The way Meggyesy saw it, football was racist, dehumanizing, warlike. That was why he quit after seven productive years as a linebacker for the St. Louis Cardinals, he said.
''I quit at the height of my career,'' he said. ''The Nixon regime was lockstepping with the Lombardi ethic. I was discriminated against because of my antiwar activities. I was benched. They said, 'We're going to teach this guy a lesson.'
''When I wrote in my book that football was dehumanizing, I was talking about the fact you were a cog in a wheel.'' Considered a Dropout
Lately, he has been rereading the book, ''Out of Their League,'' which was published in 1970. It made him a leading critic of organized sports.
To some, he might have been considered a societal dropout, even though he lectured at more than 100 colleges in the 1970's. He worked as a carpenter for a few years, and also spent several years at ''a place in the mountains in Colorado; it wasn't the most externally productive time of my life.''
He had a degree in history from Syracuse University, and became a lecturer at Stanford. His course was called, ''Sports Consciousness and Social Change.'' - New York Times February 18th, 1982
The way Meggyesy saw it, football was racist, dehumanizing, warlike. That was why he quit after seven productive years as a linebacker for the St. Louis Cardinals, he said.
''I quit at the height of my career,'' he said. ''The Nixon regime was lockstepping with the Lombardi ethic. I was discriminated against because of my antiwar activities. I was benched. They said, 'We're going to teach this guy a lesson.'
''When I wrote in my book that football was dehumanizing, I was talking about the fact you were a cog in a wheel.'' Considered a Dropout
Lately, he has been rereading the book, ''Out of Their League,'' which was published in 1970. It made him a leading critic of organized sports.
To some, he might have been considered a societal dropout, even though he lectured at more than 100 colleges in the 1970's. He worked as a carpenter for a few years, and also spent several years at ''a place in the mountains in Colorado; it wasn't the most externally productive time of my life.''
He had a degree in history from Syracuse University, and became a lecturer at Stanford. His course was called, ''Sports Consciousness and Social Change.'' - New York Times February 18th, 1982
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