The Pussification Of American Sports

Today's athletes are becoming and being treated like pussy cats more and more each day -- when a difficult situation arrives, don't confront it -- run from it, blow the whistle, throw a flag, or bring the bullpen in.  In the three biggest American sports -- the NFL, the MLB, and the NBA, rule changes have increasingly made it more difficult for fans to enjoy the games and decreased the level of entertainment. 

1. The NFL is perhaps the biggest sport guilty of pussification.  Remember the days, not too far back, in the 1990's when you could strategize to knock the quarterback out of the game?  In the new NFL, this strategy and many others have been put to shame by Roger GOOD-ell and other NFL executives.

 A. They've made the rules so strict that you can't dare to breathe on a quarterback or risk a 15 yard penalty.  You can't hit the quarterback below the knees or above the shoulders.  This leaves a very small area for the defender to aim at when they are trying to make a play within a matter of seconds at full force.  The out-of-bounce 15 yard flag seems to be something we see regularly; when a player's momentum carries them out of the playing area and they accidentally bring a player down a flag is thrown.

B. The latest phenomenon is the Brett Favre "pitch count" by Brad Childers, who said that he is keeping him between 20 - 29 throws (If I'm the opponent, thanks for giving me your strategy Brad).  If you can't throw more than 29 passes, you shouldn't be in the NFL.  As if ruining baseball isn't enough, now they got to try and ruin football.

C. The horse-collar tackle.  Anything to keep the offense on the field, right?  This is a basic tackle where the player tucks their hand in the back of the padding behind the opponent player's neck and pulls them down.  Former Cowboy's DB Roy Williams used it as a part of his regular tackle methods.  It now costs teams 15 yards.  Why not just let the player walk into the endzone if you get behind him?

D. Rules for dancing and celebration.  Yeah, the NFL has even put handcuffs around dancing.  While you can still get your grove on in the endzone, taunting penalties are applied to individual celebrations, and you can no longer get creative by using props or doing team celebrations.  That means no more Mile High Salutes, unless it's just by one player.  No more throat slashing gestures, sorry Favre.  I miss the 1990's when each player had their own celebration.

Remember the Dolphins' Irving Fryar & 49ers' Merton Hanks chicken dancing? How about Ricky Watters and Steve Young high stepping and turning the endzone into Studio 54?  Everyone always knew when "The Playmaker" Michael Irvin got a first down.  Nobody could forget about "Prime Time" Deion Sanders making a theater out of celebrations.  And Shannon Sharpe was always coming up with something fun.  Thanks a lot T.O. for bringing that Sharpie to the game and ruining it for everyone.

E. Helmet to helmet hits are a 15 yard penalty.  The 2000 Ravens, the greatest defense of all time who won a Super Bowl, said they would gladly pay the fine for the helmet to helmet hits, especially if it meant a big stop on third down or knocking out a key player.  The league then made it a huge fine and a penalty.  Why the penalty?  If you pay the parking ticket, you should still get to keep your car in that spot until you leave, right?

F. No bandanas and no removing helmets in the end zones.  Ray Lewis looked even more aggressive with the dark purple bandana on; like you were meeting him in the back of the alley.  How about nearly the entire 1994 San Francisco 49ers team sporting the bandanas?  What about Emmitt running around with helmet off in the endzone?  I guess the NFL executives didn't want to scare the 60 year old white men off their rocking chairs on a Sunday afternoon.

2. The MLB is completely out of control.

A. Since 2005, the media has emphasized pitch counts to the point where people are watching it on a scoreboard.  Forget the days where pitchers threw 150+ pitches, wait...that was this decade.  Former Arizona Diamondback's pitcher, Randy Johnson, threw 150 pitches in a single game in 2002.  Forget the game.  Lets just go to the ballpark and count pitches -- how neat.

Even in 2008, C.C. Sabathia threw 140 pitches on his third consecutive start in 9 days at the end of the season pushing the Milwaukee Brewers to a playoff appearance.  So why are MLB teams babying these starters so much? 

It was standard throughout the 1980's and earlier decades to throw on three days rest -- now pitchers throw every fifth day.  And now the majority of teams have their pitchers on strict pitch counts and they pull them out around 100 pitches.  There is hope that the mark could go up