The National Football League will hold its annual draft on Thursday April 22 at Radio City Music Hall in the heart of New York City (Manhattan.)The draft is important for all 32 teams because it gives them the chance to pick the best player(s) that they need in order to compete for the Lombadi (Super Bowl) Trophy. One of the players in this draft that has a good chance of being selected is Myron Rolle. Rolle, who had three very productive years with Florida State, has something that his other fellow draftees does not have, he is a Rhodes scholar. Rolle, after his third year with the Seminoles, spent a year in Oxford to further his education. After completed his studies abroad, Rolle decided to put his aspirations on becoming a neurosurgeon on hold (for now) so that he can start his football career in the National Football League and one way was to add his name to the NFL Draft.
Question his Commitment?
In February, at Union Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, Rolle and a bunch of NFL hopefuls participated in the National Football League Combine. The combine gives owners, general managers, scouts, etc. the chance to see those who played college football participate in a series of events (i.e running the 4.40, jumping, passing skills, running skills (for running backs) how to run a route (for wide receivers and tight ends), punting, kicking field goals, etc. Along with that, those in authority get to challenge the players mental skills on whether or not they are tough enough to handle criticism and/or tough questions. One person in particular from Florida State talked to Rolle and questioned his commitment to playing football. The guy actually believed that Rolle was being selfish in ditching football and he should have turned down the chance of going to Oxford! Are you kidding me? You have to be a complete idiot to say no to Oxford because an opportunity like that doesn't come along everybody. The guy was brazen enough to say that Rolle should commit to football only and forget everything else. I guess having aspirations on becoming a neurosurgeon is just a big waste of time and money. Sure you can just focus on football (if you have ever seen a typical NFL playbook, the binder is a thick book filled with numerous plays for the offense along with some defense schemes) but at the same time, you would like to have other interests too. I just don't buy into the idea of concentrating on one thing only and forget everything else because to me, if would make your life pretty boring and predictable.
What the National Football League should do
The NFL should be happy that they could have a player that has something important going on his life other than football. In a league unfortunately with some of the players getting arrested for DWI, domestic violence, gun possession, fighting in public, and now with the situation with two time Super Bowl champion and Super Bowl MVP Ben Roethilsberger, the NFL should use Rolle's image as a symbol of saying "Hey, we may have a few knuckleheads but we have some have great guys in our league, too."
Editor's Note: Myron Rolle was drafted in the 6th round by the Tennessee Titans.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Monday, April 12, 2010
Richard Pryor Show
This past Saturday, TV One played a marathon of the Richard Pryor Show. Technically, you can't really call it a marathon because the network ran the original special and the four episodes
of the series. But at the same time, those four episodes were a great mix of comedy , variety, drama, social commentary. Now, when the show made its debut in the fall of 1977, I was too young to remember it when it was on the air (I was four years old at the time; if I could barely remember both the last seasons of Chico and the Man -1978 and Welcome Back, Kotter-1979, there is no way I could remember anything back in 1977.)
1977
During the summer of '77, Pyror hosted a special on NBC and the network noticed that the program showearned high ratings, they decided to give Pryor his own show for the 1977-78 television season. The network felt that lighting could strike again by having a comedian tone down and clean up his act and star on his own television show (in 1972, the network gave Redd Foxx his own show, Sanford and Son, and in its five year run, the program finished third overall tv ratings twice, and two times it was the No.2 ranked show in the country- only All In the Family drew higher ratings than Sanford.In May 1977, Foxx left Sanford and Son along with NBC to host his own variety show on ABC.)
NBC- Nothing But Censors
Even before the show made it debut, Pryor had problems with the NBC executives, specifically
the censors, for what he wanted to do and say. In today's television landscape, you can do and say certain things on the air, but this was 1977 after all and the suits weren't having it. To give you an indication on how the show was going to go, on the the first episode, Pryor appeared on camera wearing nothing but a nude body suit while saying" looks like they have taken everything away from me." In another episode, Pryor was holding a press conference as the
40th President of the United States (who knew 30 years later that we would see a black president in the movies (played by Chris Rock and Morgan Freeman, on television (on the hit show 24, Dennis Haysbert played the role) and in real life with Barack Obama!) Another skit
was when Pryor played a drunk at a bar (special guest star John Belushi was the bartender)
and when he when home to talk to his long suffering wife, and when he fell asleep on the couch, his wife (played by Maya Angelou) delivered an emotional dialogue-turned-monologue in
the sketch which looked like something you would see at a Broadway show.
