Skip to main content

The irony of ESPN's Michael Sam obsession

ESPN appears to have a rather bad track record when it comes to their NFL man-crushes. First there was Tim Tebow. During his year as the starting quarterback of the Denver Broncos, ESPN couldn't get enough of him. It even reached a point when I felt ESPN should change their name to ETPN, with "Tebow" replacing "Sports." Oddly enough, the former Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback has played in less NFL games than I've played games on the Atari (and no, I've never owned one). Then came Johnny Manziel, and while the rookie quarterback will likely start at some point in his career for the Cleveland Browns, he'll be riding the bench to at least start this season. Michael Sam is the latest man-crush for ESPN. Unfortunately for him, he didn't make the St. Louis Rams' 53-man roster and failed to make their 10-man practice squad as well.

In light of this bit of news, Ross Tucker of the NBC Sports Network tweeted, "Michael Sam performed much better than most expected and still isn't even on a practice squad?"

Buffalo Bills center Eric Wood then responded, "blame that on espn. No one wants the distraction"

Oddly enough, I wonder if Wood has a point, and it would quite sad if that were indeed the case. How ironic it would be that ESPN obsesses over a player and his story to the point when a team won't sign him because they want to avoid ESPN obsessing over this player and his story. ESPN would be, in essence, talking about the potential first openly gay player to play in the NFL to such an extent, they would prevent the first openly gay player from playing in the NFL.

Like Ross Tucker said, though, Sam did perform quite well in the pre-season, so hopefully another team gives him a chance, despite ESPN's obsession.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/01/michael-sam-espn-eric-wood_n_5749774.html

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Boycotting jukeboxes because of TouchTunes

I love music and enjoy hitting the bar(s) over the weekend, so naturally, when the mood strikes me, I've never been coy about playing some songs on the jukebox. This past Thursday, a friend of mine turned 50, so several friends of her's, including myself, all met up to celebrate the occasion. At around 9:30, a friend of mine and I both chipped in $5 to play some songs on the jukebox. Four hours and 231 skips later, we gave up on hearing the songs we had selected, and went home knowing we had just wasted $5. This wasn't the first time such a thing had happened to me (and many others), and due to that, I'll be boycotting jukeboxes. Why? The scam known as TouchTunes. You see, here's how the plot typically breaks down. A person (or group of people) downloads the TouchTunes app on his/her phone, consumes one too many adult beverages, and due to this, has less care for spending extra money to hear the songs of their choosing right NOW. That's the thing with TouchTun...
2 comments
Read more

Face guarding is legal in college football and the NFL

I just wanted to remind fans and announcers especially, that face guarding is legal in both college football and the NFL. It all comes down to contact. So long as a defender doesn't make contact with an intended receiver, he doesn't have to turn around to play the ball. I can't tell you how many times every week I hear announcers talk about face guarding being a penalty. It's not. I even heard one announcer yesterday state, "If the defender doesn't turn around and play the ball, the ref will call pass interference every time." That's simply not true. Courtesy of referee Bill LeMonnier, he says this with regard to the rule at the college level (answered on 8/12/13): "NCAA rules on pass interference require the face guarding to have contact to be a foul. No contact, no foul by NCAA rules." In the NFL rule book, this is written:  "Actions that constitute defensive pass interference include but are not limited to: (a) Contact by a ...
2 comments
Read more