The Wisdom Of Cam Skattebo
Cam Skattebo recently joined a podcast (Bring the Juice with Frank Dalena) and joked about CTE and Asthma being “an excuse”. Insinuating that they are fake. Because this is the offseason, it made news. It made enough news that Skattebo made an apology statement.
First off: watch the clip. He claims he was joking, and I believe him. Why? Because I went and bothered to listen to the actual podcast. The context for the clip in question comes about 3:48 minutes in, and I think the lead-in is important here. The host asks him about his most hype touchdown. Cam describes a high school play where he says he broke “14 tackles”, and describes how he was barely on the ground and got back up and kept going. The host is impressed and follows up with a question asking if Skattebo ever actually trains for this kind of stuff, like running into hay bales or telephone poles, which is a story Skattebo’s mom has told the media. Skattebo brings up the telephone pole thing, comments that he’s not even sure that was real, but the story his mom told went viral, but he doesn’t remember it, and then goes “but I don’t remember much!” and then says the quote that I think is key here: “Could be the reason why I don’t remember!” He’s outright joking that he might have damaged his own brain. Rather odd for a guy who thinks it’s fake.
That’s when the host does a shit-eating grin and takes the moment to ask the “Do you think CTE is a real thing” and we get the viral clip. When you hear the lead up, and Cam self-depreciatingly joking about not remembering running into telephone poles because he ran into telephone poles, the famous clip comes significantly closer to feeling like a bit. His reaction to the CTE question does seem genuine, but after the host starts with the Asthma thing, the feeling that this is all a riff feels even stronger. Cam’s goofy face during the last part just strengthens the argument, imo. I don’t think it’s a very good bit, it’s a banter without much chemistry and falls flat, but I do think it’s a bit. To be honest the main thing I took away from the podcast was that it’s kind of a shit podcast.
Also, his mom defended him on twitter, saying he frequently had to “go run to get her inhaler”. If that’s true, I highly doubt Skattebo thinks Asthma is “an excuse”. All signs point to it being a bit, the bit being taken out of context, and people who didn’t bother researching the context then using it to confirm some priors about the man.
When I first started making this comic this post was going to be me asking why on earth do we give this much of a shit about the NFL player most likely to have a favorite flavor of crayon sharing a dumb take about head trauma, and in the process of researching it I came away with annoyance for the modern media hellscape. I had to read all kinds of moralizing about it from social media posters and sports sites, all discussing how bad it is and how Cam went from loveable oaf to horrible influence, yadda yadda. He then had to go apologize for it, when the actual problem here was that a clip of him out of context got spread around the internet and caused discourse. He inadvertently caused a distraction. That’s definitely on him for not fully appreciating how this machine works and hopefully this little incident teaches him something. You are in the NY media market now, Skatt man. You have to be more careful.
I want to reiterate that I do not think Cam Skattebo is a particularly smart person. I think he’s genuinely an idiot. I also think it’s kind of ridiculous to moralize how terrible he is for not understanding CTE, if he in fact does think it’s fake or whatever. Anybody aware of Skattebo before this is fully aware of his reputation as a neanderthal. Why are we suddenly holding this guy to such high standards? I got wind of this clip before most of sports media did, because I root for the Giants, peruse Giants circles, and therefore tend to see minor Giants news break before it reaches wider audiences. It was on reddit/social in Giants spaces a couple of days before it hit wider news sites, and Giants fans seemed to genuinely react the same way: why on earth did anyone expect more from Skattebo? Of course he’s an idiot about CTE, this isn’t surprising. This is a guy we have been making jokes will have a very fun 2-year career since his first snap last season. This is a guy we have footage of slamming his head into a brick wall pre-game to pump himself up. We all knew this guy is the missing link and that he’s not a role model for taking care of himself.
I don’t know if Skatt genuinely believes in CTE or not. I think he probably does believe in it, but doesn’t really dwell on it or care much. I don’t really blame him for it. I blame the NFL for spending years covering it up and downplaying it, leading to millions of people not taking it seriously. I blame the current wave of anti-science/anti-intellectualism that has swept the nation and the world, which has led to so many people just disregarding research and facts because they don’t personally vibe with them. Skattebo is just as much a victim of the bad influence as he is one. He’s a symptom of a wider disease. I think it’s a touch unreasonable to be super upset at the class dirt eater to not be a wise enlightented scientific master. I kinda feel bad calling him an idiot this much as I am, because this has taught me he isn’t quite as dumb as people are making him out to be.
I hope he’s a bit wiser in the future with his words, and does a better job understanding how the media will take anything he does in the worst way if it gets clicks. I would bet this is far from his last incident. I’m sad to see that this out-of-context bad joke is going to be used against him by people who never bothered to look into it and see if there was any more to the story, but just believed the quick headlines.
For me, this served as a good personal reminder that it’s important to even casually research what you can before spouting off a take. It did not take me long to check the podcast, see the post his mom made, or read into it, and I’m glad I did, so I could get a better picture of the situation and hopefully share those findings with you so that when this comes up in conversation in the future, you know more than the other guy.
