All the Bounty of the Saints

You nearly murdered that guy! Pound it!

You might be surprised, but I'm completely OK with this bounty program Gregg Williams has seemingly had wherever he's coached. Mainly because I know that this kind of thing is just a part of sports and has been for a long time. Yes, putting up as much as $50,000 in a season is a lucrative amount of compensation, but players in every sport in the world have been encouraged to injure opposing players since the beginning of time.

For the uninitiated: An NFL investigation found that New Orleans Saints defensive coordinator Gregg Williams and 22-27 defensive players contributed to a bounty program rewarding the injuring of opposition players. Sometimes specific players, often quarterbacks, were targeted. "Knock outs" paid out at $1000 each, while "cart-offs" paid out at $1500.

Occupy Drunk Driving: A Football Article

Aldon Smith, Occupiers take top headlines as Superweek starts

Pretty mediocre mugshot. Pretty incredible ears.

Maybe it's because I'm in the Bay Area right now, but all that anyone seems to want to talk about regarding football is the Occupy movement's appearance in Indianapolis. And if they don't want to talk about that, they want to talk about 49er defensive end and likely NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year Aldon Smith's DUI arrest in Miami Sunday morning. For all intents and purposes, it looks like Mr. Smith had an intense Saturday night. I had my first shift at a local grocery store yesterday, bagging groceries. I quickly found this was one of those jobs (like bus driver, taxi driver, therapist) where people think it's OK to talk to you about whatever the hell they feel like. Most of the time, people wanted to talk about the gluten-free soy sauce substitute that contains no sodium that they just bought. But those who wanted to talk sports to the guy getting paper cuts so they can carry their food home wanted to tell me about how Aldon Smith is just a young kid making mistakes. I wholeheartedly agree (but also, I don't agree at all). I'll get to that in a second.