Posted on 10/16/2017 8:03:08 AM PDT by Kaslin
Y.A. Tittle died last week. A Hall of Fame quarterback for the New York Giants, he is best known for the taking a knee on a football field. Actually, it was two knees.
In September 1964, the Giants were facing the Pittsburgh Steelers at old Pitt Stadium. Tittle was 38 years old and at the tail end of a 17-year professional career. He had led his team to three straight NFL Championship Games, in ’61, ’62, and ’63, but did not win.
In the game against the Steelers, he dropped back into his own end zone to throw a pass. He was viciously knocked to the ground and his helmet flew off. The pass was intercepted for a touchdown.
He struggled to his knees and stared blankly into the open field, bleeding from his head. The other players backed off and left him to himself. At that moment, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette photographer Morris Berman snapped a picture.
It is among the greatest sports photographs ever taken. There is Muhammad Ali standing over Sonny Liston and Ben Hogan with his one iron at Merion’s final hole. But those are about achievement and victory. This is about the struggle to rise after being knocked down.
People watch the NFL to revel in such mythology. A game where redemption is purchased at a great physical cost serves as an allegory for the common man.
In the 1960s, American culture was fracturing along a fault line, with the common man on one side and scorn against his mores and values on the other. The league’s commissioner at the time, Pete Rozelle, chose to take the side of ordinary Americans in the raging culture war, because they were his natural audience. The league sent star players to visit troops in Vietnam and issued rules requiring players to stand upright during the playing of the National Anthem.
In 1967, the NFL produced a film that combined sideline and game footage titled, “They Call It Pro Football.” The film was unapologetically hokey. It was crew cuts and high tops and lots of chain smoking into sideline telephones. With a non-rock, non-folk, non-“what’s happening now” soundtrack, heavy on trumpets and kettle drums. John Facenda, who would come to be called “The Voice of God” for his work with NFL Films, provided the vaulting narration. The production began with the words, “It starts with a whistle and ends with a gun.” There was nothing Radical Chic about it.
The NFL surpassed baseball as America’s pastime with careful branding that conformed to the tastes and sensibilities of middle-class Americans – Nixon’s silent majority. A half century later, Roger Goodell would kill the goose that laid the golden egg.
In August 2016, America was experiencing a polarizing presidential election. San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick sat during the playing of the national anthem, to protest injustice. It was a politically divisive act directed at fans who regard the national anthem as something sacred. The league did not lift a finger to stop him.
Most employers don’t let their workers make controversial political statements to their customers. It is why you do not know your UPS driver’s views on the expansion of NATO. The Constitution does not prohibit private businesses from regulating speech during work.
A savvier commissioner would have reminded Kaepernick that he is being paid millions to wear the logo of the NFL, and the league does not permit players to use its brand to flaunt their personal politics. Instead, Roger Goodell permitted the pregame ceremonies to become the focus of intense political scrutiny, as the media lined up to catalog whether players stood, sat or knelt during the national anthem.
He knew, no doubt, that protesting the national anthem would be offensive to some people. With Hillary Clinton’s inevitable triumph looming, it was generally considered okay to offend those people. They would be described by Hillary Clinton a few days after Kaepernick’s protest as a basket of deplorables. The NFL was just pandering to the prevailing sentiment when it green lighted Kaepernick’s cause. Then Trump won.
The rule before Trump was that half the country had to endure any scold, put up with all name calling, and generally be treated like idiots by popular culture. The brilliant lights who made the rules never considered that scolding half the country may, in itself, have been divisive. And that people have been stewing about it for years.
When the 2017 seasons started, President Trump railed at the NFL for permitting the protests. Rather than back down, the NFL doubled down, employing the double speak of the cornered weakling. Try to imagine John Facenda speaking the words, “The NFL and our players are at our best when we help create a sense of unity in our country and our culture” – you can’t.
Television ratings have tanked. By permitting its games to become a forum for liberal politics, the NFL broke faith with its fan base.
