Only A Conspiracy Theory?

 

1.

Suppose you were the owner of a team in the National Football League that had not had much success for a long time. And, after recently going to considerable lengths to find such success, you recognized that your franchise once again had to start over to somehow try to be competitive. So, you hit upon the idea of "tanking" to rebuild; that is, deliberately losing games to get higher picks in the draft. But other owners and "the League office" itself can't see you doing that overtly, as they frown upon that. (The National Basketball Association instituted its draft lottery system due to that very issue -- NBA teams can deliberately tank but have no guarantee of getting the highest possible draft picks.)

Given that, what might you do?

You could start by hiring some new staff -- general manager, head coach, and position coaches -- without much or any experience in those positions. Your general manager might be in on it with you; that is, he could collude with you in helping to tank a season (or seasons?). Even your head coach could be in on it, although it seems best (more plausible) if he is sincerely able to tell everyone week after week that "they" are doing their best to try to win games. ("They" as in “the whole organization,” without him knowing it’s only him, his coaching staff, and the players trying to win games.)

Another important thing would be to get rid of players (by various means) who might help you win games. That could look like "dumping salaries" and "acquiring draft capital." (Which is, of course, part of the rationale, but the point is that it will help in losing games if you lack the talent to compete.)

 

2.

I believe I have just described the New York Jets of 2025.

Woody Johnson hired a new General Manager (Darren Mougey) and a new Head Coach, Aaron Glenn. The Glenn hiring looked mighty appealing. He’d recently had success as the defensive coordinator for the Detroit Lions and was a tough-minded coach cut from the Bill Parcells-Sean Payton "coaching tree." More importantly, he was a former Jet -- an outstanding defensive back -- who played when Parcells returned the franchise to respectability in the 1990s.

In the player roster area, things started well enough. Of course, getting rid of Aaron Rodgers didn't sit well with everyone, but what a distraction full of drama that had all been. The Jets ran the ball well in 2024, when they ran it. (Compare the Cincinnati Bengals and Zac Taylor's distaste for the running game, no matter how effective it can be.) Jeff Ulbrich spent the remainder of his interim head coaching opportunity giving Aaron Rodgers every chance to win games using mostly his wits, his arm, and Davante Adams.

The Jets' 2025 draft made sense, in that their picks were not bad as such. They got several promising players -- a couple of defensive backs and a tight end whose father and maternal uncle were great NFL players. And they used their first pick on Armand Membou, an exceptional prospect who may bookend with Olu Fashanu as the Jets’ offensive tackles for the next few years. Then again, some thought Membou made more sense at right guard, due to his height, which would have freed Alijah Vera-Tucker to return to left guard, his original position as a rookie. (Moved to make room for Laken Tomlinson’s two scintillating seasons, and used at tackle due to other injuries, he has dealt with injuries himself ever since, and now has three of five seasons wiped out.)

I might say that the Jets could have traded the seventh overall pick to (let's say) the Bengals and gotten more draft picks while drafting (let's say) Jaxson Dart, quarterback from the University of Mississippi. And they could have used their next pick on Darius Alexander, a defensive tackle, to potentially pair with Quinnen Williams. I might say that, because it was my mock draft scenario for the Jets; instead, the New York Giants got Abdul Carter, traded back into the first round to pick Dart, and then took Alexander with the first pick in Round 3. (At least I had the city right – but, incidentally, I am a life-long Washington fan.)

By August, the Jets were scouring the entire planet to find some defensive tackle who might be able to help. (They'd signed Derrick Nnadi as an Unrestricted Free Agent and were so impressed that they traded him back to the Chiefs.) And, of course, at this point, the Jets are gun-shy about drafting any quarterback. Jaxson Dart may have seemed too much of a gamble after Zach Wilson, Sam Darnold, Geno Smith, and ...... Christian Hackenberg? If it seems like you have no idea how to pick a quarterback or develop one, you're probably doing the right thing by no longer trying to.

 

3.

I got the idea to write this once it struck me that something might be very off aside from the Jets’ 0-7 record. Aaron Glenn was unusually firm not only about the status of Justin Fields but especially that of offensive coordinator Tanner Engstrand. Whether it was only stubbornness -- or admirable stoicism in a tough situation -- was hard to tell. But the idea hit me: this could be how you go about losing now to (hopefully) gain in the future. Engstrand had never been an offensive coordinator before; I have no idea if he'd ever called plays before. As his special teams coordinator, Glenn hired Chris Banjo, who had never been one before.

The Jets went into the season with Justin Fields as their first-string quarterback (and Tyrod Taylor as an experienced journeyman backup). Fields is a former first-round draft pick reclamation project who looked more promising than Trey Lance at this point. And, to complement Garrett Wilson, the Jets acquired ............. Josh Reynolds -- a nice third receiver (flanker/slot receiver) on a packed team, but not the most credible prospect to take attention off Wilson. And they hung onto Allen Lazard, picked up former Charger Tyler Johnson, and drafted Arian Smith. Not the most inspiring scenario. All of this seemed to indicate that they were willing to settle for less.

They traded Michael Carter, a fine but occasionally injured nickel back, and shortly thereafter, of course, sent off Quinnen Williams and cornerback Sauce Gardner. That doesn’t seem like a good way to improve your defense, or even to build one for the future. But it could be a highly effective way of continuing to lose games (while keeping key players on offense?).

