Free Mike Vick

I come back from a peaceful trip to Cream City only to find out that Michael Vick is embroiled in an alleged drug controversy. I won’t rehash the facts, no more than to say that a TSA agent believed that Vick was transporting drug residue in a secret compartment of a water bottle as he attempted to board an Air Tran airplane from Miami, Florida to Atlanta, Georgia.

This story has sparked substantial attention from Falcons’ fans and established Atlanta sports writers. Many people jumped to judgment and not only pronounced Vick guilty of drug possession, but many demand for his trade and unleashed an onslaught of personal attacks. The whole situation is crazy. How can one player go from being so loved to being so hated in such a short period of time?

I have several reasons concerning why Vick has suffered consistent criticism. One being recent inconsistent play, two being two consecutive seasons of not making the playoffs, three being his recent two finger salute in the Georgia Dome, four being his recent inability to accept reasonability for poor team play, and five, his unique ability to run the ball.

The mainstream Atlanta media and fans misunderstand Vick as a mobile quarterback. Simply put, they want a strictly pocket passer quarterback. For example, even when Vick was winning big games and carrying the rest of the offense on his back and leading the team to the playoffs, people though he wasn’t good enough. They called for backup Doug Johnson who was a pocket passer and we see how that turned out. No disrespect to Matt Schaub, who’s been a great backup and pocket passer, but I honestly believe that if Schaub was good enough to be the starter then he would’ve been the starter, money, salary cap, and egos be damned, after all, the NFL is a business motivated by winning and making money. You want examples, see Dallas benching Drew Bledsoe, see Oakland benching Aaron Brooks, see Tennessee benching Kerry Collins, see Miami benching Daunte Culpepper because of injury, Arizona benching Kurt Warner, and I can think of two high-profile quarterbacks being traded because of money – Drew Brees and Steve McNair.

With all that being said, if Atlanta had other opinions, then they probably would’ve exercised that opinion because the Falcons want to win.