[RchW]

Originally Posted by Déjà Bru

John Madden, I respect you, but this metaphor is the problem in a nutshell. Since when did professional football, or even any sport (well, I'm not sure about mixed martial arts but that's relatively new) turn into a "brutal gladiator sport"?

Same with you, Ragnar. Why is this a "war"? Why cannot the game be just an athletic contest, albeit with a lot at stake?

Look, I know I sound naive. This kind of thinking started going out the window with Vincent Lombardi. It's not right, though. The more folks believe it to be war, the worse it's going to get and it's helping to take the rest of society down with it.

What, you think Frank Gifford and Dick Butkus weren't tough? Yet, you never saw them conduct themselves as if they were "gladiators" (or ill-mannered prima donnas, which is more like it). I don't even remember Deion Sanders doing such things.

Yet now, you guys think it's normal and accept such behavior as a part of "war." I cannot believe that in justifying stupid, callous, self-aggrandizing behavior we turn a sport into "war." It's sad, really.

They didn't seem to act that way because it took more than 30 minutes after the players were showered and dressed for the media to even get access. AFAIK Butkus was the king of trash talk and backing it up with action, of his day. Any player I've seen interviewed always says he was the dirtiest sob they played against.

Comparisons are futile. There is no way to know how people would have acted if put under the microscope like today.