If you ever been close enough to the field or court to hear the language players say to each other, you know how filthy it can be.
If a rule like this would be put in place, at least at the beginning, flags will be flying rapidly. Here is the report from Pro Football Talk.
“[W]e believe that the League can address this concern by instructing Game Day officials to step up enforcement of Rule 12, Section 3, Article 1(b) of the League’s Playing Rules, which prohibits the use of ‘abusive, threatening, or insulting language or gestures to opponents, officials, teammates, or representatives of the League,’” attorney Cyrus Mehri (pictured) wrote in the letter to Pash. “Directing the ‘N’ word towards others in a place of work is abusive, threatening, and insulting. We believe the League should authorize Game Day officials to use graduated discipline with warnings, 15 yard penalties and ejections as appropriate.”
Mehri, who along with the late Johnnie Cochran was instrumental in the development of the Rooney Rule, pointed to last Sunday’s incident between Redskins tackle Trent Williams and umpire Roy Ellison.
“We believe that situation warranted a penalty, if not an ejection,” Mehri said. “In our view, if Game Day officials are empowered – and encouraged – to treat the use of racial epithets as grounds for an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty, future incidents of this nature are far less likely.”
This will probably never happen, but it would be nice if some of the language was cleaned up a bit.