LeBatard's column on Jason Taylor and playing with pain

[BillyT]

One of the other guys in the newsroom pointed this out to me his before I saw it here.

It's great when you have stuff like that and can present it as effectively as he did.

 

[Versatile]

As with many LeBatard columns, I'm left impressed by the writing and detail and underwhelmed by the perspective and intellectual rigor. Mere sympathy isn't much of an opinion, especially when, by the end of the column Taylor says he'd do it all again and he frowns on people who look after their health. LeBatard more or less genuflects -- as he often does -- at the altar of Pro Athlete, accepting all of his motivations, actions and conclusions as a product of a vicious world.

A better column -- heck, feature story -- says to Taylor point blank: OK, well, what about painkiller addictions? What about suicide? When you say you'd it all again, can you appreciate the message that sends to high school and college football players who aren't as smart as you are, or doesn't have the wife you do? If the game's really going to evolve, don't players have to start acting a little more responsible, and a little less like robots who take every order the franchise gives them?

Every story doesn't have to solve the world's problems. This column was excellent at what it attempted to be. That's only not enough if no one is pursuing those issues you mention. That's not the case.

Additionally, I think a lot of football fans like reading something like this without being lectured.

 

[Yodel]

I think this thread marks the first time I've heard LeBatard praised on this board.

 

[Big Circus]

Tard's the best. And this is one of his best.

"My first wife was 'tarded. She's a pilot now."

 

[Boom_70]

As with many LeBatard columns, I'm left impressed by the writing and detail and underwhelmed by the perspective and intellectual rigor. Mere sympathy isn't much of an opinion, especially when, by the end of the column Taylor says he'd do it all again and he frowns on people who look after their health. LeBatard more or less genuflects -- as he often does -- at the altar of Pro Athlete, accepting all of his motivations, actions and conclusions as a product of a vicious world.

A better column -- heck, feature story -- says to Taylor point blank: OK, well, what about painkiller addictions? What about suicide? When you say you'd it all again, can you appreciate the message that sends to high school and college football players who aren't as smart as you are, or doesn't have the wife you do? If the game's really going to evolve, don't players have to start acting a little more responsible, and a little less like robots who take every order the franchise gives them?

Every story doesn't have to solve the world's problems. This column was excellent at what it attempted to be. That's only not enough if no one is pursuing those issues you mention. That's not the case.

Additionally, I think a lot of football fans like reading something like this without being lectured.

Exactly. I much prefer a story that just puts it out there for me to decide and not come away feeling that writer is trying to skew my opinion.

I respect that Taylor said that even we all he had to go through he would do it all over again. In the SI story a few months back Earl Campbell said pretty much the same thing. I've also heard Harry Carson say that he bought all his grand-kids golf clubs so they would not play football.

I don't think it's the job of the player or writer to teach kids life's lessons. Would it have been a better message for Taylor to lie and say that he would not have played knowing what he knows now?

When all the steroids stories starting hitting in the last 80's most were encrypted with messages of how they did not help performance which really did not ring true and likely made teenagers pay less attention to the dangers than more. Teenagers do not want to be lectured.

 

[Azrael]

After 100+ years of football-as-American-character-builder bullshirt, maybe it's not a bad idea to occasionally call on sports writing to deliver a judgment about the actual cost of the thing.

 

[da man]

After 100+ years of football-as-American-character-builder bullshirt, maybe it's not a bad idea to occasionally call on sports writing to deliver a judgment about the actual cost of the thing.

Or maybe a writer can simply paint a vivid and accurate portrait of the actual cost of the thing and let the readers make the judgment.

Show, don't tell.

 

[Azrael]

After 100+ years of football-as-American-character-builder bullshirt, maybe it's not a bad idea to occasionally call on sports writing to deliver a judgment about the actual cost of the thing.

Or maybe a writer can simply paint a vivid and accurate portrait of the actual cost of the thing and let the readers make the judgment.

Show, don't tell.

Are the two approaches mutually exclusive?

 

[Boom_70]

After 100+ years of football-as-American-character-builder bullshirt, maybe it's not a bad idea to occasionally call on sports writing to deliver a judgment about the actual cost of the thing.

Seems arrogant. Personally not a big fan of that type of work. I feel the same when the local weatherman tells me to drive slow in the snow. Ok thanks.

I guess one school of thought is that sportswriters spent 100 years as the messenger, building up football as character building and it is their job now to tear down the notion.

I think the better message is to teach kids to properly disseminate the facts from fiction and think for themselves.

The Charles Barkley "I'm not paid to be a role model" rings true.

 

[Azrael]

Guess I'm not sure why it "seems arrogant" for someone to publicly express an opinion (ie., "football is dangerous and comes at a high price") that you assume people 1) already hold (ie. "football is dangerous and comes at a high price") or 2) will arrive at naturally when presented the same information (ie., "football is dangerous and comes at a high price.")

 

[Boom_70]

Guess I'm not sure why it "seems arrogant" for someone to publicly express an opinion (ie., "football is dangerous and comes at a high price") that you assume people 1) already hold (ie. "football is dangerous and comes at a high price") or 2) will arrive at naturally when presented the same information (ie., "football is dangerous and comes at a high price.")

I guess it depends on format. Not arrogant if it's in an opinion column of author but arrogant if message is cryptically buried in story.

 

[Rusty Shackleford]

I think this thread marks the first time I've heard LeBatard praised on this board.

I was thinking the same thing - I thought he was one of the Perpetually Ripped of SJ.