"It's a brutal sport; I never play it.
Rams third and 4 on the Titans 34 yard line. Warner takes the snap, drops back, sees Marshall Faulk run up the gut and avoiding coverage. Warner passes to Faulk, just as Blaine Bishop comes across the middle and levels Faulk as the defenseless halfback first touches the ball. As Faulk falls to the ground, Bishop stands to greet the roaring crowd, beating on his chest like a warrior. Faulk proceeds to the sideline to lick his wounds as the punt team comes onto the field, and the defense prepares to destroy the punter as their hunger for blood is insatiable.
Why is this so popular? Football at all levels is better than ever. We even pay up to fifty bucks a fight to watch the WBC title fight every six months or so. Heck, even USC has a rugby team. Men love violence. Weather consciously or unconsciously, we actually all thrive on some sort of violence occasionally. If you drive by a bad wreck, you hope that everything is ok, but secretly you wonder if there is a corpse or any lost limbs. I even have sat on the couch following the tragic events taking place in the Washington, D.C. area over the past week. Yes, I think its horrible that someone could go about shooting random strangers from hundreds of yards away, and I also worry for my sisters safety because she lives in the area, but I admit that if the guy wasn't actually killing people that he should be commended and given a nice big trophy for his impressive long distance shooting and stealthy movement. I don't consider myself a violent or dark person, I just admire such a feat. So we know that we like violence, weather its openly or covertly, but why is this?.
One theory is that if you work forty-plus hours a week, that watching a sport such as football all weekend long is something of a release. Football is a way to vicariously experience physical empowerment. Boxing, for example, is even more so. You find yourself shouting "punch him! Kill him! Knock him on his ass!" and secretly it's what you want to do to your boss, your in-laws, or your bastard neighbor.
