Have you noticed the increase in NFL post-game player kneel-downs following great plays or touchdowns, or of players crossings themselves, or increased finger pointings skyward in the direction of heaven so far in this early season? I have, and I believe something is going on religiously in this kick-ass sport, and my guess is it started last year with Tim Tebow, tebowing. His overt and public acknowledgement of his Deity has turned into a kind of football tent-revival. I'm not disparaging this movement, if it indeed exists. Prayer circles after games in the NFL have been around for a long time, so this may be merely an extension of a growing religious fervor among the pigskin crew. Anyway, who can it hurt? Maybe, the unbelievers. I worry such religious enthusiasm, if the movement grows, might hurt the players who do not believe God is interested in football and plays no roll in it's action or outcomes. Will these apostates be discriminated against by the believers?
Another thought: if Tebow flops in the NFL, which is a reasonable possibility, he has a job waiting for him as the official minister to football worldwide. It's a made to order TV ministry. Okay, I'm being "snarky."
Sorry, Tim. You have the right to go with your beliefs. Pause. A deep sigh. Just don't bring it into my court.
Another random thought: For years I have been upset by the beer commercials sponsoring sporting events, football in particular. Why? Because, as a great fan of beers, I knew these beers to be some of the worst tasting beers brewed in the world. Gag me! How can these companys dare to call their products beer? Now, I've changed my reasoning. The way I'm figuring it now is that the more people who succumb to these beer commercials and taste these obnoxious brews, the more people will stop buying them. I'm calling it reverse advertising. It's not the label or the numbers of dancing girls, it's the quality of the beer that matters.
Here's a poem I wrote about football.
Football Poem With Random Implications by Tom Meschery
For Dell
In King Lear, Kent trips Oswald
and calls him a base football player,
base, because it was a sport played
by peasants not by the sons of gentlemen
who, later in English history, attended
famous public schools like Rugby
after which the sport of Rugby is named,
which in rules and action more closely
resembles American football that has,
in recent years, become America's most
popular sport, supplanting baseball,
a sport better suited to statisticians
and novelists. I'm not surprised to learn
about the base nature of soccer, given
the often rowdy behaviour of its fans,
clearly plebs. Such behavior, having nothing
to do with the results of the games, but
with their station in life, would never
be tolerated by graduates of Rugby,
many of whom sit in the House of the Lords.
