One play from last night triggered my ongoing deep ambivalence with the NFL: does it resemble cock-fighting and similar outmoded activities that we will look back on regretfully for having supported?

Or is it a culturally necessary battleground and antidote for an increasingly neutered and virtual reality? Or is it something in between? What’s clear is that the screen beguiles and insulates us, and, as ever, our conscience makes cowards of us all.

After a first half riddled with offensive ineptness and dumb and spiteful penalties, a desperate Philadelphia squad chose to employ a trick play in the 3rd quarter, enabling them to sustain a drive and ultimately grab a slim 10-6 lead. Atlanta received the ensuing kickoff and its dreadful offense capered out onto the field.

Philly star defensive end Fletcher Cox was a major reason for Atlanta’s ineptitude. The Eagles had drafted the Blue Chip Cox in the first round in 2012, and within two years he emerged as an NFL star, earning All Pro Honors and inking, in June of 2016, a $103m contract with $63m guaranteed. On this opening night, Cox was wreaking havoc, stuffing runs, rushing the quarterback, and requiring double teams.

On the other side of the ball, Ryan Schraeder, offensive tackle, was charged with protecting Matt Ryan and blocking for Atlanta’s formidable run game, and he certainly takes that job seriously. Unlike Cox, Schraeder went undrafted, having played college ball at Division II Valdosta State. After signing as a free agent in April 2013, Schrader himself developed into a star within two years, making the All Pro team, and signing a 5-year deal worth over 31m USD, which is an awful lot of money, but is not, as noted above, Fletcher Cox money.

The Falcons opened their drive with a run to the right, Schraeder’s side, and the Eagles’ Chris Long stoutly set the edge against Schraeder and assisted on the tackle. Long, son of NFL Hall of Famer Howie, punctuated the play by pumping his fist, which is attached to a tattooed arm, creating just the sort of spectacle football fans love.

On the very next play, Matt Ryan calls for the snap and hands the ball to Tevin Coleman for a run to the left. You may still have the game DVR-ed, in which case I’d recommend you go have a look and keep these facts in mind: Schraeder had just been stuffed by Long, and his team had just been chumped by Nick Foles on the trick play. More historical context inheres as well: Philly is defending champs while the Falcons missed the playoffs last year. The year before, the Falcons lost an absolutely gut-wrenching Super Bowl to the Patriots, blowing a 25-point lead–a game in which Schraeder tore a ligament in his ankle in the 2nd quarter but continued playing on it until the 4th.  

So Coleman runs left and Schraeder, unblocked on the right side, positively launches himself at Fletcher Cox, who was locking horns with another Falcons offensive linemen. Schraeder’s helmet, propelled by his tidy 6’7” 300-lb frame, impales itself into Cox’s left knee and topples him.

For most of us, if we were Fletcher Cox on that play, immediate left leg amputation or possibly death would be reasonable expected outcomes. Not so for Cox.

Had his cleat been planted more firmly in the turf, if he had been leaning just a bit more heavily this way than that, we would’ve endured an extended commercial break, followed by the gruesome spectacle of the stretcher + golf cart, and heard Al Michaels intoning, “You just hope this isn’t serious,” which, if you had Philly’s defense on your fantasy team, it certainly would be.

But Cox immediately rises to his feet, gestures to the official and, according to Michaels, bows in gratitude when the referee produces and hurls his yellow flag to indicate an infraction.

I certainly don’t know Schraeder, and have no reason to think he’s a bad guy or dirty player. And that’s kind of the point here: no one seems to react, beyond the official’s wrist-slap.

So a 15-yard penalty on Schraeder for clipping. Second and 25. Short pass. Incomplete pass on 3rd down. Punt. Philly ball.

The Eagles go on to win, elated to escape with a victory. The Falcons are crushed one game into the season, with fans and journalists already expressing the desire to fire the coach and start planning for the 2019 season.

After the game, far from ranting about foul play, Cox made this remark on the defensive unit’s teamwork: “Everybody’s being a selfless player. It’s great.” Which remark, to state the obvious, just doesn’t give us much insight at all into his experience.

~ ~ ~

The game featured all that Americans have come to love about the NFL. Two sides pitted against one another, each harboring for the other extreme hatred. A battle for land, where the weak are dispossessed. The visible misogyny of underdressed and over-excited cheerleaders. The superstar, Julio Jones, racking up yards and catching the game’s last pass and falling back to earth like Icarus, but tragically out of bounds. The commissioner looking down from his Olympianly high luxury box, with sandy/brown-red/? hair, pockets bulging from his 80 million USD annual compensation, looking not merely corrupt but cruel. The dulcet tones of Al Michaels, interlarding his play-by-play with genuflections to NFL royalty (c.f. his q.4 mention of Bill Parcells, who was famous for yelling at black players for not catching punts correctly). We all know the grand story of the NFL, Michaels was saying, and aren’t we lucky? The big screens, the flashing lights, the highly visible racial mix.

And yet it’s just a game. On a stage seemingly set for earth-shattering outcomes, the sea is today still shrugging as it licks the rocks and sand. Schraeder and Cox are seemingly okay.

But the world turns slowly and the roads are winding. 99% of the deceased NFL player brains studied by BU researchers tested positive for chronic traumatic encephalopathy, which don’t seem like good odds. I have no insight into that choice, or whether it is a choice at all, for my couch is light years away from that side of the screen. But I do know there is not one side without the other.  

In the dystopian future of Infinite Jest, NFL players hang-glide down onto the field during the pre-game pageant, and kickers have absurdly oversized kicking legs, and quarterbacks have ridiculously swollen throwing arms. They are less human beings than vessels for certain specialized capacities.

The future is more or less now. Our NFL players walk onto the field, but they are specialized and well designed to hunt and hurt. All one can do is watch. Or not.