I agree with him.
He fired off this tweet last night, which popped up all over my timeline on Friday morning:
A lot of “big talk” about how poor, sorry, bad, not entertaining, etc week #4 of the #nfl preseason is…These men are busting their a$$ trying to accomplish something that could change their lives forever on the upside. Maybe show some respect?
— Louis Riddick (@LRiddickESPN) August 31, 2018
Yeah, week four of the preseason is pretty bad. The play is low quality, with a bunch of backup and peripheral guys just thrown out there and asked to make something happen. They don’t have much experience playing together and they’re tasked with executing vanilla offensive and defensive schemes. A few guys might be fighting for 53-man roster spots, but the majority are just “bodies” who exist primarily to bridge the gap from late August to week one of the NFL regular season.
So of course the complaints are valid. It’s not a good product on TV or live at the stadium. The ticket prices are too high. The concession prices are too high. The parking costs too much. Maybe those things should be drawn down in the preseason to be aligned with the quality of the experience you’re getting, which makes too much sense.
But it’s also corny to sit here and read about how much Christian Hackenberg “sucks” from people who probably can’t kick a football five feet or run the 40-yard dash without falling over dead. No, Christian Hackenberg is not a great quarterback, but I respect the hell out of the fact that the guy worked his way from a division one “Power Five” program to the NFL and is still trying to make it happen. I’m not going to shit on anybody who is good enough to find a way to Lincoln Financial Field, then go shove a recorder in his face after the game and pretend like I wasn’t just ripping him on Twitter.
It’s easy to criticize but much harder for people to give credit where it’s due, and trust me, coaches and athletes pay attention to that kind of stuff. They know who the shit talkers are. As a general rule of thumb, when a player or coach goes out of their way to tell you that they don’t read the stories or pay attention to social media, they usually read every single article and scan Twitter before and after a game.
That’s not to say that people who didn’t play in the NFL don’t know what they’re talking aboutf or can’t be critical of players. No, Howie Roseman didn’t play pro football, but he built a Super Bowl winning team. Fans and beat writers can learn the difference between cover 2, cover 3, and a 3-3-5 odd stack. You can be a fantastic journalist in many different ways, but obviously I’m going to favor Ike Reese’s opinion over Howard Eskin’s opinion if both guys are talking about proper block-shedding technique.
One thing I don’t think people understand is that it’s not just whether you played pro sports or didn’t. There are multiple layers to it. For example, some fans and media members grew up playing the sport and officiating the sport that they watch or cover. Some still do. I always felt like it was important to play and ref soccer if I was going to write about it, because I felt like it gave me more credibility. To that end, I’d hope I’m at least speaking from a position of personal experience when I explain that a center back is supposed to pass off a striker to his or her partner instead of following a mark across the field and getting crossed up. I don’t know half as much about the position as Jim Curtin does, but I’d hope the effort in at least learning and playing the game would benefit my work.
Likewise, I try to keep it simple on the Sixers beat, because I’m learning a different sport. I’ll write about some of the basic offensive sets I see on the floor, but I’m not going to sit here and try to tell you about the best way to dunk a basketball, because I can’t dunk a basketball.
Anyway, this is how players and coaches look at the outside world. They know that some fans and media are legit and some aren’t when it comes to specific topics. They appreciate when we can identify things that the average talking head cannot. Maybe that makes me sound like an total asshole, but I always just felt like learning the game you cover and attempting to actually play it should be the BARE MINIMUM expectation for an able-bodied media member.
I think sometimes we treat athletes like they exist solely for our entertainment, as if they’re caged up circus animals who are only released on Sunday or after our work day to give us a way to wind down. LeBron James should “shut up and dribble,” right? He’s only here to please us and give us basketball highlights like he’s some sort of automaton. But these guys aren’t automatons, they’re human beings with thoughts and emotions and memories, and if we’re gonna rip people because they “suck,” then we should at least try to give credit where it’s due.
