Rhetorical Analysis: Should Character Matter In Pro Sports

Superior Essays
American athletes perform on the largest stages in the world. These players make hundred of millions of dollars yearly which can ultimately lead to a dangerous sense of entitlement. The driving force in team selection has become the ability to maximize team performance rather than the character of the overall player. Players such as Ray Rice, John Brown, and Aaron Hernandez have all shown poor acts of judgement and questionable character traits yet progressed to the National League due to their on-field performance. Character is defined as the mental and moral qualities distinctive to an individual. The trail of teams who have placed performance over personal integrity has led to repeated scandals and violence across all sports. Many sports …show more content…
Cuban's experience in evaluating players and decisive selection of which players will ultimately succeed on and off the court has led to the strength of his overall brand. Cuban says, “A quality team that cares about character can have a significant influence and, with the right support system, can get that player to turn the corner and be a professional on the court and a good citizen off” (Cuban). Cuban’s evidence deals with both the logos and ethos of the argument. According to Cuban, he believes that a player should be looked at extensively before signing and have a great support system behind them once they are signed. His credibility as a team owner and his use of rhetorical devices make his argument valid and worth taking notice. Cuban argues that the character of a player has recently appeared to be a non-factor in the decisions of professional sports teams in the hiring of new athletes. However, the headlines and legal proceedings that have followed some of the most controversial hires appear to have damaged the very teams they were supposed to benefit. The past actions of a player should indeed be used as a factor in determining an athlete's potential future with a new team as it is most certainly in the best interest of the team to protect its brand. In the article, “Teams Can Make a Difference If They Care About Behavior" the author discusses how teams are often overlooking the character of a player in order to get their ultimate goal, winning

Related Documents

  • Decent Essays

    CRACK!!!!!!! The baseball went flying in the left field as it sours into the blue clear sky. He’s running 1,2,3 heading for home he’s RUNNING faster than a jack rabbit HE’S………... SAFE!!!!…

    • 238 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Football players in the NFL are kneeling during the national anthem protesting racial inequality. Which isn’t going to help the cause. Kneeling during the national anthem is disrespectful and isn’t going to solve the situation at hand. Kneeling is disrespectful to the flag, the country, and the soldiers who died for our country. For the teams coming on the field after the national anthem, that is not going to solve the cause either.…

    • 404 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Steve Almond’s essay taken from his book Against Football, he discusses the negative side effects that come with playing football. He shares how such a violent sport like football can go from good fun to a terrible tragedy in seconds. Using an early memory of Patriots’ wide receiver Darryl Stingley getting leveled by Jack Tatum of the Oakland Raiders, Almond plants his opinion of the hard hitting sport into readers heads. Watching a traumatic hit on public television has the potential to permanently scar the mind of an eleven year old kid, and that certainly happened to Almond. He shares personal information about his life growing up with brothers, and how violence between them always seemed prevalent.…

    • 1261 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In The Program, the focus of the movie is the ESU football program working toward a winning season after two losing seasons. The team and the coach must win amid the culture and pressures of college life and the oftentimes unethical influence of the administration, alumni, and boosters. Indeed, in considering the movie, there are countless unethical decisions take place. One such unethical occurrence is that football players do not have to do well on the placement tests.…

    • 470 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    John Amaechi is no newcomer to bullying in sports. He has been both the victim and the witness. Experience allows him to use ethos, pathos, and logos in a compelling essay to educate athletes and coaches in “Sports’ Bully Culture”. Amaechi uses the three appeals to help his audience understand why bullying in sports is intolerable. Ethos is all about appealing to character.…

