Tolstoy

Good point. I think there are differences, but even if we ignore them, note that smoking has become shamed everywhere you go, and especially by the media. You certainly won't see major corporations (other than the tobacco companies, of course) willing to become associated with smoking. So too, I suspect that once football and its violence are seen to be a severe health risk, the sponsors will begin to pull their support.

I'm not sure how I missed this latest incident of brain trauma, but read this from CNN. Read it! It is frightening: http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/04/01/brain.concussion.dronett/index.html?hpt=C2 Here, friends, is the real reason that the NFL came down on head-shots last year. The owners are scared, very scared, that their money train is coming to an end, and they know the real cause. Of course, the latest pathetic crusade against head shots would have done nothing to save Shane, and I suspect the owners know that. They are just feeding the illusion that tackle football is a fine and healthy sport, and it is just the violent rule-breaking miscreants who make it unsafe. What I can't figure out is why the Players Association (or should I say "former" players association, since the NFLPA has disbanded, and the poor players are now simply a group of defenseless individuals being preyed upon by the greedy monopoly that is the NFL owners) are not up in arms about this. Is it perhaps that their money train would end too, and they have no other choice of profession at this point? Shane was 39 years old. Professional football as we know it will come to an end soon. The NFL will suffer massive lawsuits from former players who have dementia and brain injury, as well as their families. Parents will not enroll their children in the sport once these findings are confirmed. The NFL will try to implement various and sundry protections, but it is the very nature of the sport (the constant sub-concussory hitting) that is the problem. The outcry of the media will be incessant. Unless football goes "touch," it will end. Just wait.

Here is a happy thought! If the NFL were to miss an entire season (which I highly doubt), and the Bills were to pick 3rd, we would have a very, very good shot at Luck! It may well be that at least one or two other players creep ahead of Luck after an entire year of college football (or the two teams ahead of us might not be interested in QB as a top priority).

I acknowledge that the writing seems a bit choppy, but I think that is by intention, to give it a certain tone. I am not an avid reader of Rolling Stone, but often have been very, very impressed by the writing quality when I have had the chance to read it. For example, I am a religiously sensitive person (and rather conservative) but one of the funniest things I have EVER read was an article several years back in which Matt Taibbi infiltrated John Hagee's Christian organization. I think it was called something sacrilegious like "Jesus Made Me Puke." I tried to find it, but I think it is in their archives, and I'd have to pay money to get it.

I am not sure that we should assume that he will go #1 next year. He may not have as great a season, or get injured, or other great players might show up (QB, DE, OL, RB) etc. In other words, we might not need to be first in the draft order to get Luck. Having said that, I'd be surprised if he dropped lower than #5. I have to say that his decision only heightens my respect for him. I am a college professor, and take education seriously. I am really pleased by the message this sends to young kids in America.

And you sound a bit like a guy who spends all his time at the bars, my friend. More books, less movies for you. It will be good for you.

It is amazing to me. This guys gets praised for citing a Hollywood movie. I get lampooned for telling him to read two books on the nature of a Liberal Arts education after he suggested such an education is less than praiseworthy. I can laugh at myself and the irony of this whole situation. It really is funny, given my original point in this thread.

Not quite sure I understand your response. But that is ok.

Hold on a minute, "dude." Back up. Did you just associate "majoring in liberal arts" with a "football factory school education"????? I'm not sure where you are coming from here, but a degree in literature, theology, or philosophy, to me, is an intellectual achievement. I will not stoop to denigrating other disciplines, but anyone who studies the seminal ideas of our intellectual tradition, and who learns to think, read, write, and speak, as required for a degree in the liberal arts, is an educated person of the highest order. Any idea why they are called "Liberal" arts????? Go read Cardinal Newman's Idea of a University, or Joseph Pieper's Leisure: the Basis of Culture, and then we will talk. You just picked fight with the wrong "dude."

