With major controversy surrounding the NFL, Roger Goodell and the recently terminated Ray Rice, the NFL is moving like lightning to ease up on weed.
WHY?
Not why are they easing up, but Why Now?. The NFL drug policy has always been some convoluted, use in the off-season only, mixed message that is harshly used against weed abusers while front office alcoholics and oxy users engage in attempted homicide, choosing to drive while impaired. If that wasn't enough disciplinary confusion, the Ray Rice domestic violence incident encouraged an instant revision to the domestic violence standards, but it may have just forced the NFL to ease up on weed too?
Why would Goodell, the famously tough commissioner, give in so much on something he just recently punished so harshly for? An NFLPA (Players Association) vote is schedule for today (9-12-2014) and, if approved, is expected to be retroactive to players that are currently doing time for trace levels of recreational drugs (Browns receiver Josh Gordon tops that list of players). Players might be voting today, but collective bargaining typically only occurs when contracts have expired and work stoppage is pending.
If the NFL has given ground on this issue days after Goodell promised he didn't see the video, Goodell is essentially slapping his own hand from recent recreational drug punishments at the same time that he must get tougher on domestic violence, . Is this just a way to take the attention off of the other failed decisions that Goodell has made recently? More importantly, is it the right thing to do anyway?
Former NFL kicker and current NFLPA player representative, Jay Feeley, had his moment at the ESPN First Take desk today and his words made a lot of sense. Feeley explained how he personally couldn't relate to addicted players who continue to risk their livelihood for the sake of illegal drugs like marijuana, until the Jim Irsay situation shined a light on the matter for him. When Irsay, Indianapolis Colts owner, had to accept some form of punishment (what a joke) from his employee Roger Goodell, he was given 6 games of suspension from whatever owners who mix oxy and alcohol, do. I'm still wondering how exactly the Colts team was punished for the actions of its owner, but I am not confused about what the official statement was on the matter.
 |
| I'm not saying that Irsay has always looked like an abuser, but....okay, yes I am. |
"He is seeking help and he's done that voluntarily," Goodell said in March, a week after Irsay's arrest. "Obviously any policies or laws that are broken, whether they are commissioner, player or coach, those are subject to discipline." (cbssports.com)
Was Irsay disciplined? Sort of!
In actuality whether it was Irsay or each ruling against Rice, Goodell is walking a slippery slope that is so very slick, he can't keep from falling. Easing up on drugs right now is another slip by Goodell mostly because it is not driven by the correct motivations.
Reactionary governing is how America ended up with the welfare state.
Easing up on off season abuse, which is what raising drug testing levels will do, is not a great formula for encouraging players to voluntarily get help as Irsay was said to have done. Weaker testing policies will only benefit the current player practice of quitting just before the season begins and hoping that your detox plan will slip through testing. Now, only the guys who just can't quit for a few weeks before the test, will get caught up into this web, and even they are being given a test beating compromise that should keep many players currently in the league drug program, below the new allowable levels.
Addicted people can be detrimental to themselves and their teams, but that applies to people who are addicted to food, drugs, sex or themselves. What separates illegal recreational drugs from the rest of the addictive items I've listed is one word. Illegal.
The standard that we place upon people who get paid a lot of money for whatever they do in life has always been a bit skewed. The standard that we place upon athletes, especially NFL players, is moving into the realm of constitutionally illegal. Weed is typically seen as a poor man's drug, so the prevalence of it in the black community and among black athletes makes it an easy target for public disdain and distorted punishment. Alcohol, on the other hand, is socially accepted to the degree that we are much more comfortable with potentially murderous front office executives only losing 6 games for drunk driving convictions.
Did recreational drug users who play football actually need domestic violence to gain some slack?
Basically.
What that says about righteous discipline is that you had better quit playing football if you expect to get treated like an American citizen again. Thanks to Goodell and the NFL, constitutional law might soon get a few new case studies for consideration. Can a league legally flex their employment policy to meet whatever they consider to be public opinion? Ray Rice was punished already for his actions. Granted, he was never given the correct punishment, but he was punished. Even if the league decided to give him the result of the new policy, a policy that his wife beating helped to create; that new policy only called for 6 games on the first domestic violence offense, not an indefinite ban from the league. How can the NFL legally justify ignoring a rule that had been implemented less than a week prior?
Will Ray Rice force the NFLPA to stand up in his defense, and what will they say? Wife beating is not a collective bargaining agreement like drug testing. The domestic violence policy is one of those 'Goodell is god' things that he can place under the umbrella of "detrimental to the league". Detrimental behavior has suddenly become way too subjective to determine how Goodell might respond. Carolina Panther superstar player, Greg Hardy, is playing as we speak despite a domestic violence conviction that he is currently appealing. Apparently, the potential of winning an appeal is enough to keep you out on the field, so future offenders need to be preparing their appeal before they even commit the crimes.
Rice, who plea bargained his charges, falling on the mercy of the legal system, was forced to go get the help that he will need to correct the problem, while Hardy is functionally innocent in the eyes of the NFL until his appeal says otherwise. The Hardy story has only recently come to light so the question of whether public sentiment comes to bear on this issue, as it did on Rice, will be worth watching. If Hardy offends again while waiting on his appeal, then what? Is he still considered a first time offender?
Either Goodell is working on losing his job or instigating a big lawsuit between a player and the league. Nothing, except public disgust, is impacting the reason that Ray Rice has been banned from the league. If he is coordinating with the NFL to take a year away and help Goodell and the Baltimore Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti absorb the decision that (I believe) they all made to hide the worst of that video, than I do not expect Rice to sue either of his employers. Wait and see if Rice is not reinstated at the end of the season, and playing for the Ravens when he returns. Lawyers will line up to challenge the NFL treatment of Rice, while that same league turned a blind eye towards Hardy and many other players with domestic violence charges that are pending.
These changes to the drug testing policy were inevitable because they are in tune with our changing world. but the timing only diminishes the statement made by this noteworthy act of contrition. If changes are made to the manner in which players receive help for addiction problems as Feeley claims, than the NFL will complete the circle started by this initial action today.
Change is painful, and the NFL is struggling so badly with change that they keep creating their own set of work place laws that are totally different than most employers must adhere to. Up until now, we have allowed millionaire employee's to suffer at the hands of their billionaire employers because working for less than six figures a year doesn't naturally develop millionaire sympathy. When seemingly unfair NFL discipline felt like the right thing to do for the players themselves and the children who look up to them, we allowed it to happen.
Suddenly everything has changed.
Roger Goodell has quickly confirmed that the NFL is only concerned with its bottom line, and that America is so football obsessed the we will allow the NFL to be the only corporation in America that can randomly re-write employment policy (even retroactively) whenever their bottom line demands it?
Fantasy football has a totally new meaning.
No comments:
Post a Comment