If you follow American football at all, you’ve probably heard about the massive scandal surrounding Tom Brady, the quarterback of the Super Bowl champion New England Patriots. Apparently Gisele Bundchen can throw a football further than he can.
No, not really. The scandal is that some of the footballs used during the AFC Championship Game between the Patriots and the Indianapolis Colts (motto: “Who needs Peyton Manning? … well, maybe we do”) were underinflated. This has been a major point of discussion among sportscasters, league officials, fans, and almost everybody else in the United States ever since the game ended, waaay back in January. This may be a contributing factor to the belief among the rest of the world that Americans are stupid.
Anyway, Tom kept telling everybody who would listen that he didn’t know the footballs were underinflated, and the National Football League, in the person of Commissioner Roger Goodell, kept telling everybody Tom was a lying sack of dog excrement who steals candy from babies and has been known to kick jack-o-lanterns off the porches of nursing homes. Finally, Roger got fed up with the whole thing and ruled Tom would be suspended for four games to start the 2015 season.
Well. If you think things were bad BEFORE, they went to DEFCON-0 at that point. Somehow, this disagreement wound up in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, and now Judge Richard M. Berman is listening to testimony and arguments. That’s right: The district court widely regarded as one of the most influential and active federal district courts in the United States, largely because of its jurisdiction over New York's major financial centers, is handling a case regarding the amount of air in a football. Is this a great country, or what?
All this is by way of background. We’re getting to the Man Rules now.
Earlier this week, Tom appeared in court. And courtroom sketch artist Janet Rosenberg produced one of the most hilariously awful sketches in the history of the universe.
Now, Tom is generally considered one of the more handsome football players of our time. Here’s how he usually appears:
And here’s the sketch Janet made (we added the red circle, so you'd know which guy is supposed to be Tom; you can click the image to make it larger, if you enjoy torture):
Now, to be fair, Janet isn’t a Man, and technically a Man-Rule shouldn't apply to non-Men. We took a quick poll of the executive team here at The Man Rules, though, and we felt the terribleness of this drawing was worth commenting on anyway. So we reiterate: Don't Take a Job You're Not Qualified to Do. The first installment of this particular Man-Rule involved football, and it seemed apropos to bring it up again. If you are a courtroom sketch artist, and your courtroom sketch looks like it was drawn by an alcoholic chimpanzee, maybe you're not in the right line of work.
Naturally, with a drawing this bad, I’m sure you’re thinking it would quickly be forgotten and attention would once again be focused on the truly pressing issues of our country, such as the amount of air in a football. And you would have the brains of a dead jack-o-lantern if you believed that.
Social media exploded with versions of this courtroom sketch. People (some of them who probably consider themselves Men) were violating another important Man-Rule left and right: Don’t Make Fun of the Way Somebody Looks. Again, this Man-Rule doesn't typically apply to drawings, but we figured, what the heck.
Folks were comparing the Tom from the sketch to zombies from The Walking Dead:
Or to E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial:
Or to Batman’s undead foe, Solomon Grundy:
As usual, we here at The Man Rules stand firmly against such juvenile attempts at humor, and we condemn them most harshly. Those of you who are perpetuating these silly comparisons should cease and desist immediately.
Although the Grundy one is pretty funny.
(c) 2015 John Puckett
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