Dance Cam intercepts real QB issue
It is a big week for talking about quarterbacks in America, which means it is a week in America. Aaron Rodgers? Maybe he is struggling because, as reported, random people wonder whether the fact that he is dating actress Olivia Munn is a factor, as opposed to, say, a shoulder injury. Peyton Manning? Ha, what a joke, that guy, it’s over, pathetic. Andy Dalton? He was offended by Houston’s J.J. Watt saying “Our goal was to make the Red Rifle look like a Red Ryder BB Gun.” I’d hate to see Andy Dalton read the Internet.
And the biggest show of all was Carolina’s Cam Newton. Why? He did a dance! TO THE CONTROVERSY MACHINE.
It sounds like a joke, but it isn’t. The dance is called the dab, and after some Internet research I can report that you basically act like you’re sneezing, and trying to cover it with your right arm, but you pull your head more towards the arm than the arm towards your head. Anyway, the dance led to a letter in the Carolina Observer from a woman in Tennessee headlined “A Tennessee mom to Cam Newton: This is what my 9-year-old saw,” which included the following paragraph:
“Because of where we sat, we had a close up view of your conduct in the fourth quarter. The chest puffs. The pelvic thrusts. The arrogant struts and the ‘in your face’ taunting of both the Titans’ players and fans. We saw it all.”
Leaving aside the fact that Elvis is probably laughing very hard in his heaven full of televisions, and that if Cam Newton was a white quarterback this debate would probably have a very different tenor, this topic has semi-swept America. People did the dab, including some quite awkward white newscasters. There were other parts to Newton’s dance, but the dab was the one that went viral, as we say now, lost as we are in a stupid chaotic half-digital wilderness of the soul.
And all of it masks the fundamental, underlying issue facing the NFL: Who is going to beat Tom Brady and the New England Patriots? Rodgers? Probably hurt, and the Packers are flailing. Manning? He’ll need a full-body transplant. Dalton? He can’t handle barely clever nickname taunts. Newton? I mean, maybe? Seattle’s still a hungover mess, Arizona is pretty good as long as Carson Palmer doesn’t get broken, and then . . . who else is there, really?
I’ll tell you who: The New York Giants. They probably should have beaten the Patriots last week, and they’re 5-5 in a weak and stumbling division, and Jason Pierre-Paul can rush the passer with one and a half hands, and Eli Manning is working on the best QB rating of his career, and while their defence is a tire fire, it was in 2011, too! Somewhere out there, there’s a largely anonymous Giants receiver ready to make a miracle catch. Come on, Tom Coughlin. One more time.
On the other hand, God, imagine Cam Newton versus Tom Brady in a Super Bowl. It would be the Super Bowl of racial code, too.
Last week this space went 4-10. I told you the big splat week was coming. I warned you, and you didn’t listen.
As always, all lines could change.