I have been in the habit recently of setting my fantasy team lineup early in the week, checking scores, and doing anything and everything to avoid watching football on Sunday afternoons.
As a sportswriter, I understand I’m supposed to be interested in America’s biggest sport. But as a person looking for entertainment, a game between the Bengals and Patriots with Phil Simms talking on my TV doesn’t sound like entertainment to me. Please don’t fault me for choosing “The Shawshank Redemption” for the 43rd time over a lead analyst saying things like “When things go bad, it’s not going to look good.”
The NFL, by nature, isn’t necessarily a place where there’s an abundance of fun. In true “Footloose” fashion, a little jig in the end zone can result in a fine – they don’t call it the No Fun League for nothing.
But the Steelers-Bills game was a little funny, at least to me. At halftime, John Deere tractors with brushes came on the field to clear the dusting of snow that had formed on the artificial surface.
The brushes cleared the snow, but also dug up those annoying little, black pellets that add cushioning to the field. The second-half kickoff was delayed. Players wrote their names in the black piles near the sideline. Jim Kelly threw up his arms. Twitter had a field day.
But as a viewer, it was funny. The NFL is supposed to be this pristine league where the games are so strict, making a snow angel can cost your team 15 yards.
(On a side note, those pellets – oftentimes made from recycled tires – have been linked to cause cancer, so maybe the Buffalo groundskeepers were just trying to keep the players safe.)
Then there were Bills, who tried their best not to play competitively, even going without a no-huddle offense with three minutes remaining and down 14 points. After Buffalo finally scored, kicker Dan Carpenter proceeded to then boot the onside kick attempt out of bounds, essentially ending the game and any slim chance of the Bills going to the playoffs for the first time in the 21st century.
TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGING
At least across the District 9 boys basketball landscape this year, postseason play is going to look very different than in years prior. First off, the PIAA’s decision to tinker with the classifications means competition is thinned out from the previously top-heavy divisions.
Class A, which for the last few years was dominant with Elk Catholic, Ridgway and Johnsonburg hoisting championships, is no more. Ridgway moves to Class AA with holdover Brockway, last year’s D-9 runner-up.
Kane, last year’s AA champion, is up to Class AAA, which is populated with just three other teams (Karns City, Moniteau and Brookville). Bradford, meanwhile, is one of three Class AAAA teams along with D9 League rivals St. Marys and Punxsuawney. DuBois boys and girls are the lone Class AAAAA teams in the district.
With impending construction at Clarion University’s Tippin Gymnasium this spring, the day-long basketball championships may be a thing of the past.
DODGE, DUCK, DIP, DIVE…
The NFL, in its latest attempt to make the Pro Bowl great again, announced it’s going to implement a skills competition with this year’s game. Relay races and dodgeball are two events schedule, which will be incredibly fun to watch.
What the NFL has been missing for years is an all-star challenge and, while I like the move to let fans see Dak Prescott hurl a red ball at a 300-pound lineman, the league is still missing the kind of skills challenge that the NHL and NBA have executed so well in their respective all-star celebrations.
How about a field-goal kicking competition? Throwing challenge? A 40-yard dash in pads?
Who wouldn’t want to see how far Cam Newton can throw a football flat-footed? It’s progress by the NFL, but we’re not completely moving the chains yet.
