Aug 3, 2013 5 min read

Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver Riley Cooper has been sent away by his team so that he can become more sensitive. By now, you probably know that Cooper has spent most of the last week in Cyberhell after a video of him using the “N” word went viral. It’s hard to imagine a situation more awkward than the one Cooper found himself in when he had to face his black teammates a day or two after the video became public.

First the Eagles fined Cooper an undisclosed amount, and then they told him to spend some time away from the team in sensitivity training.

I would love to see the video of the sensitivity training. Does a 25-year-old professional football player, who has been on teams with black players all his life, and who has forever labeled himself a racist for screaming the “N” word into a cell phone camera, really need to have someone explain to him that he needs to be a little more sensitive to the feelings of people who might not look like him?

Some of Cooper’s teammates, including quarterback Michael Vick, have already said that they forgive him, and others have said they don’t know if they want him to remain on the team.

This shouldn’t be hard. Let the Eagles vote.

Forget the stupid sensitivity training and just put it to a vote. Have the Eagles players vote anonymously to cut Cooper or keep him. The majority of the players on the roster are black. The people who might have actually been offended should decide whether they’re comfortable with Cooper as a teammate.

The white coach shouldn’t decide. Neither should the white general manager, nor the white owner. They can all let us know how offended they were, but they can also spare us the sanctimonious outrage. They will never know how offensive the word that Cooper spat out can be. The players, black and white, can show how serious Cooper’s offense was and/or if they forgive him by voting whether or not to keep him around.

• Speaking of the Eagles, new coach Chip Kelly’s offense might be a little too exciting for the NFL. Kelly doesn’t like to huddle up much on offense. Last season, when he was coaching at the University of Oregon, his team went without a huddle 78.5 percent of the time. The NFL average in 2012, according to a story in this week’s Wall Street Journal, was 12.8 percent.

Oregon averaged just 23.2 seconds between snaps, which the Journal points out was 32 percent faster than the norm for college football.

That means it was probably 50 percent faster than the average NFL team.

Is the NFL embracing the hurry-up offense in hopes that it will add more excitement to a sport that’s been getting less exciting every year? Absolutely not.

Dean Blandino, Vice President of NFL Officiating, told Kelly and the Eagles during the offseason that they can forget about moving that fast in the NFL. He says the NFL has its own pace and the officials will not be going out of their way to help Kelly run his hurry up. No, you wouldn’t want to cut back on that dinking and dunking.

• The Pro Bowl is not dead yet, but the NFL continues its attempt to put it out of its misery. The latest format change is to pick captains and have them pick up teams the way kids used to do before they only got together for play dates. No more NFC vs. AFC. And no more kickoffs. They’ll be placing the ball at the 25 to start each half and after scores.

It’s only a matter of time before the kickoff disappears from football. This is a good first step in that direction.

My sources tell me that, next year at the Pro Bowl, there won’t be any football. It’ll be a soccer match. They’re also considering bowling.

• Why would anybody take a 2-year old to PNC Park? It seems to have become a popular idea. Do people really think that their son or daughter knows why he or she is suddenly surrounded by 35,000 people who, every once in a while, scream really loud? Is that really doing the kid a favor?

• Many of your friends in the major college football community were upset to hear college presidents and athletic directors talking out loud about the possibility of a super football association that would include the five major conferences, Big Ten, Pac 12, Big 12, SEC and ACC.

It’s mostly about the ridiculous TV money that those conferences are getting and how that will continue to widen the gap between them and the peasants in the other conferences.

Sounds like a good idea to me. College football is already a cesspool, so there’s not much more that the big schools can do to make it more corrupt, but it could be a factor in reducing the stupidity.

The five conferences could easily devise a tournament that would determine a real national champion. Five conference champions and three wild cards – based on wins and losses, with no voting and no computers – and you have a nice, neat, eight-team playoff.

John Steigerwald writes a Sunday column for the Observer-Reporter.