People vs. the NFL: After an offseason where the NFL got almost everything wrong, a lifelong fan reflects on shame, love, fatherhood, and the future of the league.

I. Gravity

The NFL has many entry points, and all of them produce the same pull as a whirlpool or a waterfall or a black hole: slow and gentle, then irreversible and hopeless.

My entry point was football cards, because the Seattle Seahawks weren’t often on TV on the military bases where I grew up, and the rote memorization of statistics felt like fandom in my spongy mind. I got to know Steve Largent and Curt Warner and Kenny Easley through the words and numbers on the backs of their...

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