Tom Brady: How I Learned to Stop Hating and Love the Game

Let me start by sending a sincere message of sympathy to my rival fans in Foxboro and the entire Patriots organization. The loss of your top player is not making this JETS fan smile. 

As a sports fan, and as I watched the game on Sunday, admittedly I immediately started to reflect on what how this would affect my team. There is a fellow human being lying in agony in front of thousands of fans, and I’m wondering if my team will benefit? 

What is wrong with me?

I am no fan of Bill Belichick or Tom Brady, simply because I think they got complacent and cocky last season. Offseason comments further cemented my dislike for Tom. But, this mentality of cheering an injury of a Hall of Fame player is wrong on so many levels.

One, as I mentioned, this is a living, breathing person. As fans, a plastic box with a glass front seems to confuse us on this fact. Does anyone remember L.T.’s reaction to the Theismann injury?

Taylor had marching orders to de-cleat Joe, but in the blink of an eye, his attitude changed from competitive to compassionate.

Two, if we all love the NFL so much, why would we cheer for one of its biggest stars to be removed for an entire season? Will that help the product? Was I the only one last year that found it amazing that U.S. senators got involved when a history-making game was not available to be seen by every NFL-blooded American?

Finally, as a fan, do we want our teams to play a crippled opponent? If the JETS knock off the Patriots this weekend, yes it will still be an accomplishment, but will it be the victory we wanted? Is that how we want to win?

If that’s the case, we should all become members of the Tonya Harding fan club.

Haters Beware! Picture Favre, Manning (Eli or Peyton), Anderson, Palmer, Brees, and the others I missed, writhing in pain on the turf on Sunday, and ask yourself how you would feel. I implore real sports fans to stop spewing hate.

And to the Patriots fans out there, look at the picture above and use it as motivation to get through this season and good luck to Cassel. I hope we beat him.