After fighting with censors on a regular basis, Pryor had enough and decided to pull the plug on his show on October 4, 1977. In that final espisode, there was a sketch where Pryor was being roasted by the members of his comedy team. The comedians are well known now but were unknown back then, the cast included: Paul Mooney, Sandra Bernhard, Robin Williams, Marsha Warfield, Tim Reid and John Witherspoon.
The censors were not the only the thing that The Richard Pryor Show had to face. The network
placed the show at the Tuesday 8 p.m. time slot opposite two programs that I grew up watching
(as well as some of my favorite tv shows of all time) Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley. When
the 1977-78 television season started, Happy Days was the #1 rated show in the country with
Lavrene & Shirley close behind at #2. If you're the head of NBC programming and you placed
a new show against the #1 and #2 ranked shows in the nation, do you really think that you're going to stand a chance of winning the time slot? Unfortunately, NBC took the gamble and lost out.
The Legacy of the Richard Pryor Show
Even though it had a short stint on television, The Richard Pryor Show was the forerunner for
a number of comedic programs. Its influence could be seen in the following programs: In Living
Color, MadTV (even though some might argue that the show also has elements of Saturday Night Live); The Chris Rock Show and the Chappelle Show. The show is now on DVD and
some of it clips are on Youtube and I suggest that you should check it out.
of the series. But at the same time, those four episodes were a great mix of comedy , variety, drama, social commentary. Now, when the show made its debut in the fall of 1977, I was too young to remember it when it was on the air (I was four years old at the time; if I could barely remember both the last seasons of Chico and the Man -1978 and Welcome Back, Kotter-1979, there is no way I could remember anything back in 1977.)
1977
During the summer of '77, Pyror hosted a special on NBC and the network noticed that the program showearned high ratings, they decided to give Pryor his own show for the 1977-78 television season. The network felt that lighting could strike again by having a comedian tone down and clean up his act and star on his own television show (in 1972, the network gave Redd Foxx his own show, Sanford and Son, and in its five year run, the program finished third overall tv ratings twice, and two times it was the No.2 ranked show in the country- only All In the Family drew higher ratings than Sanford.In May 1977, Foxx left Sanford and Son along with NBC to host his own variety show on ABC.)
NBC- Nothing But Censors
Even before the show made it debut, Pryor had problems with the NBC executives, specifically
the censors, for what he wanted to do and say. In today's television landscape, you can do and say certain things on the air, but this was 1977 after all and the suits weren't having it. To give you an indication on how the show was going to go, on the the first episode, Pryor appeared on camera wearing nothing but a nude body suit while saying" looks like they have taken everything away from me." In another episode, Pryor was holding a press conference as the
40th President of the United States (who knew 30 years later that we would see a black president in the movies (played by Chris Rock and Morgan Freeman, on television (on the hit show 24, Dennis Haysbert played the role) and in real life with Barack Obama!) Another skit
was when Pryor played a drunk at a bar (special guest star John Belushi was the bartender)
and when he when home to talk to his long suffering wife, and when he fell asleep on the couch, his wife (played by Maya Angelou) delivered an emotional dialogue-turned-monologue in
the sketch which looked like something you would see at a Broadway show.
After fighting with censors on a regular basis, Pryor had enough and decided to pull the plug on his show on October 4, 1977. In that final espisode, there was a sketch where Pryor was being roasted by the members of his comedy team. The comedians are well known now but were unknown back then, the cast included: Paul Mooney, Sandra Bernhard, Robin Williams, Marsha Warfield, Tim Reid and John Witherspoon.
The censors were not the only the thing that The Richard Pryor Show had to face. The network
placed the show at the Tuesday 8 p.m. time slot opposite two programs that I grew up watching
(as well as some of my favorite tv shows of all time) Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley. When
the 1977-78 television season started, Happy Days was the #1 rated show in the country with
Lavrene & Shirley close behind at #2. If you're the head of NBC programming and you placed
a new show against the #1 and #2 ranked shows in the nation, do you really think that you're going to stand a chance of winning the time slot? Unfortunately, NBC took the gamble and lost out.
The Legacy of the Richard Pryor Show
Even though it had a short stint on television, The Richard Pryor Show was the forerunner for
a number of comedic programs. Its influence could be seen in the following programs: In Living
Color, MadTV (even though some might argue that the show also has elements of Saturday Night Live); The Chris Rock Show and the Chappelle Show. The show is now on DVD and
some of it clips are on Youtube and I suggest that you should check it out.
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