{"id":1560,"date":"2009-07-25T07:25:44","date_gmt":"2009-07-25T12:25:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/2009\/07\/25\/let-the-man-play-why-michael-vick-should-be-reinstated-into-the-nfl\/"},"modified":"2010-06-13T07:11:50","modified_gmt":"2010-06-13T12:11:50","slug":"let-the-man-play-why-michael-vick-should-be-reinstated-into-the-nfl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/2009\/07\/25\/let-the-man-play-why-michael-vick-should-be-reinstated-into-the-nfl\/","title":{"rendered":"Let the man play.  Why Michael Vick should be reinstated into the NFL."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I have restrained from commenting on the Michael Vick situation.  The man is out of prison, he has served his time, and now he wants more than anything to play in the NFL again.  In the words of Roddy White, I say free Mike Vick \u2026<\/p>\n<table align=\"center\">\n<tr>\n<td>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/cgblog\/images\/sports\/nfl\/roddy_white_free_mike_vick.jpg\" alt=\"Roddy White \u00a9 Lifted from ESPN.com\" \/><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<p>As an Atlanta Falcon fan I have moved on; we now are in the Matt Ryan era.  As a father of young boys I have had to deal with the whole role model thing.  Or in the case of Vick, lack of a role model.  As an owner of a dog I find what Vick did and supported repugnant.<\/p>\n<p>Contrary to what some would want you to believe, the whole Michael Vick situation is not a racial issue.  Plenty of his supports are white, myself included.  I still have a Vick #7 jersey.  My kids still like Vick; in fact they were excited when I told them that Vick is trying to get back into the NFL.  I think the league could have looked past the Mary Janes (or whatever it is called these days), the crowd he ran with, and some of the other poor behavior.  It just so happened that Vick decided to fund dog fighting.  Wrong place.  Wrong time.  Wrong crime.<\/p>\n<p>With all that said, and with all due respect to those that would keep Vick out of the NFL, the man has paid his dues to society.  He was convicted and served his time.<\/p>\n<p>There are many places in \u201creal life\u201d where Vick as a convicted felon is no longer free to pursue work.  Currently the NFL contains no such restrictions.  If the NFL decides to further punish Vick they should take a hard look at the rest of the players in the league and decide just what point the league is trying to prove by not reinstating Vick now.<\/p>\n<p>The latest rumors are that Vick will be conditionally reinstated into the NFL, but the catch is there will be some sort of suspension.  Double jeopardy?  A suspension at the beginning of the year is going to damper Vick\u2019s hopes of catching on with a team.  What point would a suspension serve?<\/p>\n<p>After we get the suspension business out of the way, the next question will be who will sign Vick?  I think there are very few owners that are strong enough to put up with the carnival atmosphere of the dog loving protesting crap that will ensue by PETA and friends.  Of course the PETA crowd deserves its own article, but that is a different op-ed.<\/p>\n<p>For now Vick should concentrate on keeping his nose clean, getting back into football shape, and pray that someone will realize that he has already paid a steep enough price.  I say let Michael Vick play.<\/p>\n<div class=\"addtoany_share_save_container addtoany_content_bottom\"><div class=\"a2a_kit a2a_kit_size_ addtoany_list a2a_target\" id=\"wpa2a_1\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.addtoany.com\/share\" onclick=\"__gaTracker('send', 'event', 'outbound-article', 'https:\/\/www.addtoany.com\/share', '');\" class=\"a2a_dd addtoany_share_save\"><img src=\"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-content\/plugins\/add-to-any\/share_save_171_16.png\" width=\"171\" height=\"16\" alt=\"Share\"\/><\/a>\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"><!--\nif(wpa2a)wpa2a.script_load();\n\/\/--><\/script>\n<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I have restrained from commenting on the Michael Vick situation. The man is out of prison, he has served his time, and now he wants more than anything to play in the NFL again. In the words of Roddy White, I say free Mike Vick \u2026 As an Atlanta Falcon fan I have moved on; &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/2009\/07\/25\/let-the-man-play-why-michael-vick-should-be-reinstated-into-the-nfl\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Let the man play.  Why Michael Vick should be reinstated into the NFL.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"addtoany_share_save_container addtoany_content_bottom\"><div class=\"a2a_kit a2a_kit_size_ addtoany_list a2a_target\" id=\"wpa2a_2\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.addtoany.com\/share\" onclick=\"__gaTracker('send', 'event', 'outbound-article', 'https:\/\/www.addtoany.com\/share', '');\" class=\"a2a_dd addtoany_share_save\"><img src=\"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-content\/plugins\/add-to-any\/share_save_171_16.png\" width=\"171\" height=\"16\" alt=\"Share\"\/><\/a><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[29],"class_list":["post-1560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive","tag-nfl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1560"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2957,"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1560\/revisions\/2957"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calvertgames.com\/cgblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}