"The NFL IS Pro Football!!!"

The "NFL IS PRO FOOTBALL" is a weak mindset to have. It's NCAA to the NFL, that's it. If it is anything else, its a joke. This is the way people who don't like the XFL think and feel. Many of them barely sat down and watched a game, and if they did, they sat down with said mentality already firmly entrenched so whatever they did see was only what they wanted to see. Look past a couple of good series and plays, "THERE! Do you see that throw? Do you see that dropped pass? That missed tackle?? This league sucks!". You look past a hundred things that don't fit your argument to find the 3 things that do and make yourself feel like you were right the whole time. It is intellectually lazy.

But what's funny about all this is, the same people will say things like "take everything that the XFL does and put it in the NFL". So you like what the XFL is doing, but because the name on it is XFL and not NFL, it's trash. There was one person in particular who pointed out the XFL attendance numbers. Saying that it's going to fold before the season was over. When it was pointed out that said XFL attendance was more than some baseball, hockey and NFL teams, his argument was "So what. They are established. They arent going anywhere. The XFL is a joke. They won't make a second season". It didn't matter that other pro leagues faced the same issue. Since it was the XFL, they weren't excused, as he did for the others.

For some reason, these types of people have such a big agenda against the XFL. Maybe it is due to the XFL's first attempt in 2001. It really was a joke. But this XFL attempt was done right. They have done more things in this one season to move the game of football forward than the NFL has done in the last 25 years. They fixed the kickoff game by making it so much safer and still as exciting. They fixed the replay issue by making it completely transparent. They removed the boring PAT Kick and added more excitement for the play after the touchdown by making teams go for it, on a 1, 2 or 3 point play. The quicker play clock to keep the game moving along. Skill players all having headsets in their helmets. They have done so much. Let's just steal all of that and kick the XFL to the curb and act like they never came up with these ideas and that they never existed.

These fans like to KNOW things. They have watched their team over the last 5, 10, 20 years. Maybe more. Everything they need to know can be told to them by sports shows and established NFL reporters, insiders. They don't have to think, or even really pay attention to the game all that much. At some point, someone will tell them how to think and that makes them feel comfortable. With the XFL, they really don't know the XFL players. They don't know many who cover it, so they HAVE to pay attention to know what to think because no one is going to tell them what they are seeing. So instead of giving it some effort, they say it sucks so that they don't look stupid if they say they like it and know nothing about the teams or its players.

It's easy to turn on ESPN and listen to a 24-hour constant conversation about where Tom Brady is going to land this offseason. When someone brings it up in conversation, you can take what you were told and make it seem like you know what you are talking about. But if someone asks you what you think about the New York Guardians beating the Dallas Renegades, even if you watched it, no one told you what to think. So if you make your own decision on what you think, and you say it and sound stupid, then it's on you. You can't back it up with, "Stephen A. said the same thing, so if I'm wrong he is too". It's too much work. "XFL is trash" is so much easier to say.

The NFL IS Pro Football. Nothing will ever change that fact in the minds of these people. THIS beer is the only good beer. Everything else tastes like piss. That brand of car is garbage. This brand is made with quality. It's the same weak mindset that plagues this country every day by intellectually lazy people. My favorite quote, which is on the front page of this website, "A person's opinion is only as good as their knowledge on that subject" fits here perfectly. 99% of these people have no knowledge of the XFL because they haven't been told what to think other than that of their other lazy minded sheep looking for someone to tell them. So every time you see someone say the XFL is trash, or it sucks, just remember why they are saying it.

- Scott Summers