Friday Ramblings: Part of the Problem

The NFL is largely terrible. It’s corrupt and exploitative, and run by a bunch of curmudgeonly old men who’ll stop at nothing to pry every last dollar out of fans’ pockets. It’s also impossible to avoid. For 12 months a year, it’s in your face. I was in friggin South America last week and couldn’t even get a break. Alerts popping up on my phone about completely worthless NFL crap all day, every day. It’s months until a single game is played and still, try to spend more than 5 minutes on social media without having some NFL story (non-story) shoved in your face. You can’t do it. The league has completely overwhelmed our culture and ruined the joy of football. I know this. There’s no denying it. But of course I love it anyway.

So despite the fact that I can list countless reasons to stay away from the NFL, I just can’t. Which means of course that I’ll be on pins and needles al weekend waiting to see where Jimmy Effin Moreland lands. For the first time in several years, it’s looking incredibly likely that a JMU Duke will be drafted. And the player is JMUSB favorite Jimmy Moreland, which means it’s a pretty big deal in these parts. Love it, hate it, or pretend to hate it, but the NFL is the king of country’s sports culture. And we’re on the verge of seeing one of the most exciting players ever to put on the purple & gold (and chrome, and white, and black) gain admission to it.

Yeah, there are plenty of JMU guys who’ve worked their way onto NFL rosters. We’re incredibly proud of each and every one of them, But there’s something different about the potential to see a guy get drafted. And according to most accounts, we’re probably going to see Jimmy’s name called this weekend. Perhaps as early as the 4th round. So instead of grinding it out in rookie camps to try to earn a shot as UFA, one of our all time favorite Dukes is probably going to head into camp, with reasonable certainty that he’ll end up on the final 53 man roster. And that’s just awesome. Good luck Jimmy. We’re all rooting for you.

And with that said, here’s some other stuff you might have missed from the world of JMU sports.

Since splitting a doubleheader against VA Tech, Softball has been on a heater. The ladies stomped UVA this week, easily sweeping the Cavs.

Jimmy ain’t the only Duke who’s going to move on to play professionally. Caroline Sdanovich was picked 19th in the Women’s Professional Lacrosse League draft by the Baltimore Brave. She’ll join her former teammate Krisen Gaudian, who was already on the roster.

JMU Women’s Tennis secured the first CAA Championship in program history. And they did it in head coach Shelley Jaudon’s first season, defeating four time defending champ and CAA dynasty William & Mary.

And not to be outdone, the other Coach Shelly and the Dukes lacrosse team won another regular season title by defeating William & Mary on senior day. This year’s senior class won the regular season title every single year. They also won a national championship. Pretty good run.

And finally, we dropped another new episode of the JMSB Podcast this week. In it, we touch on several of the stories above. Things also got strangely serious as we discussed some of the good ways campus culture has evolved since our time as undergrads, particularly with regard for mental health and general empathy and acceptance of others. We’ll be back to making Tick jokes and talking D-Hall in the future, but we really hope people tune in for this one and share their thoughts on some of the topics we hit.