Upon hearing Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis thoughts on the lockout, I initially thought he meant amongst players. Instead, the future hall of famer thinks that crime overall, will increase if there is no NFL season this fall. In an interview with ESPN’s Sal Paolantonio, Lewis voiced his concerns on the ongoing labor strife:
“Do this research if we don’t have a season — watch how much evil, which we call crime, watch how much crime picks up, if you take away our game.
“That’s because, the NFL lockout affects way more than us — the owners and the players.
There’s too many people that live through us, people live through us. Yeah, walk in the streets, the way I walk the streets, and I’m not talking about the people you see all the time.”
The future hall of famer is correct in assuming that crime will go up, but he’s wrong in believing it will be amongst the public. It is the crime rate of the NFL players that will rise if there is no season. Not having a NFL season will remove all governance of player conduct and will erase that second or third thought of consequence from player off field behavior.
While we all love football and will rue the day that there will be games missed from the lockout, Lewis is probably crediting the NFL with a tad bit more importance than it warrants. Lewis is correct with one part of his analysis.
There will be nothing to do…for football players that is.
