{"id":11454,"date":"2013-09-05T17:34:21","date_gmt":"2013-09-05T17:34:21","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2013-09-05T17:34:21","modified_gmt":"2013-09-05T17:34:21","slug":"the_nfl_season_kicks_off","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2013\/09\/05\/the_nfl_season_kicks_off\/","title":{"rendered":"The NFL Season Kicks Off"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Listen<\/a><\/p>\n

RUSH: I cannot believe the NFL season opens tonight. The Baltimore Ravens at the Denver Broncos. (interruption) Why, what is that weird look on your face? Did you not know the season began tonight? (interruption) You\u2019re just not up for it? You\u2019re just not. What if the Cowboys were playing tonight? (interruption) Okay, so you\u2019d be revved if it was the Cowboys tonight? I have to admit, an opening night game Ravens and Broncos is not all that, but it is what it is.<\/p>\n

(interruption) What? (interruption) Yeah, they\u2019re two good teams. I guess. I don\u2019t know. (interruption) Yeah, they say that every year, Snerdley. “The Cowboys have a really good team.” You know what, I can\u2019t… Tony Romo makes, what, $125 million and he\u2019s won one playoff game? And they… This guy, I\u2019ll tell you, he\u2019s really mastered it. I mean, he\u2019s made money on the come for I don\u2019t know how many years now. It\u2019s great. I\u2019m all for it. <\/p>\n

Capitalism. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Tony Romo would have been a great pilgrim. If he\u2019da been on the boat, he\u2019da been a great guy. I\u2019m sure William Bradford would have thought he was cool. The Wall Street Journal. TV ratings are gonna go through the roof. Folks, I have to tell you something. Even preseason ratings have gone through the roof. Do you know why that is? As much trouble as football is in — and it is. Don\u2019t doubt me. There\u2019s a dearth of stuff on TV. But my God, it\u2019s so bad out there, people are looking for something to watch.<\/p>\n

You know what the popularity of the NFL equals? What it equals is a link to the past when times were better in people\u2019s mind or whatever that means to them. Not more innocent. It just something that\u2019s there. There\u2019s an American tradition that they haven\u2019t changed. They\u2019re in the process of turning it upside down. They haven\u2019t pulled it off yet, but they\u2019re trying. It\u2019s still something good in the midst of lackluster TV, in the midst of lackluster life, lackluster job, lackluster government, lackluster president.<\/p>\n

You watch. The ratings are gonna be through the roof. They really are. It\u2019s something solid that is American, that people can glom onto, and I think people are searching for that. For a lot of people, it\u2019s subconscious. They\u2019re not even aware of it. But I, who have lived much of my life by observing others live it, know exactly what I\u2019m talking about. This concussion thing is not over by a long shot. Oh, I\u2019ve got three or four articles on that in the news Stack of Stuff.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Within minutes of the settlement! The NFL said they want to get this off the table, get this out of the conversation. It\u2019s not gotten it out of the conversation. The conversation is growing on this. But look. Wall Street Journal headline: “NFL Offenses Exploit a Fear of Fines.” This is a story about rules changes that are rooted in increasing player safety and how players have learned to exploit it. It\u2019s another object lesson in how massive bureaucracies can try to control large numbers of people with regulations and laws — and how entrepreneurial, creative people find ways around it. <\/p>\n

I don\u2019t want to give it away, but this is about how defensive players now have to pull up and make sure they don\u2019t hit offensive players too hard and hurt them. Defensive players are not supposed to hurt offensive players. Rodney Harrison is quoted. In the game of NFL football (college football, too) manliness is defined by your willingness as a receiver to go over the middle. Not run the sideline routes. Not run go and out patterns on the sideline. Do a crossing pattern over the middle. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s where these supposed decapitations have taken place. That\u2019s where the real brutality is, because the offensive player does not see what\u2019s coming. Now the NFL has decided, “That\u2019s too brutal. That\u2019s too mean.” So they have put limits on what defensive players can do to offensive wide receivers going over the middle, running past the middle of the field. Rodney Harrison says, this is just a joke. He says these wide receivers are now laughing as they go over the middle. <\/p>\n

They\u2019re not afraid of anything. <\/p>\n

They know they can\u2019t be hit — and if they\u2019re hit, they know that the defense is gonna get a major penalty. So these guys, there\u2019s no fear anymore. You know, Rodney Harrison is the prototype safety in the NFL. Prototype. It\u2019s funny to listen to these old-line guys who played the game like it was meant to be played and they\u2019re watching it now. This is not their word, but they\u2019re watching it be a little “wussified” here, as the lawyers are getting their hands in it, which is naturally gonna happen. <\/line><\/p>\n

