As usual, one or more of the top picks in next week’s NFL draft won’t make it to training camp on time. They’ll become holdouts and be referred to in pejorative terms for what will be perceived as unwarranted selfishness.
They haven’t even completed a pass or made a tackle or scored a touchdown, the rant will go. How dare they demand even more millions than the franchise is offering.
Here’s why: Al Lucas.
The Arena Football League player was attempting to make a tackle Sunday in the Avengers’ game against the New York Dragons. He bent down. A blocker and the ball carrier tumbled over him. Lucas hit the ground.
It was a scene every football fan has witnessed a thousand times over, the classic three yards and a cloud of dust.
And what followed was a scene every football fan has witnessed dozens of times. The injured player lay motionless. Medical personnel rushed to his aid. A hush fell over the arena. The player was stabilized on a stretcher and wheeled off the field.
The only thing that was shocking about what happened Sunday on L.A.’s Staples Center football field was, thank everyone’s lucky stars, that it doesn’t happen more often.
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Lucas didn’t move again.
A wife and 1-year-old daughter survive him.
Al Lucas, who died playing football at 26, is why professional football players ought to hold out for every penny they can get, no matter how ridiculous it sounds for a guy to be paid several million dollars to play a kid’s game from the sandlot. We may call pro football a game, but it is a dangerous choice of employment.
Lucas took the risk to try to get back to the NFL and a multimillion-dollar contract. But what befell him is why I don’t understand how anyone can begrudge pro players making gazillions to entertain us like the modern-day gladiators they’ve become.
Pro football players are worth whatever they can squeeze from the market. These guys literally put their necks on the line.
This time, with a tragic result.