Dimitri Liapis

Professor Leah Huizar

4th and goal

The National Football League commonly referred to as the NFL is continuously evolving and

advancing without the fan approval because the commissioner of the NFL is a money seeking,

power-hungry individual. The NFL is in desperate need of a new commissioner because

Roger Goodell is unfit as a commissioner because he only looks at the numbers and takes little

fan consideration into his decision making.

Imagine your favorite NFL team, it is the final seconds of the fourth quarter in the Superbowl

and your team, whoever it may be, is down by seven points. This means you cannot kick a field

goal because that is only three points, instead you will have to go for a touchdown to get six

points and then kick the extra point you are rewarded after a touchdown, in order to tie the game

and to send it into overtime. The crowd is on their feet and roaring, the quarterback is trying to

hear the coach over the headset for the play. It is pouring down rain. The ball is snapped and the

quarterback is looking for a receiver. He looks in one direction, then the next, it feels like he has

been behind the offensive line for hours. He has no other option, he takes the ball, tucks it into

his arm and sprints toward the end zone. The crowd is roaring and up on their feet you are in the

stands, standing on your chair trying to see the play and you finally get high enough over the

raging fans to see the quarterback run through the end zone to put the team down by one point.

However, after the quarterback crosses the plain, a defender pushes him, he slips and then he

falls and now he is injured. The fans are booing the refs and throwing water caps onto the field

because it was obviously a late hit but no call was given. Unfortunately, it is too late, the
quarterback is curled up in the corner of the stadium holding his leg and is being carried off to

the locker room. Now the coach has a tough decision. Does he go for a two-point conversion to

win the game, does he attempt the difficult task even without his starting quarterback or does he

use his kicker to get the extra point and send it into overtime. Half the crown is pleading for a

two-point attempt while the other half wants overtime. He thinks for a while but then holds up

two fingers indicating that he will go for the two extra points to win the game. The second-string

quarterback is in, the stadium is deafening with all of the music blasting and the fans screaming,

not even a fire siren can be heard in this environment. The second-string quarterback hikes the

ball and is immediately slammed into the Earth by the opponents defenders. The stadium is

silenced with shock and disbelief. The ball game is over all because the coach got greedy, the

coach wanted it all and did not take the future into consideration, he saw the fans and the

atmosphere and the decided to go with momentum. Now the team has lost its first Superbowl

game. If one were to have witnessed a game that happened exactly like this, it would be a

heartbreaker and would be a nightmare that will be forever inside your memory. This is how a

diehard football fan feels about the product known as the NFL.

Over the years, Roger Goodell has made some changes that have helped the game but, when the

league is under a lot of criticism and everyone looks to Goodell who is the coach in this case,

Goodell does his own thing and ignores the potential backlash which will lead to the destruction

of the NFL. For example, the recent relocation of multiple franchises. For starters, it is extremely

rare for a franchise to be relocated, this event of relocating has only happened 17 and about to be

18 times in NFL history. Two of these relocations have happened in the last year. The third

relocation is still pending. When an NFL team relocates, it is taking the life out of the city,

especially the smaller cities. The reason teams relocate in the first place is due to the lack of
money and growth within the franchise which ultimately creates the need for the franchise to

move to a wealthier and more popular city with a high demand of a football team. Recently, St.

Louis Rams had to be relocated due to the lack of attendance and revenue being generated. Due

to the issues in St. Louis the team moved back to Los Angeles where they were previously before

getting relocated to St. Louis. Fans around the country who were St. Louis fans were devastated

because they lost the football team which resulted in weeks and months of furious outrage

toward the commissioner. However, it made sense because compared to other stadiums, the

attendance was depressing. Now in 2017 the San Diego Chargers are being relocated due to the

fact that the stadium simply cannot be maintained any longer and is outdated. The solution

appearing in everyones mind is, just build a new stadium, but the owner did not have any funds

to do so. However, San Diego has a different story compared to the St. Louis Rams. St. Louis

leaving for L.A was simply a return of a once beloved franchise. San Diego leaving for Los

Angeles was a selfish move on the commissioners part to maintain steady revenue, without

doing any work at all. This is where the NFL makes its biggest mistake.