    • 679 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    To begin, people who are into sports or who frequently watch the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network also known as ESPN are well aware of the scandal involving FIFA and their leaders. This situation involving FIFA officials is an example of highly qualified professionals contaminating this organizations leadership whose integrity is in question yet again regarding their top officials. Going all the way back to the early 1990's, FIFA's top executives devised to accept enticements from marketing organizations in return for exclusive television deals. As Attorney General Loretta Lynch stated, “It spans at least two generations of soccer officials who, as alleged, have abused their positions of trust to acquire millions of dollars in bribes and kickbacks (McFarland 2015).” "In 2010, FIFA awarded the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, which led to reports of vote buying, but that’s not a focus of this particular investigation (McFarland 2015)."…

    • 316 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Colin Kaepernick is someone I admire for his courage in the recent controversy on kneeling during the national anthem. If ever given the opportunity to speak on the behalf of this free agent football player, I would want this speech presented in a forum in which it could be received by millions of Americans. The first thing I would do in presenting the speech would be to focus on the purpose of my speech, then come up with a good topic. Next, I would gather enough material and place an emphasis on key points as to why I admire Colin making sure the opening statement is an attention getter. For instance, speaking on how he addresses injustice for all minorities regardless of backlash; in addition discussing the fact the he’s ranked 16 out of…

    • 204 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Coach Observation Report

    • 847 Words
    • 4 Pages

    I am going to compare my college baseball coach to the National Standards for Athletic Coaches. Through my freshman year and also through my first semester of my sophomore I have a good idea of how my coach compares to the national standards. My coach meet a majority of the standards, but he definitely did not meet them all. First, I’m going to talk about the standards that he did meet.…

    • 847 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Sports Rhetorical Analysis

    • 1333 Words
    • 6 Pages

    C4C Elisha A. Palm 1Lt Kelly Griffith English 111-Project 2 T5A 10 October 2017 Kneeling For Love Or Hate The rising trend of professional players kneeling during the national anthem during sport events is becoming a prominent discussion in the United States. This in response produces many different reactions and conversations expressed over a number of different genres.…

    • 1333 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    NFL Hiring Practices

    • 1470 Words
    • 6 Pages

    National Football League has been a mainstay in American sports for quite some time. It has had many positive impacts on our society, however, we will explore how minority professional football players are unfairly targeted. This has occurred by a host of entities both inside and outside of the league. We will examine employer drug testing, stereotypes by the media and how law enforcement unfairly target athletes through unfair practices.…

    • 1470 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    The NFL Highly Inconsistent

    • 2398 Words
    • 10 Pages

    The NFL: Consistently Inconsistent Over the years, the NFL has been subject to widespread controversies. From bounty scandals and dog fighting to banned substances and domestic violence, the multi-billion dollar league always seems to be under the microscope. This year has been no different with the Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson domestic violence cases. The NFL, being the most popular and lucrative sport in the nation by a considerable margin, often comes face to face with the comic book saying, “With great power, comes great responsibility.”…

    • 2398 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Out of 10,000 high school players, only two or three will get the chance to play professional basketball (Shaughnessy, 2011). Every once in a generation there is a Lebron James. But what divided him from those 10,000 high players? A great athlete has to have leadership, raw talent, commitment, high tolerance for pain, and life outside the sport.…

    • 1094 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    They fail to recognize how many equally talented players are competing for a salary” (Thelin). Those who sit on the bench may be just as talented at those who play on the field, but where do you draw the line of who gets paid and what…

    • 1366 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Traumatic Encephalopathy

    • 1137 Words
    • 5 Pages

    This is evidence that the NFL wants to prevent a shift in their fan base’s culture from praising the idea of aggressive injury resistant players to treating players as human and as vulnerable as anyone else. The former places the idea of a larger than life human being who…

    • 1137 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    By banning Jones from track and field, the Olympic Committee makes a strong statement to other professional runners. The IOC proves that it will expel and show no mercy to runners using substances to cheat and win. Not only does banning cheaters from their game help keep professional sports free of controversy, it inspires future athletes to not make the same poor decisions. Children look up to athletes as their role models. It is important that athletes who commit crimes are punished in order to set an example for the future of sports.…

    • 1119 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays