Goodbye, NFL

I’m quitting football.

Despite a Super Bowl victory for my favorite team, last year was incredibly frustrating for me as a fan — the replacement refs and the inconsistent safety rules and penalties — and certainly the dark cloud of head injuries and the long-term health consequences for the players has cast a shadow on my fandom for a while. And when Haloti Ngata of the Ravens destroyed RGIII’s knee with an unnecessary hit in December I felt a visceral anger about this sport (and a player I root for!) that I had never felt before.

Of course, the Super Bowl run was great—with the Denver game being perhaps the greatest football watching moment of my life. But the joy didn’t linger (in contrast to the joy I still feel about the Orioles’ playoff run last year).

Then in March the NFL waged a PR war against the Baltimore Orioles about a manufactured scheduling conflict, turning Baltimore fans against each other and ultimately screwing the Ravens and the city in the process. And that was the straw that did it.

Schedule-gate was, admittedly, a minor thing, but it highlighted the nature of the beast that is the NFL—namely, it’s a bully. It bullies cities, players, fans, other sports, and now even ESPN.

It’s all bullshit. And I won’t support it any longer.

Which kind of sucks. Football is a great game, and the NFL is home to some great players that I would still love to watch (Torrey Smith, Ray Rice, Joe Flacco, RGIII). And the game and the experience of watching and following it is deeply embedded in social bonds and friendships.

But this isn’t about the game. It’s about a business—really, a monopoly— selling a product that I’m not buying anymore.