By Chris Mueller
December 5, 2017
L.J. Fort #54 and Artie Burns #25 of the Pittsburgh Steelers tackle A.J. Green (Andy Lyons/Getty Images)
The scariest thing about the scariest play of the game was that it wasn’t outwardly, well, scary. The play that put Ryan Shazier in the hospital, the play that has people wondering whether he’ll ever walk easily again, let alone play football, was innocuous, by the standards of the NFL.
Shazier led with his helmet — a tactic far from unique with him or most of his fellow NFL defenders — in an effort to bring down Bengals receiver Josh Malone. You know what happened next. Shazier immediately clutched his back, managed to roll himself onto his back, and then was taken off the field on a backboard. Aside from a few updates, at best cautiously optimistic in nature, no one knows much about how he’s doing.
It wasn’t a blowup shot, or a blindside block, or a safety attempting to prevent a catch by trying to take a wide receiver’s head off of his shoulders. The play that may dramatically alter Shazier’s career and life wasn’t about a gratuitously violent collision; it was about risky tackling form causing a freak injury.
This is what football is.
The hits that followed, the ones that garnered suspensions for JuJu Smith-Schuster and George Iloka, were similar to what one would see in every game every week. They were vicious and illegal, yes, but nothing out of the ordinary. Only Shazier’s freak injury, and the Steelers’ and Bengals’ penchant for having extremely physical battles made them stand out.
The reaction to the game was curious. For the national media and many outside observers, it seemed to signify some sort of tipping point, a level of wanton violence that required action from the league, lest it represent some point of no return.
Unsurprisingly, the NFL took action, slapping Smith-Schuster and Iloka with one-game bans. This was, of course, a terrible decision by the league. Both men were banned for attempting to make football plays. Were the plays worthy of penalty flags and fines? Sure. Suspensions? No way, not unless one of the men had been a serial offender.
Incredibly, New England’s Rob Gronkowski received the same length of suspension despite doing something that was exponentially worse. Gronkowski’s pro-wrestling style cheap shot on Buffalo’s Tre’Davious White came after the whistle, was done to an unsuspecting player, and caused a concussion. If the league really wanted to send a clear message, they’d have banned Gronkowski for three games.
What’s more, in explaining Smith-Schuster’s suspension, NFL czar of discipline Jon Runyan (once cited as one of the league’s dirtiest players) specifically made mention of Smith-Schuster’s taunting as one of the contributing factors to the decision. That part made it clear that this was all about optics, and about making sure that huge hits during a prime-time game, ones that were criticized at length by Jon Gruden and Sean McDonough on the broadcast, were punished. It was about a league that has been consumed by concussion concerns wanting to appear serious about the issue in full view of the public.
Apparently the last thing that the NFL wants is people thinking that violence in football will be tolerated. News flash: Football is violent. Always has been, always will be. The participants, especially those who have come of age in the last 10 years or so, know the risks better than any players who have come before them. Injuries are guaranteed, and serious injuries an unavoidable, unfortunate cost of doing business.
This is not to suggest that the players don’t deserve sympathy and compassion when they are injured. Quite the opposite. Many are putting their bodies — their lives and their livelihoods — on the line for the entertainment of the masses. Compassion should be a prerequisite.
Still, the idea that this game was somehow beyond the pale is off-base. There is no great reckoning needed for NFL fans that watched what transpired. Football is violence. You cannot have the former without the latter. The hits may have been violent, and Shazier’s injury unsettling, but the idea that this game was unique is wrong.
Monday night’s game? That wasn’t a debacle, or an outlier. That was football, for better or worse.
Chris Mueller is the co-host of the ‘Starkey & Mueller Show’ from 2-6 p.m. weekdays on 93.7 The Fan.
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