Right--I get that part. As the initial poster on this one, I just want to say that what bothered me were two things: (1) The claim that "what is most important" in the football locker room is that a player does not flaunt his academic achievements. He can flaunt other achievements, such as athletic achievements. He can wear his football achievements as a "badge of superiority" (this happens in every locker room), but God forbid he should seem in any way SMARTER than his mates. (2) The implicit assumption that having gone to Harvard does make you superior! In a strange and ironic twist, Chris Brown's remark about this shows that he at least does think that having gone to Harvard makes you superior, otherwise he wouldn't have even mentioned it as even worthy of a "badge of superiority." Who really cares where Fitx went to school? Maybe its just me, but I could really care less where you got your B.A. If you studied hard and got your B.A from Canisius or UB, you get just as much respect from me.

Here is what Chris Brown says in a recent report about Fitz: "Perhaps most important is even though Fitzpatrick comes with a Harvard pedigree, he doesn’t wear it like a badge of superiority." Just curious: why is this what is "most important?" Why is it more important than any other qualities? Why isn't it ok for him to be proud of his degree? What bothers me is that this country is so bloody egalitarian and anti-intellectual that we don't appreciate anyone's intellectual achievements. God forbid Fitz should let it be known that he has a Harvard degree (as if that is something he should strut around with for the rest of his life anyhow). No, he must act like a normal dummy because that is what is important. Getting along with the guys. Being one of the crowd. Stupid.

That is an unbelievable stat. First, it is a complement to P. Hillis. Second, it is a question: why are there more successful black running backs than white running backs?????

I have always been a "win now and don't worry about the draft" kind of guy. I have always believed that a team benefits itself more by digging deep within and finding a way to win, than getting (and squandering) high draft picks year after year. Winning builds a whole team, and enables all of its young players to develop their potential, while losing creates a sink-hole in which the greatest talent becomes worthless. Until now. I have watched some of Luck's games, and read the scouting reports. This kid is for real. The Bill's need to get this guy. In retrospect, are a couple of measly victories worth watching this kid lead another team to victory over the next decade???? I cannot believe that Carolina will beat us out on this one. The universe cannot be that unjust. Perhaps the lockout will alter the draft (or Luck won't come out). I will quit watching football if Carolina drafts Luck. I will devote myself full-time to soccer, which is a better game anyhow. Go ahead and rag on me. Fools! If the Bills lose luck, there is no God, there is no meaning to life, and when you die, there is nothing good to look forward to. The world is just governed by random chance, and there is no justice. I will have seen it, but the rest of you lemmings will be still following the losing Bill's franchise off of the cliff, ten years later--claiming "loyalty" to your team, and to "American football."

A nice piece on Jim Leonard, "the QB of the Jet's defense," one of the best defenses in the NFL. This guy was signed as an undrafted free agent by the Bills, wasn't he? Tough luck for him with the recent injury. http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/football/jets/2010/12/03/2010-12-03_jets_s_jim_leonhard_will_miss_rest_of_season_after_suffering_severe_leg_injury_i.html

Not boring in the least! In fact, I'm quite envious. I happened to rent an old farm for five years, and spent days with a metal detector going through the fields. Lots of old nails and junk...but, I did find an old 1940's pocket knife. That was very cool. Made my day. Have you tried a metal detector?

On the business of souls, the ancient Greeks simply saw it as the principle of life in a living organism, that which gives the living body its ability to move and change of its own accord, and which holds the body together. The difference between a live animal at one moment, and that same animal dead in the very next instant, is the absence of such a self-moving principle. Now whether that soul lives on after death is another question entirely, but that all living things possess it (including plants) seems a relatively self-evident truth. To deny the existence of soul in a living being is to run the danger of mechanism, whereby all that an animal is, is material parts put together in the right way, so that nothing in principle distinguishes a human being from a pile of dirt--except, that our parts are organized more fittingly (and how does that happen, one wonders, if there is no recourse to "soul"?). So, of course fertilized embryos have a soul (they are alive, right?), and of course they are human (they are not frog, cow, or dog, right?), and the actual structure of this individual living human organism possesses all the potential for human activities, so it is an actual human person to my mind.