Cam Skattebo might be an idiot, but we aren’t much better if we can’t even give the courtesy to check to see if it’s true first.
I don’t even think you need to see the entire podcast to realize he’s obviously kidding. I agree, there’s no chemistry and the bit feels unrehearsed, so it’s not particularly GOOD. But the clip pretty much says it all. He doesn’t believe in asthma, “Just breathe.”
What I’d like to know – cuz I’m always going to go there – is how many of these pearl-clutching moralizers berating him are anti-vaxxers. I would like to see a venn diagram of this.
I don’t understand how you can screw up a venn diagram, but I got the Cam Skatteboo of AI agents to work on this for me, so we’ll roll with it.
https://postimg.cc/fJcgbFjg
What disappoints me is that I think most of the moralizing is coming from the left here, not right. I don’t follow right wingers on socials, so most of the annoying posts I saw were unfortunately from left leaning people I usually respect but got sucked in by headlines this time
Well yeah, right wingers love medical misinformation.
Wow. When it comes to pearl clutching, you can normally always count on the right to be the first ones lining up to shuck their oysters. I have my head jammed so far up my own butt I wouldn’t have even heard about this if you didn’t mention it.
I mean, this was a guy “denying science”, that appeals to the current right wing. A guy denying science is exactly the type of thing to fire up self-righteous left wingers who need to go outside a bit more.
We Progressives aren’t immune to pearl clutching over stupid shit either
I agree, but the left usually doesn’t get offended en masse by the same thing at the same time unless it’s something huge, like the President being a criminal rapist and starting wars to desperately try and distract his own cult members from realizing the truth. *ahem*
What was I saying? Oh yes, the left as a group is a bit too disjointed, whereas the right treats everything more as a chain, where an attack on one link is an attack on all, so all of them will militantly be offended by the same things. Even non-gun-owning righties that I know will go absolutely bonkers if you even suggest gun control.
Whereas on the left, you have a lot of people who try to be accepting and take the, “Well, as long as you’re not being a criminal, I guess I’ll just let you be you.” Take a look at Aaron Rodgers. I froth at the mouth seeing a picture of him, but I know a lot of people on the left who just shrug and go, “Well, he is a football player after all, maybe he just took too many bonks on the noggin.”
All of this to say, yes, outside time is good for everyone. Maybe some full-contact football. If we ALL get CTE, maybe it will vanish.
Unfortunately that’s not surprising. There are terrible people on both sides who spread misinformation. We’re just more blind to the ones we agree with. I know I’m at fault too and try to keep that in mind when reading the news. Or at least the news that reaches me in this Pennsylvania meditation retreat.
I think the specific topic hits a nerve with NFL watchers.
Everyone who watches the NFL has to somehow contend with the idea that the sport, by its design, causes CTE and concussions and is terribly destructive to the players. It’s why boxing fell out of favor. Boxing used to be way more popular, but it’s too graphically violent and brutal to be appealing to most people with modern sensibilities. Football isn’t there yet, but it’s on the edge. It’s getting harder to convince mothers to let their kids sign up for tackle football.
Typically, people try to push this idea out of their minds. The media parades around the most lucid and eloquent former players like Peyton Manning & Tom Brady and tries to cover up all the brain-damaged drooling linemen and linebackers and RBs.
Some viewers, coaches, and players try to deal with the inherent cruelty of the NFL by loudly denying that CTE even exists. That primes the pump for mini-scandals like this, where a player *maybe* cops to being a CTE-denier.
That gets dangerously close to reminding people that the NFL is basically a bloodsport, and that maybe you can’t honestly call yourself both a “good human being” and also an “NFL fan” at the same time.
Is that why boxing fell out of favor? I thought it was because of how nakedly crooked it was, everyone knew it was rigged, and not in the fun way wrestling was.
I thought it’s because so many records were inflated against sub-par competition that it because rare to see competitive bouts outside the headliner of the card.
While the violence was part of it, another thing that killed boxing was how rigged it was. Pro wrestling is rigged, but has been fairly open about it. However, having a sport that people staked their futures on so obviously rigged did play a role in killing it. MMA is the new boxing, but without the promoters rigging it as obviously. Knowing that participating could severely harm you and that your future in the sport depended on some corrupt AHs is what killed it. Other industries, when they had a corruption scandal, went out of their way to eliminate it, as quiz shows, country music, and most sports leagues did. Otherwise, they leaned the other way and embraced the scripted nature like pro-wrestling did. Boxing was stuck in the middle ground, so it died.
This is unfortunately the modern media landscape. It’s always more noticeable when it happens in a field your knowledgeable about. It happens all the time, every day. News isn’t delivered once a day to all subscribers. Now it’s advertising dollars based on clicks. It’s lying, obfuscating, and fear mongering all to get you to click or watch. It’s depressing and makes it difficult to get accurate news without reading multiple sources. One key is to try and wait a couple days for details and context to come out before making up your mind.
this is just corny bro