If you’ve stopped watching NFL games because of players protesting during the national anthem, you probably know what the next question is:
That’s why? As opposed to every single other reason out there, this year and the last several?
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It’s actually too early to reach conclusions about anything this season, including whether the widely-reported ratings drop is or isn’t just a speed bump. It’s way too early to decide in the six weeks since Colin Kaepernick’s protests first went public, whether that’s even a factor.
The increasingly poor product the league is presenting us has been on display a lot longer than the protests. Any defection of fans, though, is new. The NFL got away with it for a long time. If this speculation about Kaepernick driving away fans is true, the league is still getting away with it.
Week 4 has been just another example, and that was clear even before it wrapped up Monday night with the Giants-Vikings game. Which, to remind everybody, was missing the Vikings’ two best offensive players and biggest viewer draws again, Teddy Bridgewater and Adrian Peterson.
Add those absences to all the players missing games so far because of suspension or serious injury: Tom Brady, J.J. Watt, Tony Romo, Rob Gronkowski, Le’Veon Bell, Marcell Dareus, Jay Cutler, Vontaze Burfict, DeAngelo Hall, Martavis Bryant, Justin Houston, three key Chargers, multiple Patriots, huge chunks of the Colts’ offensive line, major portions of the Cowboys defense, two high Bills draft picks, and again, Josh Gordon.
Not to mention the Giants kicker, Josh Brown, who missed a game via suspension after multiple incidents of domestic violence against his ex-wife. One game. Not a factor to overlook as another Domestic Violence Awareness Month begins.
A bad precedent was already in place before Monday: prime-time games that have turned into dogs. So far, all four Monday nights, two of the Thursday nights and two of the Sunday nights.
This Sunday night, the Steelers-Chiefs game was over in the first quarter when Pittsburgh led 22-0; it was 36-0 in the fourth quarter. The Bears managed to get on national TV twice in the first three weeks, and got spanked both times.
Meanwhile, the most dominant team in the NFL over the last decade and a half just got shut out at home, with a starting wide receiver serving as their backup quarterback. (The Patriots and Julian Edelman, if you weren’t sure.)
The starter, Jacoby Brissett, is one of three rookie starting quarterbacks pressed into service because of injuries. (Four, if you include Carson Wentz, who is starting indirectly because Bridgewater got hurt.)
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Teams are blowing fourth-quarter leads three times in one month (the Chargers), throwing six interceptions in a game (Jets), giving up seven or more sacks in a game (Jets and Panthers), going through four quarterbacks in three weeks (Browns) and losing chances to win because players forget to run out of bounds (Cowboys).
They’re also firing assistant coaches who look suspiciously like scapegoats (Greg Roman in Buffalo, Bobby April in Tennessee, after Pep Hamilton got the boot with the Colts a year ago).
Fans have had to deal with flags being thrown for end-zone dancing (Antonio Brown), tossing the ball to an official (Terrelle Pryor) and interception celebrations (Josh Norman) … and not for hitting the league MVP in the head multiple times (Cam Newton, on opening night yet, whose handling under those circumstances is now being investigated).
Cam Newton goes down with an injury against the Atlanta Falcons. (Getty)
Officials may have awarded a fumble to the wrong team in Washington Sunday, and appear to have ruled a fumble for a Bengals player who was down two weeks earlier.
And it should not be forgotten that the kickoff to the entire season, the Hall of Fame game, was canceled because of an unplayable field, with most fans apparently not knowing for sure until they saw reports on Twitter while inside the stadium.
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Most, if not all, of these issues are merely continuations of last year and the years before. By season’s end, the quality of play was problematic. It never showed in the ratings, though.
The ratings are showing something now. It’s actually not unreasonable to blame it on the element that didn’t exist last season, players kneeling or raising a fist during a portion of the game that even now hardly gets televised.
Maybe athletes taking a public stand against racial oppression was the tipping point.
Of all things. The actual game is more troubling by the day. What happens before the game even starts, though, may be what the public can’t tolerate.
If you’re one of those people, you’re getting exactly the league you deserve.