So, it appears that our defense is far outperforming the offense in camp, and while that is not unusual, it might indicate that the defense is poised to make some leaps forward this year. From all reports, the secondary has been eating up the offensive passing game. That too is not a surprise, since the secondary is the strength of this team. Here is my question: Does it help or hurt a developing offense to be playing against such a dominant secondary in practice everyday? On the one hand, it arguably makes them stronger, since the O has to sharpen its play in the passing game. On the other hand, I suspect it hampers them from developing any confidence and impedes their development. Wouldn't it be better to have the O practice for a week against the second or third team--get some confidence and rhythm, and then gradually test them against a stronger and stronger defense? As it is now, it sounds like the passing game is in shambles, which bodes ill for the regular season.

Is it Andy Najar, 17 year old playing for DC United now? See this link: http://soccernet.espn.go.com/world-cup/sto...5901&ver=us

Germany has been better than England for as long as I can remember watching World Cup Soccer, but this year I am picking England, for a variety of reasons. As for the USA, for those of us who follow the national team year round, this was a tough loss to take. It was a game I think that the USA--given the development of the national team program over the last twenty years--should have won. Bradley has a lot of strengths as a coach, but when the game started, and I saw Findley and Clark in the lineup, I knew this was bad news. Bradley was over-thinking the game. He needed to go with our best 11--and that means the players who have produced. Findley's speed did nothing all tournament, nothing. Clark was useful at times, but overall no composure with the ball, and too many horrible mistakes. I really think that if the USA did not give up that early goal, we would have won that game. Oh well, no way to prove that.

Folks, The NFL has recently registered the decades old "Who Dat?" expression in connection with the Saints. Of course, the expression is a home-grown local one (not developed by NFL marketing), and the NFL never cared about it when the Saints were horrible. Now, all of a sudden, when the expression is selling T-shirts like crazy, the NFL suddenly claims to own it. This kind of greedy, opportunistic, power play against the small-time vendors of New Orleans is disgusting and ridiculous. Sometimes I just wish we could all boycott this whole greedy bunch of billionaires (players union not excepted) and make the league go bankrupt. Read about it here: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405...oWhatsNewsThird

I agree with you--as a coach, player, and founder of an inner city soccer academy. But you probably just started a war. I'm putting on my helmet now. Incoming...

I love American football, even though the stats I posted make me wonder why I like it so much. But I also love watching top-level soccer, especially the world cup. I may be wrong, but I think that part of the appeal in a sport is that other people care about it. So, if nobody cared about football in the country, I suspect my enjoyment of the game would be diminished greatly. Conversely, if everyone was excited about the LA Galaxy vs Real Salt Lake MLS final, and everyone was watching every play with anticipation, I would enjoy it all the more. As it is, I don't watch much MLS soccer.

What are the chances that Ralph survives any possible lockout? What are the chances that the Bills stay in Buffalo after Ralph passes on? Not to be doom and gloom, but if next year is the last year of NFL for a while, it might be the last year of the Buffalo Bills...forever.

This is a very intelligent post, in my opinion. However, the other posters may be correct in pointing out that many of the other owners might want to see the Bills leave Buffalo, in which case there might not be any effort by the league to make assurances of geographical or ownership stability. Still, it can't be good for the league to have an old AFL franchise like this falling apart at the seams.

Folks, This is a story about either sheer marketing genius on the part of the NFL, or sheer stupidity on the part of the American public. We all know that NFL games have too many commercials, but this Wall Street Journal article brings out the numbers: Average length of time the football is in play? 11 minutes Average commercial time? 60 minutes Average time with NFL players milling about or in huddle? 75 minutes Cheerleaders? 3 seconds What is amazing is that most of us, myself included, have made this coaching search a central preoccupation of our lives. A coach for a team that plays 11 minutes (8 minutes of it on defense!) on 16 Sundays throughout the year. I think I must be crazy. Here is the article. See for yourself: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405...sreel_lifeStyle