Wanna' Party?

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The story of the young man who drifted away after getting tossed from the football game on Thursday night is heartbreaking, isn't it?

It is assumed that he was drunk from an afternoon of tailgating before the Bills played the Dolphins. He was asked to leave. He made arrangements to meet his friends for more drinks once the game ended.

Instead he drowned in a small creek at the opposite end of the stadium.

26 years old.

His photo was in the paper.

It hit me hard on a few levels.

I thought of my kids and how excited they are by that stupid game. In a few years they will be standing in the parking lot...exposed...

I considered my own tailgating ways a lifetime ago.

But for the Grace of God there go I

It certainly could have happened during the Super Bowl Years.

The kid was going out for a good time. It certainly got way the hell out of line.

The NFL is under the gun for the drinking that goes on. Some people are blaming the security crew that sent him on his way. Others are looking to blame the friends who didn't head out with him to make sure he was okay.

It's more than all that, isn't it?

There were dozens of arrests made during and following the game. Another guy was struck by a car as he tried to cross the busy roadway in front of the stadium. Years ago someone else was killed by a tossed beer bottle.

Senseless, in retrospect, huh?

I haven't been to a game in a long while. I'm not so uptight to say that its because people drink and get fired up, but it is certainly a young man's game. I didn't even watch one play of the game Thursday night. That would have been a crazy thought twenty years ago!

I'm too tired to be hassled in such a manner.

It's just heartbreaking.

And we won't fix it. Football has a lofty place in the community.

Good, bad or indifferent the sporting events somehow get out of complete control.

Say a prayer for the poor kid.

And his suffering friends and family.

Sometimes that's all that's worth discussing about it.

Comments

Cliff Fazzolari said…
In all fairness...accounts of the story shows that it is not quite as simple as it sounds as perhaps alcohol was not a factor. It makes the story even more disconcerting if that was even a possibility.
18 November, 2012
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