Reilly nails it

I didn't get that at all. I disagree with Reilly here, for the most part. But his point that it is the players, not the owners, putting their lives on the line is fair game.

He's not making a joke. He's making a point.
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I reread it, and you're right. I guess I'm too used to Reilly yukking it up.

Still, I think Reilly used an extremely serious issue to make a point that is trivial in comparison.

I didn't get the reference to a kid with a flower getting crushed by a tank either.

 

Owners are wealthy? Really?
There is a really interesting nugget in there - the thing about owners needing to build new stadiums. Aren't at least two-thirds of NFL stadiums less than 15 years old? I can only think of the Niners, Raiders, Chargers, Vikings and Bills that have an older stadium that hasn't had a significant upgrade. So what is the problem? I'm not advocating any owner operate a team like a charity for the good of a local municipality (I'm not that naive) - I'll settle for not soaking the taxpayers for a facility that most can't afford to get into on game days.
Hell - the only owners I can think of selling in recent decades are those that died or ran their personal wealth into the ground. I can't think of any that said "I just can't make money with this team."

 

Didn't strike me as much better than Magary's piece on the same subject from Deadspin. I'd hardly say anything was nailed.

 

Locking out a bunch of guys who made hundreds of thousands to tens of millions of dollars last year is unconscionable because of the economic climate?

Sounds to me like Mr. Cruise Control is not in touch with the economic climate at all.

There are a LOT of American corporations worth far more than the NFL, who have laid off many, many times more workers than the NFL is thinking about maybe-sorta not paying for six months or a year.

In attempting to connect with reality, the author shows how out of touch he truly is. He spends most of his time advocating for the players, when given his from-each-according-to-his-means thesis, he should be advocating for the concession workers, etc., whom he so gallantly mentioned for, what, a sentence or so.

 

You're not thinking it through completely. The people who would lose jobs wouldn't be just those employed by the team. Restaurants who cater to the game crowd around the stadium would cut staffs heavily plus parking attendants at parking lots/garages ... etc. The 3000 number is a pretty good rough estimate to me.

 

The only way I come across a Reilly column since he left SI is if someone posts a link here on SJ.

I suspect that a lot of really good writing on ESPN.com goes unnoticed because of the sheer volume of what is there.

Going to ESPN.com is comparable to the experience of walking into a Super Walmart store. Both can prove to be a daunting experience.

 

I know what you mean Boom. It's so hard to even FIND the writers that I like on that site, it's always playing video -- which I never, ever want to autoplay on any site -- and then half the stuff is Insider stuff anyway. Maybe that speaks poorly of me and my computer skills, but it's the truth. I often find it easier to find and read ESPN content by being linked to it by other websites.

 

It's an extremely well-written column by Reilly that reads quickly and it probably took him all of 30 minutes to write.

 

I hate when people say that - "the players are putting their life on the line."
Great. Guess what? That's their choice. It's the risk of the job, a job where they're paid a hefty sum of money.
Don't want to deal with the reprocussions of the job? Stay in school, get a degree, and go teach.

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"Love it or leave it" is never a very good argument for anything.

It creates a very slippery slope. By that argument, the owners can do anything they want -- ban helmets, increase the season to 82 games, slice salaries in half. Hey, you don't like it? Go do something else.

Your argument is carte blanche for owners to walk all over the players and say, "tough shit." Your argument in a nutshell (apparently) is that owners in the healthiest sport in the world -- with attendance and TV ratings and revenues and interest at an all-time high -- can tell the players, "Hey, we need you to pay us an extra billion dollars. Just because. Oh, and we want you to play two more games a year for free." And if the players don't like it, they can go back to school, get a degree and teach kindergarten?

Yowzer.

(Of course, what happens when they get the teaching gig, and find it to be grossly underfunded, and working conditions untenable? Don't complain. You CHOSE to be a teacher.)

Yes, football is a violent game that comes with hazards, but that doesn't mean the people who choose to play it for living aren't entitled to certain level of safety precautions, or to be compensated fairly.

 

So he put in double the workload on the one? (I kid, I kid ... sort of)

 

I like the column. I'm just saying he could have written it in his sleep and when someone is writing twice a week you expect a little more. I know he does other things too, and I really like that Homecoming show he does, although I've only seen it twice.

 

thread header is only one letter off: 'Reilly mails it' would be more accurate. ;D