Jaxson Dart and the Problem with Apologizing for Not Doing Anything Wrong
by Ted Kluck
A week or so ago Jaxson Dart spent less than two minutes introducing President Donald Trump at an event. He did so much like most 23-year-old non-politicians would: awkwardly and without much success. His “Go Big Blue” chant flopped and he read a short prepared statement.
Here’s a paragraph about Jaxson Dart for non-football people: He starred at quarterback at Ole Miss (while very much looking the part of the Ole Miss quarterback), then turned pro, started for the Giants last season, and became part of football’s most loveable tandem of meatheads (along with fellow rookie RB Cam Skattebo). His playstyle includes running into people often and most reminds me of that of former Chicago Bear Jim McMahon. While watching him play, zero people think things like, “I wonder if this kid likes football?” or “I wonder if he cares about his team?”
In the wake of the Trump thing, the online and mainstream media furor built such that today (May 29), Dart addressed the media for four-ish minutes of hushed-tone scuffling and genuflecting and kicking the ground with his toe and, essentially, apologizing for doing something that was not illegal, not sinful, probably not even unwise, and a whole lot of nothing. He indicated that he loves his country and has had extended family members serve in the military and that he respects the office of the President. Gosh, what horrible qualities in a kid.
He talked about how the situation has led to “some really good talks” with his teammates (come on PR copywriter, be better) – like the New York Football Giants have turned into an afterschool special about Reconciling Our Differences.
He was articulate and direct but…he absolutely didn’t need to do it.
He could have said, “America is a free country, my teammates know what I feel about them and the game, and I get paid to throw a football. So let’s talk about football.”
I love the NFL. But the NFL has long harbored wife-beaters, repeat drug offenders, guys who have apparently done gross things to their masseuses (Deshaun Watson), owners who have apparently frequented skeevy massage parlors (Bob Kraft), coaches caught in apparent extramarital affairs (M. Vrabel), and Antonio Brown. We recently had a running back arrested for domestic abuse (Josh Jacobs) and have a wide receiver (Rashee Rice) serving jail time for violating terms of his probation. The obligatory guy getting arrested for driving his car too fast. All of that said, it’s a fairly typical NFL offseason and the above roster of offenses is probably not atypical for any industry employing that many people in that public a fashion. In fact it sounds a lot like Hollywood.
So I’m questioning why Dart had to put himself on trial today for still being impressed by the office of the President and saying “yes” to a pretty benign request from it?
Dart’s teammate, Abdul Carter, adhering closely to the spirit of Matthew 18 (kidding), took to X in the aftermath of Dart’s introduction to publicly question his teammate’s decision. Because quoting what one 23-year-old said about another 23-year-old on a platform I hate makes me want to quit writing, I’m not going to quote it here. But it was basically along the lines of “What are you doing and how can you support that guy?”
It was Carter, not Dart, who broke one of the cardinal rules of the locker room which is, “Don’t publicly hang your teammate out to dry,” followed closely by, “Don’t make yourself a distraction.”
What this situation taught young Americans is that Carter was allowed to speak his mind and Dart wasn’t.
My first encounter with blatant disrespect for the office came in the early 2000s when I went to a “tea room” (first mistake) to hear a folk mandolin player (second mistake, so boring) and ran across a cartoon poster in said tea room that indicated that President George W. Bush’s brain might reside in an area of the body other than between the ears (use your imagination). In the intervening decades, with the advent of social media, that dynamic has gotten about 1,000% worse.
We live in an era where a Tweet gets more respect than the office of the President and where a kid gets interrogated for having the temerity to say he loves his country. Where his army of hair-gelled PR wonks shove copy in his hand and tell him to go apologize for doing nothing wrong.
I have no solution for this, other than footballs flying through the air. We need winners and losers and this situation is proof that the offseason has dragged on for too long. We need gunslinging quarterbacks who don’t care. Namaths and Stablers and Aikmans, oh my.
Jim McMahon would have cracked open a Moosehead, spit some tobacco juice into a cup, and told the PR guys where they can stick their prepared statement (spoiler: a place similar to where Bush’s brain resided in the tea room poster). And it made him a star.