With the NFL season well underway, Americans everywhere are filled with elation every Monday, Thursday and Sunday at the sight of one helmet hitting another.
It is a game where the most appealing aspect lays in the goal of the game.
Get the ball and hit everyone in your way.
The violence makes it entertaining, but it is not violence in the worst sense. It is violence the players signed up for. Violence that, for the most part, they are protected against, with pads, helmets, cushioned socks, it is all there.
It is understood that concussions and major injuries are prevalent within the highest echelon of the football totem pole, but that is okay, because they knew what they were signing up for. The game has become a matchup, not between one team and another, but rather a game between 32 football teams and the NFL, along with its officiating crews.
A prime example would be last week’s game between the Seattle Seahawks and the Buffalo Bills. Richard Sherman was fined by the NFL $9,115 for a hit on the Buffalo Bill’s kicker Dan Carpenter. Although there was sufficient video evidence that Sherman touched the ball first before laying into the kicker, he was still fined. The initial flag was for being offside, but referees stated that Sherman should have been fined for unnecessary roughness.
Frankly, I feel as though the NFL is initiating too many rules that limit the game to a controlled state. This controlled state of play limits the game from being played how it is supposed to. Players are supposed to play as hard as they can, as fast as they can and as rough as they can in order to make sure they are the ones heading into the locker room at the end of the game with a smile on their faces.
If things continue the way they are, football may cease all together in the future. It could be deemed “too violent” or “unsafe” to play. These men are paid millions of dollars to play a game, that in their mind; they know it is a risk.
Life is made up of risks and when you are passionate about a sport, you take those risks in order to fulfill your full potential.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the writer and are not representative of The Slate or its staff as a whole
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