To hear Rodney Harrison say these wide receivers are crossing the middle now laughing? It\u2019s a perfect, a perfect description for what his view of the rules change is. The Wall Street Journal has a whole story about this. There is another story. Get this, folks. I know when we get into football some of you say, “Stick to the issues!” But this is “the issues” now. That\u2019s the point. They\u2019ve turned it into the issues. Football is the issues now, sadly. <\/p>\n

There is, in the NFL now, supposedly something new that\u2019s never happened before. Obviously it has happened. It was part of the early game. It\u2019s called the “read option offense,” and it\u2019s the kind of offense run by these new quarterbacks like RGIII who plays for the Washington (shouts) REDSKINS! (interruption) Well, until they change it I\u2019m not gonna whisper it. RGIII for the Redskins, Russell Wilson for the Seattle Seahawks, Colin Kaepernick of the San Francisco Fort\u2019iners. <\/p>\n

The read option is basically a variation of the college wishbone offense. The quarterback takes the ball, starts running either way, pitches out, or takes\/carries the ball himself (which is the key to this), or maybe stops the whole thing and throws a pass. So defenses now have been created to deal with the read-option quarterbacks. In fact, the Kansas City Chiefs have 22 coaches on the staff, and they\u2019ve got a guy for this.<\/p>\n

The Kansas City Chiefs have a coach whose title is “read-option analysis.” His sole job is to analyze the read option on both his team and his quarterback. His quarterback can\u2019t really run it, Alex Smith. So he would be analyzing the other team, helping with his defense. Now, the read option is crucial because when the quarterback leaves the pocket, he no longer is afforded wussified rule protection. He can be decapitated like any other player when he leaves the pocket running with the ball. <\/p>\n

Well, guess what? Clay Matthews is a major linebacker for the Green Bay Packers. They\u2019re playing the Fort\u2019iners this weekend, and he\u2019s talking about all the possible ways they can go after Kaepernick. He\u2019s talking about the legal ways, the illegal ways. He\u2019s talking about what the Packers\u2019 plan is. Of course this has the Fort\u2019iner coach, Jim Harbaugh, saying, “This is horrible! You don\u2019t have people out there talking about how you\u2019re gonna hurt a man. <\/p>\n

“This isn\u2019t right. We went through this two years ago! We don\u2019t want to go through this again now,” and that\u2019s a reference to the bounty program. So now you got the Fort\u2019iner coach getting close to saying the Packers are behaving the same way the Saints did with the bounty program, although he\u2019s not saying it, but he\u2019s alluding to it. You got a linebacker now saying he\u2019s salivating over these quarterbacks in the read option leaving the pocket \u2019cause now they can be creamed like any other player. <\/p>\n

All this is taking place while the league is going to great lengths to make the game safer. But look what the players are doing. The players are looking for ways around it. Just like when Obama raises taxes on the rich, what do the rich do? They don\u2019t sit there and pay it. They figure ways around it. It\u2019s what productive entrepreneurial people do. When times are tough because of overregulation, massive government, they find ways around it. The people who write the regulations, write these laws, just expect everybody\u2019s gonna be a bunch of sheep, sit there and abide by it. <\/p>\n

The NFL in this case is the government, and all these new rules, supposedly to make the game safer, and the players are conspiring — (laughing) The Wall Street Journal has a story about it! So the NFL is the issues. It relates. And it\u2019s all about this concussion business. It\u2019s all about player safety and limiting liability, which takes it all back to money. Of course. I\u2019m fascinated by it. And now Rodney Harrison, two defensive players, talking about ways that they would — (laughing) wide receivers laughing as they go across the… You know, that offends defensive players. I mean, we\u2019re laughing about it, but football is a collision sport. It is a man\u2019s game. <\/p>\n

<\/a> It\u2019s a brutal collision sport. Everybody playing it knows it. And this effort here to take manliness out of it and to reduce the collision and so forth, you got all these quotes of defensive players, “Yeah, I coulda made a huge hit, but I had to let it go \u2019cause of the rules.” You got players now on record counting the number of touchdowns they allowed to happen last year because of these rules changes. Defensive players all upset about the number of touchdowns that happened that needn\u2019t have happened if they could have leveled a guy like they used to be able to.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: I cannot believe the NFL season opens tonight. The Baltimore Ravens at the Denver Broncos. (interruption) Why, what is that weird look on your face? Did you not know the season began tonight? (interruption) You\u2019re just not up for it? You\u2019re just not. What if the Cowboys were playing tonight? (interruption) Okay, so you\u2019d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nThe NFL Season Kicks Off - The Rush Limbaugh Show<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/live-rush-limbaugh.pantheonsite.io\/daily\/2013\/09\/05\/the_nfl_season_kicks_off\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"The NFL Season Kicks Off - The Rush Limbaugh Show\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"RUSH: I cannot believe the NFL season opens tonight. The Baltimore Ravens at the Denver Broncos. (interruption) Why, what is that weird look on your face? 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