Josh Ouellette
By Josh Ouellette
There are two items on my plate this week. First is the NFL’s new rule for suspending players for helmet-to-helmet hits.
In the first the NFL has cracked down on the players ability to lay down the hammer in their hits. This past weekend’s games saw some particularly hard hits to the helmets of receivers and a few quarterbacks.
The League met, the League decided. Players won’t just be fined now they’ll be suspended. What!?!
Why would you do this in football! It’s a carnal sport! It’s a man’s game! The players know what they’re getting into when they sign a contract. That’s why the players get such large signing bonuses. So when they get hurt they still get their deserved pay.
Besides the players, what about the fans needs? I love watching my Tennessee Titans defense, especially last Monday against Jacksonville, when they swarm to the ball and drive the other team so hard to the ground their helmet comes off.
Or when Ray Lewis plugs a gap on the line and drives his helmet into the running back whose trying to run him over. Or when Troy Polamalu takes out a receiver as he attempts to catch the ball.
Growing up in football you are taught to go hard, because it’s when you hold back you get hurt. Now the NFL is asking for defensive players to hold back. And they will because not playing is worse than any other feeling to them.
Roger Goodell, please pull your head out of the keisters of all of the people telling you what to do, and run the NFL right. By that I mean let the players play.
The second is a late hit in its self in the resigning of Mike Mooney from San Marino. I am not here writing to speculate or dig into what is going on in the situation. I’m here asking for some privacy and sensitivity on his resigning.
Let’s all do prep football, San Marino High School and Mike Mooney and his family a favor. Let’s let this lie. Give it some space and let the story unfold naturally.
I was privileged to be in Mooney’s program for the last two years he was at Temple City. And he was an amazing coach there, and I’m sure he was the same at San Marino. The truth is he is and will forever be one of the best and most memorable coaches in the San Gabriel Valley.
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