Dez Bryant Rookie Hazing – NFL Football

Dez Bryant was right to refuse Roy Williams’s equipment and rookie hazing.

Dez Bryant Belies His Reputation

Dez Bryant was right.

The Dallas Cowboys wide receiver has been much maligned for being cocky and immature by not agreeing to carry Roy Williams’s bags–a typical NFL rookie hazing stunt–but it was time for someone to take a stand against the BS practice of hazing rookies.

Hazing itself is immature; rejecting to subject oneself to it is not. It doesn’t matter whether it’s high school seniors to freshmen, fraternity brothers to pledges, or NFL veterans to rookies, hazing is a childish, often dangerous, sometimes even illegal practice that has no place in any of these venues.

Anyone who thinks this is a joke should check out the following list of sports hazing incidents:

http://espn.go.com/otl/hazing/list.html

Still laughing?

Carrying another player’s equipment may seem rather innocuous, but other hazing techniques most definitely are not. So before anyone postulates that hazing is okay as long as one stops at a certain point, I ask where can you, how can you draw such a determining line?

It’s impossible. As soon as one tries, somebody else will push that limit and the situation will degrade again.

There is only one proper line, and that is no hazing of any sort whatsoever. The NFL should make it league policy as should the other professional sports leagues. True, it might be difficult to enforce, as any such enforcement may be contingent on players ratting out their teammates–so much for team chemistry–but the policy should be on the books regardless.

Dez Bryant was right. More people should stand up to support him.