NFL to Agents of Draft Prospects: Make The Bad Old Tweets Go Away
By Kyle Koster
The genre of digging up old, problematic social media posts from people thrust into the public eye has become a go-to rung on the content ladder, even though the enlightened among us realize it's not exactly a pure-intentioned endeavor itself. Still, it persists and will continue to do so as long as internet connections remain intact. So the NFL, seeing the big ol' handwriting on the wall, has gotten proactive in its messaging to the agents of draft prospects.
"Per a league source, the NFL therefore has advised agents to “proactively scrub” negative tweets from prospect accounts, to ensure that none of these messages surface “during this critical time.”"
As someone in a 1990s sitcom would say: Uh, yeah, you think?
Any agent who needed the NFL to tell them to tell their client to take out the trash or delete Twitter outright out of an abundance of caution is asleep at the wheel. That might be the very first thing a kid should do once he decides to go pro. It's antithetical to the ideal, where everyone has a voice and feels comfortable pontificating on any matter of subjects, even if it ruffles some feathers. But it's the reality.
The last thing players need on the biggest night of their lives is to get caught up on clickbait controversy. And yet it happens. Hell, it will probably happen again this year. It's also one of the last things the NFL wants to deal with on its time to stand alone in the sporting world.
Smart move to set up yet another prophylactic layer.
If I could be so bold in conclusion, let me once again offer the idea that digging through a high schooler's social media past to expose something objectionable isn't the best use of anyone's time and there are plenty of higher targets if the aim is to speak truth to power.
Stay ... appropriately woke.