Philadelphia Eagles

Usually I don’t post stuff like this because I figure everyone has already seen it everywhere else. But, I’m posting this on the off chance that my readers haven’t seen the clip from The View episode where Philadelphia Eagles players came out to meet a boy who had been bullied at school.

Bullying is a subject I feel strongly about. Not because of this whole media and celebrity obsession with it. I’ve just always stuck up for people if I felt they were being bullied. So of course seeing this cute little boy who’s so smart and sweet be sad because kids are picking on him really made me upset

It was great of the Eagles players to do something nice for the boy, but as adults we have to start taking bullying a little more seriously. Seems like people have the attitude that it happens to every one. Everyone gets teased, sure, but bullying is different.

Plus kid bullies grow up into full asshole adults! Stopping bullying is really doing a service to society.

I know a lot of people don’t believe in New Year’s Resolutions but I do. I made a list of things I want to change over the next year and decade. I think I did a really good job, so it follows that I’d make some resolutions for other people. To help out people in and around the NFL, I made a list of resolutions that I personally think others should make.

Roger Goodell - Begin to apply fines equitably across the league.

Donovan McNabb - Learn the difference between being professional and being a pushover.

James Harrison - Relearn the fundamentals of tackling.

Braylon Edwards - Utilize cabs.

Troy Polamalu - Put some bass in your voice.

Ryan Clark - Ignore the heckling on twitter.

Darren Sharper - Come to terms with being 35.

Brett Favre - Fall back in love with your wife Deanna.

Andy Reid - Resign.

Michael Vick - Spend money more wisely.

DeSean Jackson - Balance having fun with being professional.

Roddy White - Get media training.

Coy Wire, Cortland Finnegan - Hold a press conference announcing whether you’re black or white.

Rex Ryan - Put your face in the videos so that your wife isn’t the only one exposed.

Terrell Owens - Begin to take responsibility for your shortcomings.

Shawne Merriman - Sleep in a hyperbaric chamber and stretch before practice.

Maurice Jones-Drew, LaGarrette Blount, Michael Turner - Do side bends or situps, but please don’t lose that butt.

Eli Manning - Stand in the mirror and repeat “I am somebody” before leaving the house each day.

Jerry Jones - Consider the opinions of others.

Philadelphia Eagles, Chicago Bears, and Washington Redskins - Improve your  awful offensive lines.

Announcers, analysts, and media outlets — Stop mentioning dogfighting every time you mention Michael Vick.

Gus Johnson - Call more games of all kinds.

Bob Costas - Tone the dramatics down a notch.

Jon Gruden - Lobby for the HC gig in Cincy.

Collinsworth - Think before you speak and get some black friends.

Bob Papa - Point to Theisman and Millen and inform your bosses that you simply cannot work under these conditions.

NFLPA - Continue to make the NFLPA truly friendly toward the players and improve the information contained on the lockout site.

This is my quick list, but use the comments to tell other players, announcers, and NFL management and ownership what you think they should work on in 2011.

Fox Columnist Jason Whitlock who I’ve agreed with more in the past couple months than I care to admit, advocates in his column for the NFL to make a distinction between flagrant and incidental hits. If you saw the Eagles/Colts game yesterday you understand why:

On Sunday, Quintin Mikell and Kurt Coleman executed the perfect defensive secondary play, sandwiching Colts receiver Austin Collie just as he reeled in a Peyton Manning pass and took a second step running upfield. Collie fumbled. The Eagles recovered. The hit knocked Collie out cold.

A ref threw a flag, penalizing Mikell for unnecessary roughness. The ref ruled Collie’s catch an incomplete pass and flagged Mikell for a helmet-to-helmet hit. The Colts went on to score a touchdown on the drive.

In the fourth quarter of the same game, with the Colts trailing by nine points, Philly’s Trent Cole beat Indy’s left tackle and executed the perfect tomahawk-chop sack/strip on fourth-and-18. Game over.

Not quite.

A ref flagged Cole for unnecessary roughness. Cole’s hand hit the back of Manning’s helmet as he chopped down on the cocked football. The penalty gave Indy a first down. The Colts scored a touchdown, cutting Philly’s lead to 26-24.

Beyond the speculation that the NFL tried to “fix” the game for Peyton Manning, it’s obvious that this is one of those situations in which players are being (and will continue to be) punished unfairly. Whitlock’s call for a distinction to be made between an intentional hit on a defenseless player and one simply caused by momentum (or in the case of Collie, partly or wholly caused by the offensive player lowering his own head) is great in theory but getting the NFL to consider it might be difficult.

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I’ve made no secrets that the Philadelphia Eagles are my team. (Full Disclosure: I have been both an Atlanta Falcons fan and a Philadelphia Eagles fan since I was 10). I was living in Philadelphia when Freddie Mitchell “played” for the Eagles so this makes his most recent comments all the more annoying.

He has stated that he believes he was blackballed due to comments he made about McNabb. I found this claim so ridiculous that I went back and reread it to ensure he wasn’t just announcing to the public that he has balls and they are, in fact, black.

Mitchell let the arrows fly in a conversation Wednesday morning, and dived unabashed into his feelings about McNabb in the quarterback’s lone Super Bowl appearance.

“I respect both Coach Reid and Coach Shanahan — they have two total different coaching theories,” Mitchell said. “I can only wonder what would have happened in the Super Bowl if Reid stepped up and said, ‘You know what? You’re playing like [expletive], you’re benched.’ I don’t know many coaches that have the balls to do that. He was playing like [expletive] and he should have been benched. … And don’t say he doesn’t have a record of this; he did the same thing in every single championship game.”

The backup, for the record, was Koy Detmer.

These are very interesting comments coming from Mitchell especially since McNabb has always spoken highly of Mr. “I-want-to-thank-my-hands-for-being-so-great” and the fact that Mitchell wasn’t even a starter for much of his time with the Eagles.

Always a class act, Terrell Owens decided to pile on McNabb as well.

Owens also referenced McNabb’s shortcomings in the Super Bowl on The T.Ocho ShowTuesday night.

“Well, I don’t really want to start anything, but I did play in the Super Bowl and there were rumors where he couldn’t get our two-minute offense going at the end of the game. I’m just saying,” said Owens.

Do I have to point out how many things are wrong with what he just said?

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