Y.A. Tittle quit football after kneeling in the end zone and sold insurance. He hung Berman’s photograph in his office with the caption, “Nothing Comes Easy.” Last week, his death coincided with the end the NFL mythology he represented. The league is no longer a fanfare for the common man, an allegory about the struggle to get up after being knocked down.
It is easy to drop to one knee in a deliberate pose to protest something. Rising from two knees after spending yourself in a physical battle, that’s not so easy. It is why people watched, Roger.
Can’t put the genie back in the bottle.
The magic of the NFL is gone.
Back in an age when Men played the Game.
Turn off the lights the partys over...
Y.A. Tittle quit football after kneeling in the end zone and sold insurance. He hung Berman’s photograph in his office with the caption, “Nothing Comes Easy.”
I feel sad for the snowflakes, they have no men like this to look up to; DiMaggio, Tittle, Neil Armstrong... we had real heroes.
Goodell would suspend players over rules that didn’t even exist.
His unpredictability and liberal politics wrecked the league.
We might be reaching the point where an interesting dynamic will unfold. I'm sure many teams refused to bench talented players because they don't want to pay the price by losing on the field, but the NFL is getting to a point in the season where teams are dropping out of contention. I wouldn't be surprised to see a few teams start dropping some of their protesting players -- even star players -- to the inactive roster on game days.
Insane commie libs are very well-known to ALWAYS “kill the goose that lays the golden eggs”. They poison everything they touch. The NFL is just about a classic example as anyone would ever want to see.
Education, finance, religion, etc.....You name it, they’ve killed it.
The POSs belong in an insane asylum. They’re useless as teats on a boar hog.
I felt dirty. Like I had cheated on my country. Won't do that again.
Liberals conflate various issues here.
1. Liberals state that we have 1st amendment rights, freedom of speech, etc. and that the players are exercising their freedom of speech. Liberals do not state that the players are there “on company time” when at the game. Liberals make it sound as if none of us can say anything because of the 1st amendment. Liberals don’t seem to grasp that we customers/consumers/general public, also have freedom of speech to be critical of the players.
2. Liberals state that Trump has somehow initiated this situation. Kapernick was the first player, followed by others. Trump simply used his freedom of speech, to state his opinion. Liberals make is sound as if Trump somehow can fire NFL players. Of course he can’t, the players work for the individual teams. The liberals make it sound as if Trump somehow is chilling freedom of speech.
3. Liberals bring race into it, because the players are protesting the whole canard about cops shooting black men for no reason. And it seems almost all protesting players are black. The liberals being the way they are, equate any opposition to a cause pushed by members of minority groups as racism or bigotry.
4. The liberals don’t seem to understand, that while we have freedom of speech, the rest of us who hear and see this freedom of speech also have our freedom of speech, to disagree with whatever cause is being pushed by protesters of all stripes.
What else are libtards known for? They could literally screw up a rock fight...
They should not be getting tax breaks, plain and simple.
I had to look the picture up ...... link:
http://newsinteractive.post-gazette.com/thedigs/2012/10/29/y-a-tittle-agony-of-defeat/
“The NFL and our players are at our best when we help create a sense of unity in our country and our culture”
I’m not even sure I understand what that is supposed to mean.
“Can’t put the genie back in the bottle.
The magic of the NFL is gone”.
Yep, it’s ruined and spoiled forever.
Nothing they try will be sincere and people know it.
Disagree. The NFL owns the game. Their rules are followed by the owners.
FLASHBACK: NFL Banned Teams From Honoring Murdered Cops; Threatened Players Honoring 9/11
No matter the outcome, I’m done with NFL. I won’t watch a bunch of players who are forced to stand for the national anthem. It’s too late, I already know how they feel about my country.
Indeed. A good idea to live by.
“The NFL has no authority to discipline players over this crap.”
That’s an ignorant statement since you have not read all the involved contracts and agreements.
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