Leading into Kickoff weekend of the 2014 NFL season, there were a few conversations I was privy to. One of the most intriguing comments was one I read in passing by HipHopShortstop.com founder Dana Pellotta. It was a comment that was as unfavorable to the sport of football as it was favorable to cultural inspection. Regardless on which side of the line you stand on: Football as America’s Game or, as Ms. Pellotta would have antagonized so eloquently, Pigskin for Pig Men, the all-everything to this website forces your hand to defend- and everyone knows, defense wins championships (so I’ll probably vie for a high draft pick).
One might interject that the previously mentioned Ms. Posada- I mean Pellotta was just taking offense to the birth of the NFL season as the football’s first Sunday shared its 24-hour time slot with Derek Jeter Day. As she is a die-hard Yankee fan who literally where’s that affection on her wrist, I could sympathize with that. However, one would be remiss to devalue America’s Sport in the name of America’s Pastime- and as an alumni of the University of Michigan, I’m sure number 2 in your scorecards and number 1 in your hearts would hardly debate that.
So now that all the pretext has been laid, we get to the question: why do men, “pig” or otherwise, gravitate towards the gridiron?
Firstly, it’s a trick question. If you look from the stands to the media boxes; and from the commercials to the barrooms, the gender split has quantitatively lessened. While some traditionalists might call it a “neutering” of the game, football has become more about Americana than about masculinity. It’s a game that promises you nothing more than 16 Sundays as fan of any given franchise. 16 chances to prove your worth, you and your pride versus that of your competition. Now, one can say that is the point of any sport. True, but seldom is every chance so dire and the pound-for-pound physical nature of the exhibition so instrumental to the challenge.
Those elements of pride and the pursuit to dominate might as well be flavor hybrids of Apple Pie or Hamburgers. They are as characteristic of American culture is as you could find. The fact that the sport is even called “football” is pretty much the country saying we have the balls to call it football while the rest of the world throws its collective arms up in the audacity of America to proclaim its universal namesake as “soccer”.
If one were to still ascertain the gender politics of football, however, it might be a perspective that turns on itself. It’s not the ‘60’s or ‘70’s anymore where linemen are hiding brace knuckles under their athletic tape and Good Lord forbid a defender’s line of vision touches a receiver after five yards! Just as the rules of the game have changed, so has its culture. A culture that has mirrored the progressive time of the very country it reflects. As always, you have the blue collar fans who probably heard their first Hail Mary on the television before hearing it in church, dawning their fathers’ favorite team’s colors as if it was as obligatory as their surname; but there has been as influx of a diversified demographic in the sport as there has been in all other subcultures throughout the world. And for every proverbial Dungeon and Dragon fan that has been adopted via the advent of Fantasy Football is a member of the “normative male” society that has crossed over to “Geek Culture” through that very same game, let alone lining up for midnight releases and online play of the annual Madden franchise. I’m not here to speak for any man of football’s past, but I’m pretty sure the bulk of us would have a good mind to disown a bunch of us who have a near 50/50 split of team loyalty to fantasy team loyalty. It’s a sickening feeling when you actually think about it.
As a New Yorker, I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve heard this conversation. “C’mon Big Blue! You got this Eli (already you know we are dealing with rose-colored glasses. And then they are picking the plays as to seem as much of an aficionado to both the company surrounding him and the anchors on the TV who can’t hear him). Touchdown GGGGGGG-MEN! NO! HYNOSKI?! What are you doing? Victor Cruz would have Salsa Danced me to victory!” We would have gotten smacked so hard by our older generations during week one with that kind of comment that we’d be drinking turkey stew out of a straw on Thanksgiving. It’s a different culture, and as a sport, it has changed within the capsule it lives. In no way is there finger pointing on the part of this observer, as I’m as much embedded into those norms as the rest of the football-watching universe. Perhaps, though, my perspective just allows me not full-scale ostracize what black-and-white historical fandom would when we ourselves would be part of that critique.
Joel Grayson
Twitter: @grayson715
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