Fireworks 3 (4) – NFL 0

Anything that involves explosives and fire outside of those who are trained in their use or disposal are the seeds of an eventual tale of woe. Two NFL players, Jason Pierre-Paul of the New York Football Giants and C.J. Wilson of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are less than whole now than they were going into the July 4^th holiday celebration.

JPP lost his index finger and broke his thumb in a fireworks accident that may or may not have been legal when the accident occurred. Also he is in-between contracts at the moment where he has a franchise tag tender offer on the table from the club worth $14.813 million for next season. Right now they were planning on negotiating a long term deal for him, but does this incident change things going forward? The Giants recently pulled a $60 million long term deal back because JPP was going to refuse it. Do the Giants stick with the tag deal now or send him on his way? I would say let him play the one year and see what you get to determine how you move forward, at least have the team doctors and hand specialists look at it before signing him to anything.

C.J. lost his index and middle finger when a canister he was carrying, it already does not sound good “canister”, had fireworks within and exploded. Was he trying to build a bomb or something? The problem with C.J., and I feel bad for the kid, he plays defensive back and will this end his career due to the loss of the two strongest fingers on the hand? JPP is an All-Pro and C.J. is not and he may be playing as many games I will next season.

But expect this to come up with future NFL contracts as the boilerplate language saying what they are allowed to do. Fireworks are dangerous and there a lot of stupid people out there doing worse to themselves. While the Darwinist in me is calling this natural selection, the humanitarian in me is saying just knock it off already. Fire and Explosives are undefeated when man acts stupidly around them. Here are just a few other stories where fireworks ruined the day and forever changed their family’s lives because theirs were taken.

• Man shoots off firework from top of his head, dies instantly | Yahoo News
• Father Dies After Lighting Fireworks Off His Chest | Opposing Views
• Detroit man killed by firework blast to chest | Click On Detroit

Just knock it off already and leave it to the professional.