In a Shocking Turn of Events, Bill Belichick Bros Out With Roger Goodell and Supports the Ban on Hip Drop Tackles

LARRY W SMITH. Shutterstock Images.

There are times when it seems like the whole world seems to be spinning out of control into chaos, disorder, and entropy. A state which WB Yeats described as:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre   

 The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

 Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

 Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world

And lately for most of us, that is the feeling we get any time we turn on a screen and see the world represented there. And in such moments, it helps to have some belief system you can cling to. A faith. A family. A philosophy. Some guiding principle in your life to hold onto. A moral compass to steer by as you navigate through the tempest. 

Chief among mine has been my spiritual guide and mentor, Bill Belichick. His moral teachings have been my rock for over 24 years. His wisdom, my shelter from the storm. Something I have always taken great comfort in. And so I was beyond happy to learn he saw down with the the focus of evil in the universe made flesh, Roger Goodell, and finally gave him the humiliating beating he's always deserved.

Except he didn't. Just to confirm we are living in a time where nothing makes sense, Belichick sat down with the lizard person who spent 15 years trying to destroy him, and treated Ginger Satan like a dear friend:

I don't get it. I can't process it. Once again we're witnessing one of the men who built an empire in Foxboro take the dreaded high road with the hell spawn who did everything in his limitless power to tear it down. To play nice with the Evil One who lied, cheated, manipulated, covered up and changed the rules with zero regard for truth or justice. Mr. Kraft has done it. Tom Brady did it repeatedly. Now Belichick. It feels like Pats fans are the only ones still fighting the war because we've yet to realize our generals signed an unconditional surrender a long time ago. And I'm only now beginning to wonder whether it's time to drop my weapon, climb down off the wall, and abandon my post.

Anyway. The second most shocking part of this is where I've cued that video up to: The 1:14 mark where they discuss the ban on the Hip Drop tackle, that has defensive players and fans alike: 

… so up in arms. 

Yet much to the surprise of everyone Belichick, the ultimate Football Guy and the Croatian God of Defense, has thrown his considerable support behind the change:

Pro Football Talk - [Belichick] supports the ban on the hip-drop tackle, which occurs when a defender wraps up a ball carrier, swivels his hips and drops onto the ball carrier’s legs.

“It’s a good thing to get rid of. There’s really no place for it. It’s just good to continue to keep the game safe for the players,” Belichick said.

Goodell said the technique has been responsible for a disproportionate number of injuries, and particularly serious injuries. …

Belichick, who saw Patriots running back Rhamondre Stevenson suffer a serious injury on a hip-drop tackle last season, agreed.

“It’s definitely helped the game be safer,” Belichick said.

Belichick noted that defensive coaches like himself aren’t always in favor of rule changes that benefit the offense, but he is a major supporter of this change.

This would be the Rhamondre Stevenson injury in question:

Despite the fact Stevenson was carved out of a solid 227-pound block of depleted uranium, that Hip Drop ended his season. So it's worth asking if keeping it in the game is worth the damage it does. And how much you like seeing a team went into the year with a wafer-thin running back depth chart get reduced to just Ezekiel Elliot, Kevin Harris and wide receiver jet sweeps that never get anywhere. 

As a general rule, I try to be accepting of rule changes designed to keep the best players playing their best. Within reason. I'm never been one for screaming at the clouds about how back when I was a kid you could commit mayhem on Ken Stabler and Roger Staubach and today we might as well put dresses on these puss-boys today. Because it never made much sense to me to not protect players unless you've got a real fetish for watching backups you've never heard of. And also because it took hockey 100 years after the invention of the slapshot to invent the goalie mask. And I promise you the first guy with the good sense and survival instinct to strap one on had his manhood questioned by people with all their teeth sitting behind chain link fencing. 

Granted, I don't trust that Goodell's incompetent goons will be able to enforce the new rule. But if Belichick is OK with it, so am I. It'll just be a lot harder to be OK with their friendship.