True or False: Sports Leagues Should Police its Representatives?

Many youth athletes enjoy sports because they are able to imitate the athletes they see succeed on television. Professional sports utilize this desire to its financial advantage by marketing products towards children, such as those carried in this specialized National Basketball Association store. Accordingly, professional sports leagues have an obligation to make sure that its representatives maintain a positive public image. In this week’s post, I traversed the vast expanse of the blogosphere, looking for other people’s opinions on the role professional sports leagues have in policing its employees. My comments, reproduced below, include my opinions on the specific issues raised by the authors. Also, I provide the author with constructive criticism about what I feel was done well and what was missing in each post. The first blog I commented on, titled The Starting Five, is a joint blog maintained by multiple authors. In “A Cry for Help?” (see first screenshot below) Ron Glover posts about the controversy surrounding the family of Andy Reid, coach of the Philadelphia Eagles of the National Football League. In Newsvine, a blogger by the user name Mydree also writes about the NFL’s watchdog role and the Reid family drama in his post “Andy Reid, Michael Vick and a Double Standard in the NFL” (see second screenshot below).

Comment:

Dear Mr. Glover,

Thanks for writing this intriguing and informative post. I agree that Andy Reid needs time away from the job in order to deal with his family issues that have surfaced recently. I cannot argue against your belief that the NFL’s lack of disciplinary action against Reid is hypocritical and wrong. However, there are a couple aspects of your post with which I disagree. For example, you state that this issue represents the hypocrisy and racism of the NFL because, there is a, “double-standard securely in place.” While I agree about the overall issue of unequal punishments in the NFL, I view the causes differently. One problem I have with your argument is that, as you say, Coach Reid “has not been implicated in any wrongdoing,” as it is his children who are in legal trouble. Therefore, it is unfair to compare Coach Reid to Michael Vick because Vick is accused of breaking the law, and Reid is not. Also, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell’s recent punishment of New England Patriots’ coach Bill Belichick, while ineffective in my opinion, shows that Goodell is not afraid of penalizing administrators or non-African-Americans. Accordingly, I think the issue has more to do with sporting leagues not taking a strong enough stand against its coaches, instead of being a race issue. Another issue to consider is that the NFL has an obligation to youth athletes and fans to ensure that its representatives behave appropriately in the public eye. To do so, I think the NFL needs to establish a fair system for penalizing its representatives equally. I think the NFL is sending children the wrong message by not forcing Coach Reid to take a leave of absence to resolve his family problems. It seems the NFL is condoning associating oneself with illegal behaviors by not addressing the Reid situation. Regarding your post as a whole, I feel that by providing a few links within the body of your post, your argument could be much stronger. After searching further on this site, I realize that most posts do not contain links, but I believe this post would have benefitted from using them. For example, your article has a lot of quotations, but I have no idea from where they were taken. Also, your first bullet point states, “Reid has had full knowledge of his sons’ drug activity for sometime now.” This statement would be more convincing if you link to an article that explained what evidence exists to prove what Reid knew and when he knew it. Finally, while searching the internet the other day, I read an interesting comment on the Reid case at another blog (http://mydree.newsvine.com/_news/2007/11/02/1068917-andy-reid-michael-vick-and-a-double-standard-in-the-nfl - comment #2 by Adam Hobson). I do not agree with this statement, but just to play devil’s advocate: “does any coach really have all that much time to spend as a proper husband or father?” Just a thought to ponder.

Thanks for reading.

Sincerely,

-mhs, http://lawandsports.blogspot.com

Comment:

Dear Mydree,

Thanks for writing this interesting post. I think you posted on an important issue that warrants further public discussion, and I believe your frustrations are appropriate. I agree with the statement that the NFL cannot be a “quality organization” when it punishes players differently than it punishes its coaches. However, I disagree with you on a few points. For example, you argue that since Michael Vick was punished by the NFL, than the NFL should penalize Coach Reid should as well. I do not agree because Michael Vick is directly accused of violating the law, while Coach Reid is not in trouble himself, but rather his sons are. Later, you say that “coaches and executives (Reid is both) in the NFL should be held to a higher standard than the employees (the players) but it seems they are not.” I disagree, and I wish you had provided more evidence for your argument, because it would be interesting to see how you justify this point. I do not agree with you because I see no reason why players and management should be treated differently. All parties are representatives of the NFL, and just because athletes are the ones playing the game does not mean they should be treated less harshly. I concur with your discussion of the double standard in the Philadelphia Eagles’ organization, but I think the fact that one of Reid’s sons admitted to using steroids is irrelevant, unless there is evidence that his son sold them to or used them with Eagles’ players. Also, I wanted to gauge your thoughts on another aspect of what being a “quality organization” means. I feel that the NFL has an obligation to penalize Coach Reid harshly because of the fact that many of the league’s representatives (coaches, players, and others) serve as role models to children. I think the suspensions that Commissioner Roger Goodell has given to players like Adam “Pac-Man” Jones have sent a positive message to youth athletes and fans, but I think his inaction on the issue surrounding the Reid family sends a worse negative message – that as you did not do anything wrong, then it does not matter what people do around you. Personally, I am advocating that the NFL force Coach Reid to take another leave of absence (he took one during the off-season) for the rest of the season to settle his family matters. I do not think Coach Reid deserves to get fired, but since coaching in the NFL is a time-consuming job, and the macho nature of many NFLers does not permit them to make allowances for family emergencies, the NFL needs to demand that Coach Reid step away from football.

Thanks for reading.

Sincerely,

-mhs, http://lawandsports.blogspot.com