As a Washington fan, I've recently seen what a complete teardown looks like. Once they were winning, I had to say they must know what they're doing. It doesn't look so great now, but my perspective may be influenced by seeing the young franchise quarterback running the ball in the middle of the third quarter (down 30-7) with several large men in Seahawks uniforms bouncing him around. (In other words, I wouldn’t have had Jayden Daniels in running plays at that point.) But the Washington situation was obvious and plausible, part of a changeover in culture and the possibility that "prior management" may not have had the best players. That's not easy to say with the Jets. The players themselves responded recently by winning two games in a row. Brandon Stephens has played his butt off this season; Quincy Williams and Jamien Sherwood always have. It's not as if talent -- let alone effort -- was lacking.

And that's why I'm inclined to say what's going on seems more surreptitious (which is another way of saying it’s underhanded, I guess). Tanking presents plenty of problems, but at least one can argue for its rationale; even jettisoning your best players to make it harder to compete makes sense. The real question is whether the coaching staff is in on it, especially Aaron Glenn. It would be unfair to them if they were hired in anticipation of their failure. But if your new head coach happens to be black, that might be important for Woody Johnson once the coach fails, as expected. Johnson can say, "See, I hired a black coach -- I gave 'one' a chance. And now it's time to move on with a shiny new .…. coach.”

The End of Zoos

Could you round up, let's say, three humans and keep them in a holding area (a cage or a pen, for instance) and run tests on them, experiment on them, or even just charge people to see them? I assume you couldn't, in most cases today, as that would be a kind of slavery. But we have done this for a long time in our relationship with all other animals. At bottom, it’s a power relation: master-owner over slave-property; and so great a mind as Aristotle's thought of human slaves as someone's property without any comment as to how there might be a problem with it. It was just part of a “natural” order, seemingly.

Humans are quite different from any other animals we know of, but we have long believed we are not just "different" from all other animals but somehow better (in various ways). And most religions have justified the enslavement, destruction, and harm of all other animals by rationalizing that power relation, mainly with ideas about humans having some posited "soul" or "likeness to God(s)." It would be ironic if more “atheistic” perspectives wind up arguing against such a power relation, since it seems to be a case of some animals enslaving other animals; of members of one species who chose themselves as superior beings -- all pretty arbitrary and insanely self-important.

And then, presumably, there might be further implications to pursue, like comparisons to humans’ widespread opposition to cannibalism. If you won’t make a meal out of your favorite dog, let alone your favorite farmhand, what’s the reasoning behind making one out of a calf or a lamb? Would it seem like a blurb for a horror movie: Mary had a little lamb, And then she ate its flesh……

A Problem of Nihilism: Beginning of Essay 4

The following two paragraphs are as far as I got into another essay. The remainder of the envisioned writing is in notes (and the footnotes for the first essays), most of which I'll probably use in one form or another in the cartoon series.

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I say that lethargy had set in; that is another way of saying "The Jerry Springer Show" became popular. With each episode giving seemingly sincere attention to an issue, the actual interest came when there was a fight (and, God willing, some chair-throwing). But it was only an early, notorious example. Its success spawned more of the same, and much of the TV programming from then on would tend toward its low standard. While they seemed to highlight the quirky facets of varied examples of the human species, one had to wonder at a vague feeling of watching hogs wallow in their filth. And since black folks were increasingly on display especially, one might think there was a problem somewhere.

Amid all this, Rupert Murdoch entered the fray like a dingo in heat, trying to extend his media empire to the US. Initially, that might have seemed a good thing as it opened some competition to the major TV networks (NBC, CBS, ABC). But his FOX network would present programming like "Married......With Children," which had cynical humor, plumbing the dregs of "real life."

A Problem of Nihilism: Essay 3

This was the last essay I completed.

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"A Problem of Nihilism: Essay 3"

 

In light of all that was going on back then, it might be easy to overlook the reaction that followed. Alongside a "white flight" from cities to suburbs came a white backlash against more progress in civil rights. For many, that would be bound up with increased resentment of taxes (since paying taxes is thought to subsidize "welfare"). And liberalized laws with more lax social norms would encourage fears of a moral decline in society (as mirrored in the abortion issue). Being conservative had suddenly become a cool thing to be.

Another less familiar aspect of those times was conglomeration, in which large companies sought to buy up other firms. In the antitrust laws, the goal had been to try to keep a single business concern (a "trust") from gaining a monopoly on the production of particular goods, such as steel. (And so being able to set the prices.) In conglomeration, a large company would buy smaller ones that produced goods other than those it did. Or two or more companies would merge, with each making different kinds of goods. There was thus no monopoly over one part of an economy. It did tend to be unproductive, though. It rarely created new jobs -- or even "new wealth" -- but merely increased the assets held by a larger enterprise. That was accumulating capital for its own sake.

As companies sought to buy up more and more of what there was to own, they drove out small businesses that lacked the resources to compete. The same thing would happen in farming, as smallholders could not compete with large corporate farms. So less actual competition would occur -- putting the lie to clichés about "the free enterprise system" -- while fewer and fewer people amassed more and more wealth. In time, they could gain a monopoly on most of the financial assets of an economy. (And become "too big to fail.") And aside from that, everyone else would have the same generic choices at "their" local branches of supermarkets and supercenters.

A parallel occurred in the television industry as merchants found ways to make money off the public airwaves. Previously, anyone who owned a television could watch broadcasts for free, as was the case for radio listening. But with cable TV, consumers would pay a fee for access to what seemed like a great wealth of channels. It soon became clear, however, that the people in charge of such things only had so much intelligence to go around. After a decade or so, lethargy had set in. Viewers wound up with regurgitations of "infotainment" and "reality TV." The result now looks so bland and dismal that we could easily believe there was a conspiracy to try to dull the senses to the point of muting all independent thought. (Or to induce people to kill themselves.)