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Everything Doesn't Have to be This Stupid

Druski butchering Jaxon Smith-Njigba's name represents all that's wrong with the NFL, and pop culture in general.
Feb 5, 2026; San Francisco, CA, USA; Druski on the NFL Honors Red Carpet before Super Bowl LX at Palace of Fine Arts.
Feb 5, 2026; San Francisco, CA, USA; Druski on the NFL Honors Red Carpet before Super Bowl LX at Palace of Fine Arts. | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

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The Seattle Seahawks have bigger fish to fry, and on Sunday they will be playing on the biggest stage in the world as they take on the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl.

That used to be the extent of it, but because the NFL is a bottomless well of greed, they've since added a thousand empty-calorie appetizers to accompany the main course, including the "Honors" ceremony, which took place last night.

On that note, the league is nothing if not consistent in disrespecting the Seahawks, their players and their coaches. Mike Macdonald getting third place in the Coach of the Year vote wasn't bad enough, nor Nick Emmanwori getting beat out by an off-ball linebacker for Defensive Rookie of the Year.

For an encore, the Seahawks literally had their name dragged through the mud when Jaxon Smith-Njigba was named the league's Offensive Player of the Year. Here's Detroit Lions legend Barry Sanders standing on stage with Druski when he made a poor attempt at a viral moment, deliberately twisting JSN's last name into a slur.

Truly hysterical stuff.

Druski obviously bares much of the blame for doing what he did, but we blame the NFL for putting him on the stage in the first place - and next to one of the game's greatest ambassadors. After turning their ceremony over to an internet "comedian" it should come as no surprise that he turned the whole thing into a joke.

The problem here is that the NFL wanted to maximize its reach with a group of fans that doesn't care about the Seahawks, or Jaxon Smith-Njigba, and certainly not the generations-long struggle that made saying the N-word on TV a cardinal sin in the first place.

This demographic the league is trying to reach has spent the last two weeks using AI to photoshop themselves onto Jeffrey Epstein's private plane, which somehow qualifies as "aura farming" in the twisted, content-all-the-time corners of their minds. Catering to this market is only going to force the NFL into the precipitous decline that's destroying the internet and everything else in this country.

The NFL should know better. The reason that it's been the most popular thing in America for the last 60 years is precisely because they don't need to do stunts like this to get attention. The game speaks for itself and doesn't need side-shows and snickering puns to draw a larger audience.

Those kids they tried to get to tune in by hiring Druski are either going to grow up some day and become fans or they won't - and the fact that nothing can hold their attention span longer than 45 seconds doesn't bode well for games that average three hours. Stooping for their eyeballs and their clicks will only make the NFL a weaker product, as we witnessed last night.

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Published
Tim Weaver
TIM WEAVER

Tim Weaver has been writing about the NFL since the 2013 season for multiple teams and outlets, including USA Today and The Sporting News. He currently covers the Seattle Seahawks and Carolina Panthers for On SI.