Written by Chris Schad
The Minnesota Vikings have found themselves in a media firestorm as Adrian Peterson has battled accusations of child abuse. While they took a step in the right direction by deactivating him for the team’s 30-7 loss to the New England Patriots last Sunday, many were outraged as the Vikings announced they were reinstating Peterson immediately and that he would play in Week 3 against the New Orleans Saints.
In the court of public opinion, the Vikings have made a drastic mistake. One week after Ray Rice was released by the Baltimore Ravens because a tape came out of him knocking out his fiancee, how could the team let Peterson back on the field for allegedly beating a child?
It seems completely mind-blowing…until you realize this is the National Football League.
The NFL is the league that brought you “The White House” and “The Love Boat.” It’s the league that suspended Rice for two games and decided to turn it into an indefinite suspension only after security footage presented the obvious as to what really happened in that elevator. It’s also the league where being an elite player gets you a golden ticket.
Nearly 21 years ago, Jimmy Johnson gathered the Dallas Cowboys into team meeting in preparation for a matchup with the San Francisco 49ers. Linebacker John Roper, who was a key reserve and special teams player on the team, started to doze off during the meeting. When Johnson saw Roper taking a nap, he dismissed him. Several days later, the Cowboys released him.
What Johnson didn’t know at the time was that Roper just welcomed his first child into the world and hadn’t gotten much sleep since the child was born. Seven years later, Johnson was asked about his rules for players as he took over the Miami Dolphins and explained that afternoon.
“I can’t be writing what the rules are because my rules vary from player to player…In Dallas we had a linebacker named John Roper who got cut for falling asleep in a meeting. If Troy Aikman fell asleep in a meeting, I’d go over and whisper, `Wake up, Troy.’”
It’s the way of the NFL to treat the elite as if they were gods and the Vikings have seemingly given Peterson the wake up tap after a one-game nap.
In the cases of Caleb King and A.J. Jefferson, they weren’t given that benefit of the doubt as “due process” took over as the team released the two reserves immediately. Chris Cook also didn’t get the wake up tap until the next season as the team told him to stay away as he fought a domestic violence charge in 2011 that was later acquitted.
While these are reasons to throw stones at the Vikings, it’s also a reason to look at the entire NFL as well as the rest of society as to why this wasn’t a bigger issue in the first place. Remember that when the league issued a two-game suspension to Rice, the reaction was more of a “Oh, NFL” rather than throngs of people with pitchforks and torches ready to burn down the league office.
Perhaps we are the ones at fault for throwing this adulation towards superstar athletes to make them feel invisible and above the law. It might also be why the Vikings decided to let their superstar running back onto the field rather than doing what many feel is the right thing and keeping Peterson away from the team.
In any event this is a mess that should have been prevented had both the NFL and society made it a point to deal with domestic violence before it became the major issue it has today. Maybe a day will come where everyone is held to the same code of conduct, but if history has taught us anything, it’s that the league will sacrifice morals in exchange for a couple extra wins.
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Chris Schad contributes to 105 The Ticket and has had his work featured on the Bleacher Report and Yahoo Contributor Network. He serves as the Vikings Lead Writerfor Pro Football Spot. Find him on Twitter @crishad. |