Examples:
De’Andre Carter was an FCS All-American in 2014 and is still hustling on the NFL fringes.
He does not “suck.”
Donnel Pumphrey ran for 6,405 yards and 62 touchdowns in college.
He does not “suck.”
Joe Callahan went to a school you’ve never heard of and wound up getting some chances in the NFL.
He does not “suck.”
That’s really what Lou Riddick is talking about. He’s not talking about ticket prices or the TV product or the quality of play on the field. He’s just asking you to not be immediately dismissive of these guys and at least appreciate the hard work they’ve put in to get to this point in their careers.
He’s just asking you to show these guys a little bit of respect.
15 Responses
Great story. Compelling, and rich.
Idiot….they suck compaired to the standards of today’s nfl
Heard The Cuz say some gay slurs today on the show. Is that it for him?
PREEECIATEEEE IT!!!
you suck
Joe Callahan, Donnel Pumphrey, Christian Hackenberg, and anyone else that doesn’t make the 53 man roster is better than 99.99999% of the people in the world at football, but they are worse than almost all other players in the NFL that play on Sundays. I think most sports fans understand this and it doesn’t need to be reiterated when evaluating a player’s talent, and I don’t think everyone needs to couch their takes to accommodate this point of view. This really just seems like hand wringing for the sake of it. Maybe I’m wrong, but I think we are all capable of connotative reasoning. Even understanding what the word suck means in this sense takes some context.
You sort of hit on the core of the problem Kevin. People are going to say it sucks because the NFL is pushing a product for the same price, in the same wrappers and packaging, but with inferior content (not that anyone other than Vince Papale in the stands could last a minute on the field).
There is a need for player development, every other professional league has its own minor league of sorts, beyond leaning on the NCAA. The NFL should create 4 regional summer leagues, play games in college towns/stadiums, create live content for NFL Network in June/July, test new rules, develop coaches and referees, etc.
They tried it. Didn’t work.
Bite me. Hackenberg sucked.
Only a 3rd-rate soccer writer would agree with a 3rd-rate NFL analyst that preseason football has value. The rest of us with triple-digit IQs know better.
I guess your triple-digit IQ missed half of the story:
Yeah, week four of the preseason is pretty bad. The play is low quality, with a bunch of backup and peripheral guys just thrown out there and asked to make something happen. They don’t have much experience playing together and they’re tasked with executing vanilla offensive and defensive schemes. A few guys might be fighting for 53-man roster spots, but the majority are just “bodies” who exist primarily to bridge the gap from late August to week one of the NFL regular season.
So of course the complaints are valid. It’s not a good product on TV or live at the stadium. The ticket prices are too high. The concession prices are too high. The parking costs too much. Maybe those things should be drawn down in the preseason to be aligned with the quality of the experience you’re getting, which makes too much sense.
But you then went on to apologize for it again for 10 more paragraphs.
Yep, you said it all right there Kevin even if you are thin skinned. It’s just sports, not life changing for your readers. And yes, Hackenberg sucks as a football player.
Reminds me of when I was a kid, opening packs of cards with friends, figuring out any possible trades and was flipping through the backups being like “scrub, scrub, scrub, need it, scrub…” and somewhere along the way, you figure it out- like that scene in Bull Durham on the bus where Crash talks about being in the “show” for 20 days and they’re all in awe and you’re reminded of just how hard it is for anyone to even get to a roster. Along with that, I also think of “Talkin Baseball with Dutch” a few years back on 97.5, when teammates/players would get brought up, and Dutch always had something positive to say, like “oh yeah, he had a real good arm” and you’d think “wait, wasn’t he a scrub?” and you’d look up the guys stats and see a career 23-40 record and a 4.80 ERA and think “real good arm”??? But again realize, yeah, maybe not great, but good enough to make it all the way to the show and have that many appearances for a team. Respect for anyone that makes their way onto any roster.
Callahan >>> Hackenburg
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