Power of Caring
  presented by CIGNA

For Crying Out Loud!

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Posted: Tuesday September 21, 1999 05:56 PM

Isn't it wonderful how the NFL has entered this new era, where a man can be so in touch with his innermost feelingsthat, even in front of the world he's not afraid to ...

... sorry ... (throat clearing)

... not afraid ... to ... (hard swallow)

... cry (unrestrained sobbing)?

In the testosterone-dripping NFL three grown men cried publicly during the first weekend of the season: New York Jets receiver Keyshawn Johnson, because his team lost; Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre, because his team won; and St. Louis Rams coach Dick Vermeil, because he's St. Louis Rams coach Dick Vermeil. It was the single biggest outpouring of tears since the Roy Firestone family reunion. It also broke a record for Kleenex use, previously set during the evening-wear competition of the Miss Teen USA pageant.

Men used to go whole decades without crying. Germany still hasn't seen one weep. But in the U.S. the most bristly, ripped and brawny men are sobbing like Lucy Ricardo.

Women can fake tears, breasts and orgasms, but men are pretty much stuck with the truth in these departments. So it's nice to know that the game means more to them than just stocks and blondes. It's just a little hard picturing all this emotion in the old days.

Dick Butkus: Look (sniff), I just want you to know (shudder) how much this meant (sob) to me.

George Halas: Let it out. Let it all out.

Vermeil, though, has taken crying to a high-water mark. He will bawl at the retirement of a blocking sled. So far this season he has cried publicly twice: after his starting quarterback, Trent Green, blew out his knee and was lost for the year, and after Green's sub, Kurt Warner, won his first NFL start.

The man has the emotional stability of Judy Garland. Sometimes Vermeil will bring a player into his office to cut him, and they'll both come out crying. Last season he huddled his players to tell them he was trading journeyman tight end Aaron Laing and couldn't get it out before breaking down. Aaron Laing? Aaron Laing didn't even cry over the trading of Aaron Laing.

Vermeil, 62, even broke down in a press conference in 1997 after releasing scofflaw running back Lawrence Phillips. Lawrence Phillips! Coaches usually throw small parades upon releasing him. "He's just at the age where he doesn't care what people think anymore," Dick's wife, Carol, says. "He's real." Dick has lost it at football banquets, Lassie movies and grammar school band concerts. He will cry at a halfway-decent sunset, a nicely executed button hook and a particularly good pasta fagiole. If you happen to bring up any of his 10 grandchildren, be sure you're wearing waterproof shoes.

"I know I embarrass myself," he says, "but I've always been this way. It's part of the reason I had to quit [coaching the Philadelphia Eagles after the 1982 season]. I get so emotionally wrung out. Now it's starting to happen here. I just, when I get to talking about somebody I care about, I just...."

Uh-oh. Vermeil is starting to lose it just talking about losing it.

What's odd is that we admire tears in men but not in women. Men who cry are "sensitive." Women who cry are "weak." When former Congresswoman Pat Schroeder cried during her 1987 exploratory run for president, critics said she set back women's chances for the White House by 20 years. After that she collected pictures of men crying. She finally stopped, she says, "in the hundreds," but not before her gallery included pictures of red-eyed Pete Sampras, Wayne Gretzky and Dan Reeves, to say nothing of Ronald Reagan, John Sununu and Gary Hart. "For men, crying has become this mandatory rite of passage," Schroeder says, "but for women, it's still not O.K."

Sorry, Vermeil just can't help himself. Two weeks ago a young girl named Mindy showed up at Rams practice. Mindy's been getting around in a wheelchair ever since a drunk driver turned her into a paraplegic. Vermeil went over to her, took her hand and tried to talk -- only to find his voice box on strike. Then the tears started up, and he suddenly remembered he had to sprint to a punting drill somewhere.

"I know, I know," he says. "It's a fault."

I could think of worse.

Issue date: September 27, 1999

 

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