Although the NFL already has its officiating flaws and its problems with taking care of its

employees (referring to the athletes.) The relocation of the San Diego Chargers is where the fans

and some players even completely lose faith and love of the great sport that is football. When the

news entered the public, fans laughed it off and thought it was unlikely. The fans of San Diego

were not crazy to take the news lightly because before this announcement, there were a handful

of teams rumored to be relocating to Los Angeles and these teams were new teams, compared to

the Chargers, a 56 year old franchise, the San Diego fans were confident that this was just

another irrelevant rumor. These other teams were Jacksonville Jaguars, Carolina Panthers and

Oakland Raiders. However, when the Panthers upgraded the stadium and the Jaguars placed
swimming pools around the stadium where fans can swim and watch football, these two teams

were safe. As time went by the Chargers continued to struggle and inevitably sent a request to

move to Los Angeles. Now although this was the San Diego Chargers owner who made the

decision to leave, Roger Goodell is still due criticism. When the Chargers left San Diego,

residents in San Diego vowed to never watch football again, some fans even said they were

completely done with football and some fans even went by the stadium to throw old merchandise

and garbage at the franchise that has now stabbed the loyal fans of San Diego Chargers in the

back. The team would be leaving to Los Angeles and it was confirmed and final. However,

residents of Charger country begged the NFL to scratch the franchise and make a new franchise

for Los Angeles. In other words, San Diegans wanted the NFL to remove the Chargers name and

replace it with a new mascot and new colors and new jerseys. However, Goodell did not listen to

a single San Diegan and moved the Chargers to Los Angeles while also claiming that the

Chargers would create a new futuristic logo for Los Angeles. The new logo ended up getting a

backlash so bad, NFL fans began making fun of the team on twitter and creating shirts with jokes

that have the LA Chargers as a punchline. This forced the team to remove the new logo start

from scratch. After this incident, it seems clear, to critics and fans that the franchise should be

scratched and a new one should take its place. However, the team decided the new logo will be

the word Chargers in simple white font, with and yellow line going through the word. In my

opinion, Chargers have just joined Cleveland Browns as becoming one half of the laughing stock

in the NFL. There are numerous suggestions and millions of different paths that could have

created a better reputation for the NFL but here is one idea I believe couldve easily been done to

revive one out of two ruined franchises.

Madden17. In the game Madden17, the game has fictional teams that a player can use in

different game modes. These fictional teams are not called custom teams or fantasy teams, these

teams were given the name relocation teams. The game itself has given Roger Goodell a list of

teams and ideas that Goodell could have forced into the city of Los Angeles to bring hype and

attention to the new franchise. Not only does it please the fans of San Diego to create a new

franchise, but the old Charger fans might fall in love with the new California team, and the NFL

would be able to keep the San Diego fan base. Another reason to justify this solution as being the

best solution, is the connection that these videogame teams would have with the younger

generation. With publicized issues of the NFL having trouble bringing in younger fans due to

Netflix and YouTube winning the younger generations attention, the NFL constantly attempts to

make the game more appealing for younger viewers. With kids playing more video games and

favoring the video games over the real sport, it makes sense to bring one of the teams that were

created for the video game and bring it to life. Not only do you have the attention from the older

fans because of this brand new franchise but, the younger fans would be able to grow up with

the video game franchise and this would boost L.A. football popularity by targeting kids all over

the country to buy into this videogame franchise in Los Angeles. Another issue the NFL has with

the Los Angeles Chargers, is the fact that Los Angeles is deemed the city and the NFL

prioritizes L.A. over every other city whether they would like the admit it or not. Now the NFL

has given Los Angeles two awful teams and neither team has made the playoffs in half a decade.

Now Goodell has allowed the Los Angeles fan base to become impatient with the NFL due to the

subpar talent that the L.A. Rams have provided, and has rewarded Los Angeles fans for their

patience with another irrelevant team with a reputation of losing. Instead of dragging an
irrelevant franchise, (that was only loved by locals) across California, bring a fictional team to

life. It would look brand new to the older fan base and it will give the younger fan base a reason

to watch the NFL. Not only will this spark excitement in Los Angeles, but all of the kids in

Maine, North Dakota, South Dakota, Canada, Utah and Mexico (to name a few) and in other

places without a football team will have a team in the new Los Angeles team because they have

been with the team before it entered the NFL. Those who play the videogame will already have a

history with the team and those who dont will learn from the younger generation. It will become

Americas new team which will solve the struggle to succeed in Los Angeles and it will also

keep San Diegans happy. This idea essentially fixes two issues. The first being the issue to bring

the game to younger audiences and the second issue being the disappointment that the NFL

brought to Los Angeles. If Goodell decided to do this, he still has time since the Chargers are

brand new to Los Angeles, but, the lack of creativity and the idea of relocating teams to get

higher ratings rather than improving the quality of current teams is the reason that Roger Goodell

is unfit to be the commissioner of the National Football League.

