NFL Conspiracy Theories Questioned
Early this season the National Football League put out a commercial poking fun at conspiracy theories that their games are fixed or the season is scripted.
Doth thou protest too much?
I was sent two conspiracy theories about the NFL last week. The first came completely unsolicited from someone I know quite well who has posted about at least one other conspiracy theory on social media. The other came from a buddy after I mentioned the first message to him.
The first message was a link to an Instagram video with a voiceover saying that “former NFL superstar and Super Bowl 37 winner, Dwight Smith, admitted in a sports radio interview that the winner of major NFL games are predetermined by the league and that both teams know literally every play that the other team will run[.] [A]s he puts it the games aren’t decided on the field.” The video also says that Smith stated “that the NFL picks teams for the Super Bowls for the storylines they will generate.” The voiceover concludes saying that “the storylines become easy to see. Follow and learn how to take advantage.”Most of the voiceover is captioned. While the captioning is not perfect, I find it interesting that Dwight Smith’s name is not captioned. Nor are the words “the storylines become easy to see.” Complete with eerie music, the video shows, I’m assuming, Smith returning an interception for a Tampa Bay touchdown against the Raiders in the Super Bowl mentioned. The action is quite clear. I only say, “I’m assuming,” out of caution.
The video is posted by “thespreadseer.” The account has posted 14 videos as of my writing. I’ve only watched about four of them. One recent video refers to Kansas City beating Buffalo with a mention of Taylor Swift (and her relationship with Travis Kelce) helping to change who is watching the NFL. Another video shows a plethora of missed tackles in the Eagles - Tampa Bay game. The voiceover says the tackles were missed on purpose. Both games were played earlier this playoff season. Both videos blatantly call the NFL fixed.
When I mentioned the original video to a buddy of mine via text, he asked me if I’d heard about the Super Bowl logo conspiracy theory. I had not. I quickly received a link to an article from a local news station in Tampa reporting about the conspiracy theory that the Super Bowl logo has included the colors of the participating teams each year since Super Bowl LVI. (The logo for Super Bowl LVII was revealed just after LVI; I don’t know if this is common practice, but I assume it’s generally revealed prior to the season starting.) As the article details, this theory seems to be falling apart after just two years. The Super Bowl LVIII logo features the colors of the two number one seeds in this season’s playoffs – the San Francisco 49ers and Baltimore Ravens.
Trust me and my wallet. Baltimore not only didn’t cover the spread in the AFC Championship as the favorite, they lost outright to the Kansas City Chiefs. The Ravens ain’t going to the damn Super Bowl. And the Chiefs do not have purple in their color scheme, the color supposedly representing Baltimore.
When I asked each message sender some basic questions, I either didn’t get a reply (yet?) or I got, “Make up your own mind.”
I’m actually not completely dismissing the idea the National Football League . . . I won’t use the word “fixed” . . . has some legitimacy issues. I have plenty of questions I’d love to ask Commissioner Roger Goodell.
This league doesn’t know what a catch is.
I grew up with a dad and brothers who were Cowboys fans. The ‘boys were dubbed “America’s Team” and were seemingly on television every week. It was a brilliant marketing strategy for the NFL. Do you really think they weren’t getting every call in the world? At the very least, do you think referees weren’t unconsciously giving them the benefit of the doubt?
I think Michael Jordan was one of the most manufactured sports stars in history. When broadcasters ran out of ways to genuflect over his offense, they started praising his defense. Watch old games. He hacked the hell out of people. Meanwhile, if someone breathed on the guy, it was a foul. He was so adored, his teammate Scottie Pippen became a Dream Teamer by proximity. On a different note, do you really think Mike just went to play baseball in the minors shortly after his father was killed because he loved the game? Or did the NBA want the media to stop looking into why his father was killed?
When the Yankees aren’t contenders, media members act like something is fundamentally wrong in the world. Do you think maybe Major League Baseball prefers them to win?
Of course, these are just my opinions. Readers would and should try to tear these ideas apart.
But dress them up enough, they become conspiracy theories. Oooh, someone said it online. It must be real.
There was no link provided by thespreadseer to Dwight Smith’s interview. They don’t even mention who it was with. Maybe it really happened. I haven’t looked yet. At the moment, my point isn’t that the interview did or did not happen.
Did anyone question this guy? Ask for proof? Ask why he didn’t say anything while he was playing?
Yet, 12,000+ people have already “liked” this post at face value.
The logo conspiracy theory doesn’t even make sense. The NFL is rigged . . . and they essentially announce it to the world. Why?
I recently watched NewsNation’s two-part report on UFOs, “From the Files of George Knapp.” I enjoyed watching how Knapp pursued the question of whether or not we’ve been visited by aliens as a journalist. He didn’t just believe whatever he was told. He questioned sources and the credibility of those sources. Journalism is a profession I got the smallest of tastes of doing, and I admire people who do the job well.
That’s what we need with these sports conspiracy theories – journalists who actually want to investigate them. Unfortunately, we have newspapers that are going out of business and a lot of TV reporters who want to (or have to) cozy up to athletes and leagues instead of covering them.
Overall, I don’t buy either of the two conspiracy theories that I was sent. There’s way too many unanswered questions and a lack of evidence. Besides, it’s ridiculous to believe that the number of people it would take to “script” the NFL would all stay quiet. And the gambling factor in all of this would be astronomical by itself, not to mention the fact that many players end up with injuries that affect them for the rest of their lives.
Then there’s the most basic question – why? Why would the NFL be rigged? The obvious answer is “money,” but the NFL is already a money-making machine. Are we saying it’s always been fixed?
That’s not to say that I don’t think the NFL and other sports leagues give certain franchises and players favorable treatment.But I would have to seriously question anyone claiming for a fact that sports are rigged or fixed. I also wonder why some people so easily believe in these types of theories. There seems to be an element of satisfying one’s own beliefs, which might be harmless in sports, but is becoming more and more dangerous in politics.
Talk to me. What do you think of these conspiracy theories? Do you believe others? Got your own? Let me know what you think in the comments or contact me directly.
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