Brian Murphy: The NFL is our national drug. We are all unapologetic addicts.
The dreadful sights and ghostly silence Monday night in Cincinnati are seared into the consciousness of everyone who strikes a Faustian bargain when they watch an NFL game for unscripted entertainment, fantasy fulfillment, or a weekly parlay.
Bills safety Damar Hamlin laying lifeless on the field after making a tackle, first responders working to resuscitate his heart after it had stopped beating.
Distraught teammates and opponents choking back tears and forming a protective curtain of humanity around their fallen comrade as he was loaded into an ambulance and uncertain future.
Broadcasters searching for the right real-time words to describe what they did not know.
A crucial Buffalo-Bengals game suspended and shelved in the home office of insignificance.
It was an anguishing night. For this country’s richest and most powerful professional sports league, its generational legions of fans and the media Greek chorus.
We are all fully vested in the violence-industrial complex of the NFL.
Hamlin remains in critical condition at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center after suffering cardiac arrest when he collided with Bengals receiver Tee Higgins. Reports indicated he was improving after being placed on a ventilator when he arrived at the hospital.
Hamlin is a 24-year-old man with a long life to live whether he ever straps on a football helmet again. This game may never resume, but the show goes on, to be sure.
Week 18 beckons. Multiple playoff implications. Careers will end, ascend and be defined over the next six weeks. Advertising spots to be satisfied. Legal bets to be wagered.
We can bury our heads in the sands of denial or confront the hard truths about our collective addiction to the purest mainstream drug that is only a click away.
An NFL player is going to die on the field again. That day was almost Monday.
The sooner we accept that tragedy and bake it into reality of this morally depraved, brutally captivating spectacle, the faster we can stop wringing our hands about how we sold our souls decades ago.
On Oct. 24, 1971, Detroit Lions wide receiver Chuck Hughes dropped dead of a heart attack at old Tiger Stadium after catching a pass and being hit by two Bears defenders.
An autopsy determined Hughes died because of a clogged artery and blood clot that caused his heart to stop. After being sandwiched by two charging players. Cause of death: hereditary, not football.
The show went on.
On Aug. 12, 1978, Darryl Stingley became a quadriplegic after the New England wide receiver collided with Oakland Raiders safety Jack Tatum and shattered two vertebrae during a meaningless preseason game.
Meaningless except it cost Stingley the use of his legs and a multiyear contract extension he was due to sign the following day that would have made him among the highest paid receivers in the league.
The show went on.
On Nov. 17, 1991, Lions guard Mike Utley suffered a spinal-cord injury blocking an L.A. Rams defender and was paralyzed from the chest down.
His thumbs-up from the gurney became an emotional symbol of Detroit’s unlikely run to the NFC championship game, and a beacon of hope whenever an injured player flashes one as they are carried off the field.
The show went on.
On Dec. 21, 1997, Lions linebacker Reggie Brown suffered a spinal cord contusion and was partially paralyzed when he tackled New York Jets halfback Adrian Murrell, an awful prequel to what we witnessed Monday night.
I was at the Pontiac Silverdome that afternoon, 26 years old, full of cheap beer and fire-breathing vigor as a longtime season-ticket holder. The Lions needed to win their season finale to clinch a postseason berth. Barry Sanders also was pursuing 2,000 yards, which he would eclipse later in the victory.
However, we watched 80,000-strong in stunned silence as Lions players frantically ran out a gurney to their wounded teammate before an ambulance backed onto the field.
Brown had stopped breathing and needed oxygen administered. Players were distraught. I can still see Brown strapped down, frantically being loaded into the ambulance with someone holding up an intravenous bag as if we were watching an episode of “ER.”
Play quickly resumed. Barry got his 2,000 yards and the Silverdome roared as the Lions made the playoffs (losing the next week, of course).
Brown regained use of his arms and legs following months of grueling rehabilitation and retained his quality of life. He never played another down.
The show went on.
On Sept. 9, 2007, Bills special teamer Kevin Everett fractured his spine tackling Denver’s Domenik Hixon during the second-half kickoff. Doctors feared for Everett’s life and figured he would never walk again.
Three months later, Everett gingerly walked onto the field at Ralph Wilson Stadium in Buffalo to a rousing ovation. He regained most of his movement and retired to his family.
The show goes on. It always goes on. Because we can’t stop watching.
We have known forever the everyday difficulties retired players face after sacrificing their limbs on the altar of lucrative contracts, unabashed commerce, and exhilarating entertainment.
The ravaging of brains by concussions and CTE, which have killed countless men and driven others to suicide by pumping bullets into their chests to preserve their minds for postmortem evaluation.
Let that marinate for a moment.
The "next man up" ethos of the locker room, which literally means scraping one guy up with a spatula to put another on the griddle.
No one is immune from complicity.
Certainly not the money counters on Park Avenue whose mission is to make the NFL a $25 billion industry for emperor Roger Goodell.
Or the general managers who acquire players off the meat hook and eventually discard their carcasses to the waiver wire or ash heap.
Or the coaches whose survival is defined by the wins they accumulate, not the bodies they break in the name of one more first down or home-field advantage.
Or the players who chase the lottery ticket and alone know the glory of coming together as men to overcome adversity on a quest to share the sweet taste of victory. They alone also know the ultimate price to pay.
Or the media who report and opine on the bounce of a ball for a paycheck and the chance to fly a little closer to the sun than the other guy.
Or the fans who pour their blood, sweat and treasure into outcomes of a child’s game that is so intoxicating.
All of us have buried our snouts in the trough. Grownups making grown-up decisions with grown-up money to sample forbidden fruit.
Face it, the NFL is a vice. No different from cigarettes, booze, drugs or gambling. Lots and lots of gambling.
Watching men abuse themselves so frontally and ferociously is terrible for their health and, to a much lesser extent, ours. But it makes us feel so damn good because it’s so damn fun.
The 2022 Minnesota Vikings are a case study in the magic of the unknown. Three hours to soak in the drama and escape a world gone mad.
The NFL knows they have the purest stuff on the street, and you and I will line up every Thursday, Saturday, Sunday or Monday to get our fix.
Death is collateral damage.
The show must go on.
