Steve Gleason had an unremarkable NFL career. He played for the New Orleans Saints for 7 years. He wasn’t drafted out of college – during his career, he averaged less than one tackle a game, mainly playing on special teams.<\/p>\n
He has one claim to fame – after the Superdome reopened after Katrina, he blocked a punt, which one of his team mates picked up and ran for a touchdown. That’s it. Because of the symbolism in someone’s mind that “New Orleans is back!”, they put up a statue of him at the Superdome.<\/p>\n
Gleason is now in his 30s and has ALS “Lou Gehrig’s disease”, which destroys your muscles and kills you in a few years. Some people get it from genetic defects, but the most common cause is head trauma from playing contact sports – ring a bell?<\/p>\n
Monday, three sports talkers at WQXI-AM (owned by an insurance company) – the ESPN affiliate in Atlanta (which is not New Orleans!), did a “bit” with a computerized voice pretending to be an interview with Gleason. Radio stations constantly do this “bit”, poking fun at physicist Stephen Hawkings – including national radio talk show hosts. Tasteless? Sure.<\/p>\n
http:\/\/www.sbnation.com\/nfl\/2013\/6\/17\/4439610\/steve-gleason-audio-790-the-zone-atlanta<\/p>\n
So some Fox Sports guy tweets out that he was offended and joins in a big campaign to tell the world how offended he is and demanding justice. The three DJs have been fired.<\/p>\n
The first amendment limits Congress – the radio station is entirely in its rights to fire them. However, if we keep doing this, radio will devolve into just playing Montevani elevator music<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Steve Gleason had an unremarkable NFL career. He played for the New Orleans Saints for 7 years. He wasn’t drafted out of college – during his career, he averaged less than one tackle a game, mainly playing on special teams. … Continue reading