Yeah, yeah, yeah.
FreeForAll Tuesday beckons bright and new and it don’t cost nothin’. Today’s bid to entice free readers to start paying me features a crucially important debate on Be Love. Also, the officiating problem and where all the snow went Monday in Highmark Stadium. Consider blowing $8/month or $80/year. You’ll get this brilliance 5 days a week instead of just one. Meantime,
Be Love, brothers and sisters.
Love Brother Love’s travelin’ salvation show. Pack up the babies and grab the old ladies, because love is all around, and so the feelin’ grows. Be good to your neighbor, don’t eat the last of the peanut butter and whatever you do, do not punt on 4th down and 1.
All you need is love, love. Love is all you need.
We kid because we love.
We make fun of things we don’t understand, because it’s easier than actually understanding them. Funnier, too.
It was easy to make fun of the NFL’s latest attempt to be on the correct side of whatever’s bugging us societally at the moment. Stop Hate. Choose Love. End Racism. Be Love. It’s sort of a Hallmark greeting card approach to curing what’s illin’ us. All within the backdrop of the most violent sport on the planet.
Unfortunate
Remember, OGs, Gerald Ford’s try at curing 18 percent inflation in the mid-70s? He handed out WIN buttons. Whip Inflation Now. It’s sorta like that. Be Deflation.
(Later, Jimmy Carter also told us to turn down our thermostats and dress like Fred Rogers. But that’s another story.)
It’s never not healthy to be skeptical about anything the NFL does. The NFL’s function is to make money in great piles. There is nothing altruistic about it. Everything the league does, from embracing the military to denouncing drugs to urging us to Be Love, is done with money in mind. The NFL is a PR/marketing colossus.
I’m not a Slogan Guy, in the same way I’m not a Resolution Person, so if I see two folks fighting in the produce aisle at Kroger over the last cantelope, I’m probably not sprinting in shouting, "Be Love! Be Love!’’
Might get m’damned head stoved in.
Today is the first day of the rest of your life.
Yeah? Gag me with a yoga mat.
And besides, if the NFL is going to use a slogan to advise us on how to think, shouldn’t it also make an effort to tell us what the slogan means?
Give me love, give me love, give me peace on earth. I love the flower girl. I don’t know why. She simply caught my eye.
Turns out, the Be Love message on the back of players’ helmets last weekend originated at the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Non-Violent Social Change, a place ‘‘established in 1968 by King’s widow Coretta Scott King (and) envisioned by its founder to be ‘no dead monument’, but a living memorial filled with all the vitality that was his. “Educating the world on the life, legacy and teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’’ according to the organization’s website.
Among the ideas advanced by the King Center is “Use your power to correct everything.’’
Fantastic. Could you be a bit more specific? I’m running late for a meeting.
On its website, the King Center asks us to acknowledge three things:
( 1 ) The violence, oppression, inequity, injustice, and hate in our world has to stop.
( 2 ) I have a responsibility and role to play in creating social change
for a more just, humane, equitable, and peaceful world.
( 3 ) The decision is mine whether to do nothing in this moment,
or to have the courage to stand up for justice.
Truly lovely aspirations.
I was feelin’ so bad. I asked my family doctor just what I had.
MLK’s birthday was Monday. Thus, the NFL’s timing.
Maybe the NFL’s intention really is to awaken social consciousness. Maybe it’s to position the league as a beacon of light in a world gone dark. Goodell loves you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And all cynicism aside, it’s a swell idea. Be love. I mean, who wouldn’t be?
Yet it seems to me we can do without the catchy reminder. Be Love? OK.
How ‘bout Be Decent. Be Good Human. Don’t be an a—hole.
I’m thinking most of us awake each day at least somewhat mindful of not being an a—hole. That involves any number of things. Empathy, courtesy, kindness, acceptance, positivity, charity, optimism, gratitude, offsetting personal fouls, going for it on 4th and 1.
For whatever reason, Be Love has become a hard sell. We’re angry, we’re divided, we punt. The world is a gray place that we are succeeding in making black or white. There’s nothing wrong with the NFL slogan-ing us on the subject.
Robert Plant. Way down inside. (Rolling Stone)
You need coolin’. Baby I’m not foolin’.
I just wish that being a good human wasn’t so hard. Or at least as hard as we’re making it. We wouldn’t need reminders. We wouldn’t need cryptic slogans from capitalistic robber barons. Be Love would Be Habitual.
Wouldn’t that be nice?
Now, then. . .
NFL OFFICIATING. It’s getting worse by the play, isn’t it? When is an obvious fumble anything but an obvious fumble? When the refs say so, then review the fumble in question and say so again.
Yahoo sets the scene from Monday’s Steelers-Bills game:
Steelers quarterback Mason Rudolph found tight end Pat Freiermuth for a 33-yard gain on the first play of a possession that started at Pittsburgh's 8-yard line.
Freiermuth fumbled the ball when he was tackled, and Bills linebacker Baylon Spector jumped on it for a recovery. But officials ruled that the ball was fumbled forward out of bounds.
Buffalo challenged the call, and replay showed that Spector clearly recovered the ball in bounds. But officials didn't agree.
Referee Carl Cheffers didn't offer any further explanation.
The only possible explanation is that officials believed the loose ball grazed Freiermuth's helmet as his body bounced out of bounds. But nothing conclusive on replay shows that.
Fortunately, the ruling had no impact on the result of the game. But it could have.
My solution is not to have better, younger refs. The rules have become so byzantine, the game so fast, better fitness wouldn’t matter. My idea is to Ban Replay Entirely. Frequent Perusers know I find replay loathsome, just on a philosophical level. Humans coach, humans play, humans make mistakes. It’s OK.
Just look at the explanation given for the call. Officials believed the loose ball grazed Freiermuth's helmet as his body bounced out of bounds.
What? It’s convoluted, same as lots of explanations involving replays. I’ve watched football a hundred years, and I still can’t tell you quite what The Invisible Plane is. We don’t need replay for that. We need an ancient Greek. There are no more ancient Greeks.
Just play the games, yeah? To err is human. Be Love, dammit.
LASTLY, A QUESTION. . .
Where did the snow go?
The 3 feet of it that covered the aisles and seats in Buffalo pregame Monday. We saw fans shoveling endless piles of it. . . to where?
You push it into the aisle. Then what? In the words of Ratso Rizzo (Lookimup), “I’m walkin’ here.’’
I didn’t see big snow mountains behind the end zones or blocking traffic in the beer lines. You? Where’d it go?
TUNE O’ THE DAY. . . As they eased from their blues roots into the more lucrative world of pop, the pre-Stevie/Lindsey Fleetwood Mac made some very good music on albums such as Mystery to Me. Here’s one.
Doc wondering what your take is on the announcement by the NFL that someone will sing the Black National Anthem at the Super Bowl this year? I surely don't LOVE the idea. As a matter of fact, exactly the opposite.
If I start making 'Don't be and A--hole' T-shirts I will split the profits with you. Officiating appears to be getting worse, but the blown calls seem to benefit some teams (Steelers, Cowboys, Chiefs) more than others (Bengals, Lions, Bills). It is even worse in NCAA basketball in favor of Kentucky, Duke, and the 'chosen' ones. I'm not sure if it is just the benefit of doubt being given to the traditionally good teams or 'intent' is involved. The Gambling is just encouraging more bad behavior. It is only a matter of time until some officials, coaches, or players are caught cheating. Too much money is involved.