Robert Z. Nemeth Doesn't Care About Oddly Shaped Balls

Know what's great? (Besides those Jimmy Dean microwaveable breakfast sandwiches. Mmm mmm. I'm not actually sure why I brought this up, it's really a tangential point to the entire post.) Opinion columns written by old men who complain about everything. Enter the fray, Robert Z. Nemeth, about how football is a waste of time.

It's not even one of those Andy Rooney-style missives about how players in simpler times like Johnny Lujack could teach these Brady and Manning kids a thing or two about quarterbacking the single wing formation. It's just a flat out screed against football and, while he's at it, the entire concept of organized sports as a big business. It's remarkably well done in the annals of crotchetiness.

At any rate, one of the reasons I'm not a fan is that the word derives from "fanatic," and I refuse to be a fanatic about anything, least of all football, a game in which a bunch of behemoths do their best to cripple each other. I don't happen to believe football is a religion, creed, human right or citizenship in an unruly tribe called Patriot Nation. It's not a science, despite platoons of coaches, coordinators and analysts using high technology to determine the best way of advancing an oddly shaped pigskin 10 yards at a time.

And another thing! What's this about my TV not working a year from now? Thank goodness I got the extended warranty on these rabbit ears. And Beatrice? We're out of fig bars. I SAID WE'RE OUT OF FIG B... Mother Mary and Joseph, that woman wouldn't hear a Kraut if he was yelling right in her face.

Super Bowl's A Super Bore [Worcester Telegram & Gazette]