Peer Review
Reviewed by: Meredith Bond
1) Introduction
a) Locate the five rhetorical tasks(located via
comments on paper)
i) Issue, topic, or problem identified [task 1]
ii) Outlined/described that problem for the audience
[task 2]
iii) Contextualized problem by entering the
conversation of prominent voices [task 3] MISSING
iv) Thesis (claim + reasoning) [task 4]
v) Preview the kinds of evidence / analysis thatll be
employed in addressing problem [task 5] MISSING
b) Intro (Tasks# 1 - 3 above). How well does the writer
contextualize the issue for the reader? Does the way the context is
developed raise any questions for you, if so list them out below? (Too broad?
Vague? Setup like a war?, etc) The writer gave a brief, but very thorough
explanation of the situation he is trying to address.
c) Intro (Tasks# 1 - 3 above) To what extent does the introduction
come across as both 1) knowledgeable of the core povs or positions at
tension and 2) indicate where this paper positions itself in that range? Good
d) Locate the thesis, then bold the claim and underline the
reasoning parts of the sentence. Evaluate the strength of the thesis parts. Is
the claim and proposed reasoning something that the scope one essay could
support with sufficient and appropriate evidence? Yes
i) What kind of evidence will be necessary for the
essays reasoning evidence that shows when the commissioner has
made decisions to only benefit him, rather than fulfil his duties and
make the best decision for the NFL
e) Based on what you see in the intro, what do you think is the
exigency and purpose (hoped for outcome/response from audience)
of the essay? To prove that the commissioner is unfit for his job, and someone
who has selfish intentions should not be running the NFL
f) Intro Commentary . Offer one or two suggestions about the
(strategic, conceptual or stylistic) introductory set-up and how to improve on
it. Introduce a figure who has sufficient credentials who opposes the current
commissioner
2) Essay Development
a) Paragraphing. Locate each body paragraphs main idea, or label/no.
them in order of interest to you (highlighted in blue)
b) Comment here and mark on page: Which paragraph idea(s) could be
explained or supported more fully? Which main or supporting points do you
have questions or concerns about? Perhaps it is a gap in the logic or an
interesting but not fully explored claim. Indicate where and why you think a
section is succeeding or underperforming.
c) Paragraph Commentary. Body paragraphs should be related to the
reasoning put forward in the thesis. Review the essays development of
 support & reasoning at the paragraph level, then either ask critical questions
or offer suggestions. Overall, as reader you are scrutinizing the relationship
between the quality and method of support and the thesis claim.
d) Citing sources. If the research is incorrectly cited (In-text or Works
cited) or not well set-up, highlight them and bring to writers attention. Owl
Purdue Citations Available here. No sources cited/ no works cited page
e) The rhetorical stance & They Say. Which words or phrases in the
draft indicate the values the writer holds with regard to this topic? The
second paragraph sets the stage for the writers opinion as well as introduces
the audience to the topic in a more understandable way. How does the writer
identify and distinguish his/her position in relation to other prominent voices?
They address their standpoint at the end of paragraphs 3 and 4, as well as
the introduction, but there isn't a contrast to others To what extent does the
writer engage with outside voices, They Says, opposing viewpoints,
naysayers? Addresses opposing viewpoints as well as other solutions
considered for specific teams
3) Explain what you thought worked best in this essay. What do you admire
and find compelling? Be specific. I really liked the second paragraph where the
writer describes the final seconds left in a Superbowl game and the decisions that
are made and how they affect many individuals
4) Offer one or two final significant suggestions: If possible, offer one
suggestion based on a set of specific details within the essay and the other
suggestion based on global/overarching considerations. Definitely close it all
together with a dedicated closing paragraph that wraps everything up and relates
back to the thesis