Michael Vick - The Dog Days of August 8/21/07

by Jimmy Russotto

The Dog Days of August takes on new meaning this year for Michael Vick, the Atlanta Falcons and the NFL as the flashy superstar pleaded guilty today to dogfighting charges, a felony, thus possibly voiding his contract with the Falcons and violating the good conduct regulations of the National Football League.

While it is true that the Feds have not had a long and proud history of fighting this particular crime, no matter what your personal feelings may be regarding the severity of the wrongdoing in this matter, from outrage to indifference ("after all, he didn't kill a person" is sometimes heard), he did break the law of the land, and once discovered, he would have to be prosecuted. A good case could probably be made for arguing that it is BECAUSE he is Michael Vick that he is being prosecuted, to make a hugely visible inroad towards fighting this despicable practice. As this is written, ESPN and Terence Moore of the Atlanta Constitution report that much of the black population is up in arms over Vick's situation and feel that he is being railroaded by the white establishment.

What a shame though! This writer for one has always marvelled at Vick's natural athletic ability, and he may be the single most exciting football player I have ever seen.. He seemed untouchable by any defense. He’d surely win championship after championship in the NFL. Back in the year 2000, I waited with keen anticipation to see what NFL team would draft him.

And I was disappointed year after year as a succession of coaches tried to leash his play-making ability and make him perform in the context and flow of a different offensive scheme. What a shame! Faster than fast, stop and start, change direction, whirl in space, you name it, he could do it and often did. When the offense sputtered, invariably Mike would take it on himself to win the game, and, once again, he often did.

Aside from his charisma, if you can indeed put that aside, comparable at least to greats such as Earl Campbell and Tony Dorsett (certainly no other quarterback), his career, though he did have one great year, has been up and down to say the least.

In the year 2000, the year before Vick joined the Falcons, they were a 4-12 team. In 2001, they improved to 7-9. But in 2002, Vick's first year as a starter the entire year, he made the NFC Pro-Bowl, led his team to a 9-6-1 record, beat the Packers in Green Bay in the playoffs only to wind up losing the NFC Championship to the Eagles.

As for personal statistics, his highest QB rating was an 81.6 in 2002, the only year he approached 3,000 yards passing. But he rushed for another 777 yards, 8 of them for touchdowns. All of this at 22 years of age.

In 2003, he was sidelined for eleven games. But in 2004, he once again led them to an 11-5 record and smashed the Rams 47-17 in the playoffs. He rushed for an astonishing 902 yards rushing in only 120 attempts for a 7.5 average yard per rush. Once again, however, he couldn't get the Falcons past the Eagles.

That was pretty much the end of his glory years, however. He never seemed to be able to mesh his talents with the team around him. The Falcons finished 8-8 and 7-9 respectively in 2005 and 2006 despite Vick’s rather astounding 1,039 yards rushing in 2006.

But grieve not for the Falcons. They may suffer for a while through a Joey Harrington year, but they'll save about 22 million dollars, the fans won't get the finger anymore (maybe it was just the white fans who got the finger), and there'll be no further question as to whether he's furthering the cause of genital herpes. (Vick settled this accusation out of court over a year ago).

Putting things in perspective though, Vick's no Ray Lewis, the Ravens linebacker who put his team and himself through an embarrassing murder investigation. And, despite a water-bottle incident at airport security that proved inconclusive, he's never been proven to be a drug-user. He was probably a gambler, but I think most NFL fans would be highly forgiving of that particular idiosyncrasy.

But what about the dogfighting, you ask? First of all, it may surprise many to discover that dogfighting has been around for centuries. It's been practiced and even furthered by some royal families. The practice goes back to the days of the Roman Empire. The Romans brought it to England, and the English by all accounts went for it in a big, big way. It was also popular in Japan and Afghanistan, and, from all I can gather on the subject, the practice is reflective of society's regard, or lack thereof, not just for animals but for the value of people as well.

By most accounts, Michael Vick was never a big people person. Most of his teammates don't know him very well. He has always played the game of football as an individual and the rest of the team has always seemed to just get in his way.

Here's a guy who's always been told what to do, how to do it, how to react, how he should involve his team, and on and on, and he never seemed to listen. Not really, not with all his heart.

And where did it get him? Well, it got him many millions of dollars, endorsement contracts and idolatry throughout the land. So when this extraordinary fighting man found that dogfighting was illegal, yet it was pretty clear the law was seldom enforced, is it any wonder that his love for the dogfighting couldn’t be balanced by any compensating feeling for the dog? His very special sense of balance deserted him at a very bad time.