On May 20th, the sun will shine on the face of a free Michael Vick for the first time in almost two years.  He’ll hear the clank of the bars as his federal prison cell opens, be escorted down the hall and handed his personal effects, then led out to a waiting car and released to the remand of his own home for the final two months of his sentence.  After which, he’ll be a free man.  At least in the legal sense.

For while Vick will indeed be free from any governmentally imposed incarceration and labeled “rehabilitated” by the state and federal agencies who collaborated to imprison him some 23 months ago, the public and professional redemption that Vick will need to achieve in the eyes of his fans, his peers, and the decision-making authorities of the NFL is still far from guaranteed.

Once one of the most exciting, talented, recognized, and highest paid players in the league, Vick will now be reduced to the prospect of remorsefully begging for even the opportunity to ever step foot on the NFL field of play again.

While there are signs that Vick may be able to eventually overcome his indefinate suspension (such as teams like the San Francisco 49ers showing interest and respected ex-Indianapolis Colts’ Head Coach Tony Dungy meeting with and vouching for him to the NFL brass), the fact still remains that no NFL franchise was even willing to part with a 7th round draft pick to secure Vick’s contract rights from Atlanta, and his mounting debt and tarnished public image will almost assuredly haunt him, and any franchise that signs him, for the rest of his playing career.

The largest obstacle to reinstatement that currently remains in this entire dog-fighting saga and the resulting media circus it created is the tenacity and unflinching resolve of Vick’s ardent and vocal detractors.

Often lost in the midst of the high-profile Vick scandal is the fact that the NFL (like any and every other segment of society) unfortunately contains a wide variety of unsavory elements within its midst.  From drug and alcohol abusers to steroid taking players and cheating coaches to violent spousal abusers and manslaughter offenders, the collective personnell of the NFL run the gamut of legal and moral convictions.

Yet the extent of Vick’s prosecution and persecution for his role in the brutal and unforgivable “sport” that he participated in has surpassed every other form of personal and professional fall-out in recent NFL memory.

There was no public outcry when Donte Stallworth killed a man while driving his car under the influence on a sunny March morning in Miami this year.  There was no clamoring for his career or his freedom or his life by the NFL community.  And there still hasn’t been any action taken by the league.  Mario Reyes lies dead and yet still nothing has been done to rectify the situation.

There is an arbitrary and superficial nature to the punishments that are imposed and the forgiveness that is granted to NFL players both within the league and in the court of public opinion, and the implication here is that the value-system of the public, the attention span of the audience, and the process by which the NFL determines, regulates, and enforces appropriate behavior might need some serious re-evaluating.

Because somehow, in this mass-market, media-influenced, public-opinion world that we live in today, you can be responsible for the death of a man and the NFL will give you the benefit of the doubt.  You can hunt animals:  you can shoot them dead and watch them die slowly right before your eyes, and the NFL will take no action at all.  But fight a dog.  Fight many dogs.  Kill dogs and you might never play football again.

Under the NFL business model, public backlash is measured in dollars and cents and private rehabilitation doesn’t exist without the public redemption that affects thier bottom-line.  And that’s the bottom line.  Literally.


Categories: Features, Pigskin Paparazzi