So the lack of a new collective bargaining agreement between NFL players and owners has brought the league to a screeching halt. The owners have locked out the players, the players are suing the owners, and in the meantime, fans are wondering if we will have football next year, and if so, what form it will take. The owners, for their part, have said that there WILL be a full NFL season next year. Many NFL experts, however, have predicted that the stalemate will last until August or September at the earliest.
What this means is that it seems there is a very real possibility that we will see at least some NFL games played next year with replacement players. And if you've ever seen the movie "The Replacements" which was based loosely on the 1987 NFL strike and you were wondering, yes, it was actually that bad. And a repeat of that scene could very well be in the near future.
So I say...why not enjoy it?
Seriously, if it actually comes to that, it's going to be a big joke anyway, so we might as well enjoy the rare opportunity to watch some shenanigans, hijinx, and tomfoolery that could only be achieved with replacement players. So in that spirit, I've composed a list of suggestions, nay, demands, that I as an NFL fan expect to see as something of a consolation prize in the event that I don't get an actual NFL season with actual NFL players. So here we go, things I expect to see in the NFL if we get games played by replacement players:
- A player whose beeper for his real job goes off during a game and he has to leave.
- A player that doesn't like the team's uniform, so he makes and wears his own.
- A really big, muscular, female linebacker.
- A team composed entirely of midgets.
- A player who refuses to wear any padding.
- A quarterback who doesn't speak any English, so he has to have a translator in the huddle with him to help him call plays.
- A player who plays the entire game while smoking a cigarette.
- A cheerleader who runs onto the field and flashes the opposing team's players to distract them.
- Keanu Reeves, Mark Wahlberg, Cuba Gooding Jr., and every other famous actor who has played a football player in a movie.
- A team that sparks a debate as to whether they are better than the actual team (say, the Panthers?).
- A team that used rocket-propelled cleats and jet packs to get a competitive advantage.
- A converted pro wrestler who keeps trying to tackle using wrestling finishing moves and body slams the referees whenever they call a penalty on him.
- A player who is brought in from prison each week to play.
- A gorilla used as a lead blocker in goal-line situations.
- A team of unathletic Asian players whose superior intellect allows them to out-think and fool the competition.
- A coach with frizzy white hair and bloodshot eyes who is constantly coming up with bizarre plays and diagramming them on his chalkboard on the sideline.
- Charlie Sheen quarterbacking a team to a WINNING! streak.
- A running back who wears a doo-rag instead of a helmet, baggy pants, and yells "Oh shit! It's the Po-lice!" every time he gets the ball, and then he runs like hell.
- A really gay center who wears a dress over his uniform and makes moaning sounds every time his quarterback puts his hand between his legs to get the snap.
- A scoreboard operator with tourettes who keeps putting cuss words on the scoreboard.
- A receiver who couldn't catch a cold and misses easy catches all game long, but then makes that one impossible catch late in the game to win.
- A month where they all randomly wear pink to kiss female fans' asses in a shameless ploy to win political correctness points...oh wait...
people agree that an all-midget football team would be the shit