We have more than one Philadelphia sports jersey at our house. We have Roy Halladay and Chase Utley (of course) and are on the waiting list for Cliff Lee. We have Mike Richards, Danny Briere and Dan Carcillo. We have DeSean Jackson. But there was no Michael Vick jersey under our tree this Christmas.
Pocket Utley has been a little surprised by the omission – not so much because he is spoiled in this department (guilty as charged) but more because getting properly suited up for the game is part of our routine.
We have been enthusiastically cheering for No. 7 all season, and enjoying seeing him grace the cover of Sports Illustrated and repeatedly be named NFL offensive player of the week. Last week’s victory over the Giants was a transformative moment as Vick seemed to have a switch he could flip to produce the necessary points for victory in an incredibly short time. Obviously he didn’t do it by himself – both the Eagles and the Giants contributed – but it is safe to say that in that game no Vick would equal no win.
We’ve watched the highlights over and over and been glued to sports talk radio. We’ve been feverishly anticipating the Eagles-Vikings game during this most un-Christmas-like drought of Philadelphia sporting events this week.
I was bravely hoping that if I didn’t talk about the jersey, the issue would just go away. But one day last week Pocket asked me point-blank in the car, “Mommy, why don’t we have Michael Vick jerseys?” It was time.
He was pretty surprised when I pulled the car over to the side of the road and turned around to face him and his sister. “That’s a tough question. Do you want to know the real answer?” They nodded. “Michael Vick ran a dogfighting ring and dogfighting is illegal.”
The predictable slew of questions came: What is dog fighting? Why would you do it? What happens to the dogs? How could you torment a dog? Kill a dog? What happens when you go to prison?
Given the position canines have in our house the whole episode was shocking. One of our dogs once took one of Pocket’s balls and ran off with it. He chased after her and tried to kick her. It earned him one of the most severe reprimands of his young life. We don’t hurt animals.
Pocket was puzzled and disturbed by this information. He’s been spoiled by heroes of the Roy Halladay ilk – the type whose greatest vice appears to be bass fishing. He assumes that is the norm.
I suppose it is to some extent my fault for not having “the talk” with him before he became so excited about Vick, but it was hard to find the words to describe the situation in terms a 7-year–old can grasp, and also to explain why I was cheering for someone I knew had done terrible, even unforgivable things.
Of course he zeroed right in on that. “Mommy, how can you like Michael Vick so much?” I told him I was still struggling with that one. I hadn’t liked Vick very much to begin with. If the NFL decided in its wisdom that he could return to football I wished he had gone anywhere else where we could root against him. That would have been pretty easy to do.
On the other hand, I have a lot of respect for Tony Dungy and Andy Reid, and if they thought he deserved a chance to play again, that gave me some pause. In addition, I was impressed by Vick’s behavior – by his quiet demeanor last season and how he handled the QB pingpong game with Kevin Kolb at the beginning of this season. He has been dutifully performing his community service and living within the circumstances of his parole. Finally, I think it is encouraging that he has not declared bankruptcy but was taking responsibility for the financial ruin his actions had caused.
I told Pocket this was my intellectual rationale for supporting Vick but that I know I also want this to be a redemption story. I want to believe that our system works, and that a miscreant – even one accused of such sordid, ugly crimes – can be apprehended, tried, found guilty, punished and then released to contribute to society.
But that I am also concerned that putting the burden of this kind of narrative on a clearly flawed human being is a primrose path for our expectations, not to mention a dangerous message to other young people who encounter temptation – Pocket included. I worry that in our enthusiasm for winning we are not only forgiving but incentivizing the unforgivable.
In the offseason Michael Vick may be in a position to sign a contract of historic proportions with the Eagles. Will this be true redemption? Or something much darker and self-indulgent?
We’ve kicked the issue around over the last week, helped oddly enough by Vick himself. In interviews, he has been calm and forthright in his responses to questions on prison and all things canine. I have found it is a relief to have Pocket know the full picture even if he has come face-to-face with his mother’s inconsistency.
When I peeled his No. 10 DeSean Jackson jersey off him Monday morning after 48 hours of continuous wear he asked that it be run through the wash before Tuesday night. He seems content to remain Pocket Jackson for the moment.
We’re still excited about the game and we will cheer for our quarterback, but we’re not ready for Vick jerseys quite yet. Maybe next year.
Cross posted at Philly Sports Daily.
