Liam Neeson, my new favorite actor

I admit that I don’t understand how sports radio does it. I like politics, but I could not fill a three hour show talking only about Wednesday’s debate and stay sane.

And yet, sports guys can do a three hour pre-game, a three hour post-game, and then spend the next 24 hours analyzing THE SAME game!

I guess that is why, when ESPN brought actor Liam Neeson in to talk a little trash about the Jets, it never occurred to them that Neeson might not know anything about football:

“Can you even act like the Jets are good this year,” asked ESPN Sports Center anchor Mike Hill.

“Umm, okay, we better start again, can’t we? Are we live,” said Neeson.

“We’re live.”

“Okay, I’ll be very honest with you: it’s only the second football game I’ve ever been at in my life. I still don’t understand the rules,” said Neeson.

We have just entered the ESPN twilight zone. Consider: what if there actually existed human beings who had not even the slightest interest in professional football?

“They brought in Tim Tebow,” said Hill, “he gets criticized lots for his quarterback skills – but should Rex Ryan, in your opinion, make that move to Tim Tebow?”

“You see, you’re speaking ancient Arabic to me, buddy. I swear to you, I just don’t understand the game yet,” said Neeson.

It was time for the anchor to ask the most generic question possible:

“What do you appreciate about the NFL?”

“You can feel the tension in the air between the two teams. Now, if that was in Europe, there would be severe violence,” said Neeson.

There it is: what makes American football so remarkable is how peaceful it is.

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