C'mon Man! Obama and the Vick Comment

Much ado is being made about Obama's comments praising the Eagles organization for giving Michael Vick a second chance.

A couple of thoughts come to mind:

- As a society, we create some very real structural problems for criminals. It becomes difficult to become employed following a conviction. Many experts point to this as a main reason for recidivism.

- I am unaware of any relapse by Michael Vick. He doesn't seem to be drowning, electrocuting, and otherwise torturing dogs. That's probably for the best.

- Society may very well be improved if more ex-cons were able to pursue careers that provide a solid quality of life.

That being said, C'mon man!

NFL is hardly unforgiving in regards to criminal transgressions. Off the top of my head, I can think of the following:

• Donte Stollworth - Former Browns WR, now Baltimore. Served time for Second Degree Manslaughter after boozing it up and running somebody over
• Rey Maualuga - Bengal LB pled guilty for drunk driving
• Larry Johnson - Currently not playing, but this guy has fucked over more Black women than Hurricane Katrina. His felony rap sheet is ridonculous. And while he's not playing right now (or probably won't play moving forward), it certainly doesn't have to do with his criminal record as he was signed by the Redskins and subsequently released.
• Pacman Jones - Not sure I could do this strip club gun incident justice. Bengals player now.
• Plaxico Burress - Will be released from prison soon. It's a foregone conclusion that he'll make a team somewhere, assuming he has stayed conditioned.

(dis)Honorable Mention:

• Ray Lewis - his murder charge got dropped down to a misdemeanor after he testified against two of his buddies.
• Ben Roethlisberger - I'll give a flyer to Ben on this one since there haven't been convictions and the commissioner has taken fairly appropriate measures for what has been just accusations. That being said....c'mon, Ben.

And I don't even follow this kind of stuff. I'm sure I'm missing something.

The NFL is hardly new to giving second, third, fourth, or even fifth chances to their star athletes when they run into legal trouble. And to couch it in terms of giving an ex-con a second chance, as if it's a magnanimous decision to help rehabilitate the criminal is utter lunacy.

Am I glad Vick is playing again? I'm agnostic to this, I suppose. He's fun. He's fast. And even though he just dropped a game to a banged up Vikings team starting their third string quarterback and a JV secondary, I like watching him.

Let's just not fool ourselves. This isn't about a chance at redemption. It's not a kind act by the Eagles. This was a cost-benefit analysis by a profit-seeking entity. They grabbed a premier athlete at basement low prices, much like grabbing BP stock when it was $27/share after the oil spill. It was a risk, but so much upside.