‘I can’t blame anybody for my death’

MALCOLM GLADWELL’S damning profile of the relationship between American Football and brain injury, which he wrote for the New Yorker over two years ago, has stuck with me ever since.

Michael Vick had just been released from prison for running a dog-fighting ring. The then ex-Atlanta Falcons quarterback’s cruel hobby provided the perfect metaphor for Gladwell.

This multi-billion dollar industry which generated its income partly from the suffering of its athletes was, for Gladwell, no better than a primitive tussle between snarling mutts who knew no better.

The dogs were loyal to a fault and seemed to enjoy their own destruction because of the intense relationship they had with their owners. They had no choice but to fight and revelled in the ring as handlers and gamblers cheered on the cruelty.

“The owner knows that seeing his master rooting him on will make a dog work all the harder to please its master,” wrote Gladwell.

“This is why Michael Vick’s dogs weren’t euthanised. The betrayal of loyalty requires an act of social reparation.”

Having presented damning medical evidence of the effect concussions had on the brains of players from a young age, a damage that was sure to return and haunt them, Gladwell continued: “Professional football players [like dogs] are selected for gameness. There is nothing else to be done, not so long as fans stand and cheer. We are in love with football players, with their courage and grit, and nothing else — neither considerations of science nor those of morality — can compete with the destructive power of that love.”

On Sunday, I did my usual thing: spreading the Sunday New York Times out in front of me, I prepared for the 10-hour marathon of NFL viewing that lay ahead. As I opened up the sports section, big, sad Kris Jenkins stared out at me. Jenkins was a defensive lineman with the Carolina Panthers and, towards the end of his career, with the New York Jets.

As gleaned from interviews with Greg Bishop, Jenkins (32), recounted the horrific toll football had taken on him, a successful millionaire footballer who reached the 2004 Super Bowl (losing to the New England Patriots) but whose position on the field brought with it a dual threat to his own well-being: his job at the frontline of defence is to strip the football from the quarterback or running back — in so doing he must evade or absorb the brutality of the men who are in turn supposed to protect their ball carriers and play makers.

“The thing about football is you’re directly playing with your life, the quality of it and the longevity of it,” said Jenkins, who was over 25 stone or 165kg during his playing days.

“I can’t blame anybody for my death. I made the choice to play football.

“I made the choice to walk through the concussions. I could have stopped. I could have said, ‘my head hurts’. It was my choice, as a man.

“We consider football a gladiator sport because we understand you’re going to get hurt. You’re putting your life on the line. You might not die now, like in an old Roman arena, but five, 10 years down the road, you could. You know that.”

Jenkins repeatedly highlighted the fact that he wouldn’t change anything, that he and his fellow players love the violence and this was what they signed up for from the get-go.

But does that absolve us as consumers? Of course not but Jenkins, for his part, avoids implicating fans directly. He enjoyed being part of an industrial-scale Sunday pastime, one enjoyed routinely by 20 million Americans and by almost 150 million when the big show, the Super Bowl, rolls around.

“The violence is what I remember. Winning, the physical part, the mayhem, finding the line between insanity and sanity, that’s the exact reason why you play. That’s the reason fans like football in the first place.”

Which worries me. But will it stop me?

Footnote: Major League Soccer enjoys a growing profile but, as with many finals since the dawn of time (okay, the late 1800s), Sunday night’s decider was a dismal climax that might serve to check their inflated opinion of their own league.

That morning, Liverpool’s win at Chelsea was broadcast live, as usual, on Fox’s soccer-dedicated satellite channel.

Later, viewers were able to enjoy a delayed as-live repeat on Fox’s main channel (one of the big four networks alongside CBS, NBC and ABC). Sadly, this huge platform ensured twice as many viewers as the MLS Cup final.

The NFL will never be threatened — its biggest concern is the long-term health of its players but that will never affect the bottom line. But, with the rights to the Champions League as well as the World Cups in 2018 and 2012, Rupert Murdoch’s Fox is taking a significant punt on the original football.

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