one-but his talent has been silenced this year because of the game's excessive violence-a major reason for writing this book....the violence undermines, rather than enhances football, both for the quality of the game, and for the majority of fans.... In a recent KC Chiefs game-Alex Smith made a particularly long run towards the end zone, a defender grabbed him around the waist and slammed him into the ground. Sorry I don't remember the game, but was in the 2017 season. The point is that this was an obvious "unnecessary roughness"-since Smith was out of the pocket, it wasn't a "roughing the passer"-but the penalty objective is the same-the penalty is to limit injury to players-and to lose a valuable quarter back is a collective loss-minimizing their injury is infinitely magnified in maintaining the quality of football It is possible the ref didn't see the play-no penalty was called-but it didn't add to the excitement of the game, and had Smith been injured-the game of football is diminished