There was only one acceptable reaction to the traumatic, life-threatening injury suffered last night by Damar Hamlin. Everything had to stop in terms of the game. Football and “the game must go on” stopped mattering. Anyone who so much as mentioned the concurrent question of whether the game would be replayed or forgotten about was all but beaten senseless by Twitter gorillas. The biggest such episode was triggered by a single tweet by veteran sportscaster Skip Bayless). It was unanimously suggested that Bayless needed to be cancelled, stomped upon, drawn and quartered, tarred and feathered, etc.
Hamlin is reportedly okay or at least stable, but when things appeared to be touch and go, his Buffalo Bill teammates were visibly distraught. I saw some weeping. Except — hello? — this mishap was a result of the normal playing of a football game. Football is intended to be the most violent professional sport of all, a game that routinely calls for brutal tackling, bruising, body-slamming. Players occasionally get hurt or even knocked unconscious, and nobody bats an eye when they do.
Hamlin suffered a cardiac arrest (it was a freak occurence) and was a heartbeat or two away from death, and was saved on the field by fast-acting medics. Thank God he survived, but the expectation of violence and the threat of serious injury…well, isn’t that partly why people pay to see football games?
Remember that climactic scene in Jerry Maguire when Cuba Gooding, Jr.‘s Rod Tidwell was knocked unconscious during a Monday Night Football game between the Cardinals and the Dallas Cowboys? Everyone was extremely anxious and concerned for Rod, and thank God he came to. But what if he hadn’t recovered and had slipped into some kind of coma? Would the game have been forgotten about out of respect for poor Rod and his wife and kids? Put it this way: If you were the screenwriter and Rod slipping into a coma was an irreversible plot point, would you have cancelled the game out of compassion for the poor guy? I honestly don’t think that would or could have happened in the world of 1996 and Jerry Maguire.
Hamlin’s physical survival is obviously the most important issue, but at the same time no one is allowed to even mention other aspects of this situation…no other considerations. Last night’s Twitter mood was unmistakable. If you stepped out of line and talked about anything else besides the paramount issue of Hamlin’s health, you were vermin and deserved to die.
—
