Who doesn't love a good scandal? Especially as members of the media, we live to dig up the dirt. The world of sports has more than its fair share of Hamlets and Achilles, the wonderboy phenoms who eventually fall victim to their tragic vices. We have Deflategate, performance enhancing drug accusations and recruiting violations. There is one scandal we have to turn our back on though, one sick individual who needs a dose of tough love. Lending Cleveland Brown's quarterback Johnny Manziel our attention is only enabling him at this point, not helping him.
Manziel was simply seen as a rebel during his time at Texas A&M — the bad boy who didn't abide by the NCAA's rules. He won a Heisman trophy and broke records, then screwed up, and we wrote about it — wash, rinse and repeat. He was just a college kid who partied too much and, other than his supreme talent on the gridiron, not all that different than his peers. Manziel is an adult now, and a dangerous one at that.
Since his relevance as a football player has declined, his behavior as a human being has become exponentially worse. Manziel not only ruptured ex-girlfriend Colleen Crowley's eardrum in an altercation last month, he allegedly threatened to take her life along with his own.
Manziel will do anything to stay relevant. The drinking, the lies and the cover-ups aren't enough for him anymore, though. The most insightful thing that anyone has said about Manziel came from former NFL quarterback Ryan Leaf.
Last week, Leaf encouraged Manziel to seek help on an interview with KESN-FM when he said, "You don't need to be vulnerable because you're this big, strong football player, and help means weak. It doesn't. Asking for help might be the strongest thing you ever do."
If anyone can relate to Manziel, it is Leaf. Drafted No. 2 overall in the 1998 NFL draft behind Peyton Manning, Leaf's professional career flamed out after just four seasons. Leaf has since served two years in prison and developed a dangerous drug addiction to Vicodin. The parallels between their stories are eerily similar.
The nonstop media coverage is really hurting Manziel more than anything at this point. He craves the attention, feeds on it even.
Instead of speculating whether or not Manziel's football career is over, he needs to disappear for a while and straighten himself out. He needs help, but not our attention. That might mean going home to his family, entering rehab or even going to jail. The brand and intrigue surrounding Johnny Football is stone cold dead. If things don't change soon, Johnny Manziel might follow his image to the grave.