Fox Sports' Jen Floyd Engel: Manziel is the new Rosa Parks

It just seems like the qualifiers weren't to explain herself but rather only as a shield from the hell she had to know was coming.

In her original tweet last night promoting the column, she calls JFF a "modern-day Rosa Parks."

 

For the record, I wouldn't have written it. I think that you have to thread the needle way too precisely to make what is a valid point.

 

Again, not having read it, I wonder if any qualifiers might have been put there by an editor rather than the writer.

 

The new way: Write it, post it, let copy desk (if there is one) scramble to make fixes or do damage control.

The old way: Writer discusses column idea with editor. Editor does his or her job. Really bad ideas are pointed out and headed off at the pass before collecting eyeballs. Column not written.

This was not breaking news posted in the service of the almighty "immediacy." This was a bad column begging for an editor to save it from itself.

 

Any journalist -- even one writing a column -- who calls him Johnny Football loses points with me. Use the dude's name.

 

One of the biggest problems with trying to make Manziel the tipping point or agent of change for any college football reform is you have to completely overlook what a douchebag he clearly is. People who want to blow up the sham of amateurism in this country (and I'm probably in this group) are pretending like he could be John Carlos or Tommy Smith. The reality is, he's a fratty rich punk with a popped collar and selfish streak a mile long. Use someone else to saddle up for your cause, folks. This dog won't hunt. He's too drunk and he's busy asking Uncle Nate to lick his balls.

 

I don't know that it matters what Manziel's intentions are. No one expects him to be making speeches on this. He's a cipher, yes. But he might be an accidental agent for change. That's the point.

 

An incredibly poorly made point.

 

Were there hundreds of people to do exactly what Rosa Parks did before her? Did those people happen to be Asian or Latino or something and receive the scorn of the black community?

 

It's naive to pretend like it doesn't matter. It is, in fact, the whole reason Rosa Parks is famous and not a 16-year-old pregnant girl who was actually the first person arrested for refusing to give up her seat. The NAACP didn't want that to be the face of change because they know people wouldn't rally around her, just like countless people on this board have been arguing Manziel should STFU and take his free education and enjoy daddy's oil money, because fuck him, ungrateful prick.

If this were Grant Hill at Duke saying "You don't own me or my name!" you'd see a lot more sympathy. As it stands, it's a losing battle with this kid as the face of your issue. Because he's not sympathetic or interested in any change, really. He probably just wanted money for a jet ski or some shit. And while I absolutely believe he should be able to have that money, you won't see the majority of people agreeing. It's a loser of an argument in the court of public opinion. Maybe in real court it works, but no one is rallying on behalf of this douche.

 

Rims on his truck, I believe.

 

Rims on his truck to drive his new jet-ski to the lake.