Ray Rice, Greg Hardy and Adrian Peterson will forever be bound to one of the darkest weeks the National Football League will, hopefully, ever have to address. The actions of these three men have forever changed how America looks at the NFL, its owners, and the players who compete every Sunday.
The NFL is coming off of a week in which the main storylines have been grown men beating women and abusing children. It makes me sick to my stomach thinking about how horrible this really is.
Ray Rice, ex-Baltimore Raven running back, was cut after a video surfaced of him punching his then fiancee in the face and dragging her around a hotel. Greg Hardy, Carolina Panthers defensive end, was sidelined after being convicted of two counts of domestic violence stemming from an incident in which he abused a former girlfriend and threatened her life. Adrian Peterson, Minnesota Vikings running back, was deactivated after “punishing” two different sons by beating them with a switch and causing damage to their faces, legs, and arms. Nothing justifies the actions of these men, and nothing justifies the lack of action made by the NFL and its owners.
What these men did was reprehensible and the lack of action NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has taken has only added to the embarrassment for the league. It has taken far too long for these players to be disciplined, but after much public outrage all three have been deactivated from their teams for now. The press conference this past Friday did nothing but confirm that Goodell has no intentions on giving true answers as to why it has taken the league so long to address these men and the terrible acts they have done.
Remember this: the NFL did not suspend Ray Rice indefinitely because he hit his then-fiancee and now-wife. He was suspended indefinitely because the public saw that he hit her. What only adds to this fact is how it has recently been reported that Baltimore Ravens upper management had reached out to Goodell right after the incident to ask for leniency towards Rice.
Watching Carolina Panthers owner Jerry Richardson epitomizes how these men are acting like frauds. Richardson was crying as he accepted the Echo Award Against Indifference. While he struggled through his speech, he said, “I stand firmly against domestic violence, plain and simple. To those who would suggest we’ve been too slow to act, I ask that you consider to not be too quick to judge.”
Too quick to judge? Considering that Hardy was convicted on June 15 and it took the team until week two of the regular season to take action, I’d say that we have plenty of justification to judge the character of Richardson himself and the entire Panthers organization.
The only way any of this might change is if the money starts to go. That’s the true underlying driver in everything these owners do. Some advertisers are starting to show signs that they are not pleased with being associated with a corporation that is so openly dismissing domestic violence.
The Minnesota Vikings reinstated Adrian Peterson after their week two loss to the New England Patriots. Just hours after Peterson was reinstated, the Radisson hotel chain pulled all of their advertising from the Vikings.
Anheuser-Busch also issued a statement to the NFL saying that they are “Disappointed and increasingly concerned by the recent incidents that have overshadowed the NFL season.” It’s disappointing that companies like Radisson and Anheuser-Busch will be the driving factors of change, not video and picture evidence. Unfortunately, the only way to get to the NFL and its owners is to hit them where it hurts the most: their wallets.
But what does this all mean for the average fan? Will all of these horrible incidents make them not watch on Sundays? Will it make them delete their fantasy football teams, put away their NFL apparel, and totally boycott the 1.5 billion dollar industry?
Probably not. The fact of the matter is that the NFL has become such a huge part of American entertainment that these incidents won’t slow it down. Three days after the video of Ray Rice knocking out his fiancee came out, the Ravens played the Steelers at home on Thursday night football. Throughout the crowd, countless fans were sporting Ray Rice’s #27 Ravens jersey. Fans couldn’t even stop supporting a man who viciously struck his fiancee; do you think they could stop supporting the whole sport? What was even worse was to see a Minnesota Vikings fan donning an Adrian Peterson jersey just days after news came out about him abusing his child. What put the image over the top was that she was carrying a tree branch, a switch, in her hand.
Mark Cuban famously predicted the demise of the NFL, saying, “Just watch. Pigs get fat, hogs get slaughtered.” Although it might not be time for its demise, the NFL, its owners and its players are starting to prove Cuban right: they are pigs.