Fans Have No Right to Demand Athletes Risk Their Lives For a Game

If Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler isn't as accommodating the next time a fan walks up to him for an autograph, don't blame him. When you suffer a knee injury in the NFC championship game and you're treated like you cheated on your wife or turned over top secret military documents to Osama bin Laden, then you might be a bit hesitant, as well.

Like many Americans, sports are a part of my life. I follow football (Houston Texans), basketball (Houston Rockets), baseball (Houston Astros), high school (Jack Yates in Houston) and college sports (Texas A&M) with a passion like any other. One closet in my home is nothing but athletic gear of my favorite teams.

If there was a choice between all of the premium movie channels on DIRECTV and catching all of the NFL and NBA games, sorry, the movies lose out. That's just the way it has always been growing up in my family. It wasn't about playing sports, although I did spend two years on the baseball diamond in high school and the basketball court in junior high. Athletics provide a bond between folks who otherwise have nothing in common.

Yet with the passion for sports, not once have I ever felt it gave me the right to demand that athletes go out on the field and perform, no matter the cost to their health and livelihood.

It's shocking, stunning and sad when listening to sports talk radio, reading blogs and watching folks on TV, whether they are fans or former athletes, act like nothing matters more on earth than seeing a player risk it all for a game.

There is no doubt that the stories of athletes fighting through pain are legendary.

Willis Reed of the New York Knicks is still brought up as a warrior willing to give it all. He essentially played on one leg in game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals, inspiring his team to victory and the title over the Los Angeles Lakers.

Kirk Gibson's body was wracked with pain in game 1 of the 1988 World Series as his Los Angeles Dodgers faced off with the Oakland A's. The gritty player could barely walk. But when manager Tommy Lasorda put his beaten-down slugger in as a pinch hitter, Gibson slammed a walk-off homerun. The Dodgers eventually won in five games.

The stories can go on and on, and these remarkable athletes showed tremendous courage.

But when the cameras disappear and there are no more plays of the day or ESPN's SportsCenter highlights, the fans aren't privy to our conquering heroes being unable to get out of bed, pick their children up, cuddle with their wives or even remember basic facts about their lives.

It's shameful that for the sports fan today, we have become like the Romans at the Colosseum, cheering and cheering our gladiators to where only the strongest remain standing after they have vanquished and killed the opposition.

Their lives are unimportant to us. All that matters is seeing them bring us the gratification of winning, so we can talk trash to our family and friends, collect on the bets we placed (or likely pay up big when we lost), and buy more and more gear to say "we" won.

Like any other fan, it's great to see our favorite sports teams raise a championship trophy and banner. Skipping work to attend a victory parade is often justified. But no sports fan has the right to be indignant when athletes choose to remove themselves from a game due to injury.

We have become so arrogant to suggest that if athletes are getting paid millions of dollars, an injury should be ignored and they should be carried off the field. It is as if the tickets and gear we buy means athletes should ignore all common sense and keep performing.

"Leave it all on the field" is a familiar refrain of athletes, but does that mean their actually lives?

For all of the fans cheering around the world on Sunday as they watch the Green Bay Packers and Pittsburgh Steelers play in the Super Bowl: not one of them will take a crushing hit, risk a devastating injury on any given play, or possibly be carried off the field strapped to a stretcher.

Athletes are human. They are individuals with a job to do and are compensated to do it, like all of us. So in all of our earnest desire for them to bring us satisfaction, let's remember we are watching someone's son, brother, uncle, husband, cousin or friend.

Once the crowd has stopped cheering, athletes have a lot more life to live. At the end of the day, it is only a game.

Roland S. Martin is an award-winning CNN analyst and the author of the book "The First: President Barack Obama's Road to the White House as originally reported by Roland S. Martin." Please visit his website at www.RolandSMartin.com. To find out more about Roland S. Martin and read his past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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