National Football League

A solution to NFL's strip-club problem

Published Jun. 17, 2010 1:00 a.m. ET

Jason Whitlock

Given my inexperience with the goings-on inside a typical American strip club, I was initially reluctant to comment on Tennessee Titan QB Vince Young’s unfortunate, 3 a.m. altercation at Dallas’ Club Onyx.

Should the NFL’s top cop, commissioner Roger Goodell, discipline Young?

I didn’t know. I’ve spent so little time patronizing gentlemen’s clubs that asking me to assess the inappropriateness of Young’s behavior is the equivalent of asking Skip Bayless to assess the thoughts of Sir Isaac Newton.

I’m no prude, but the thought of some gorgeous 23-year-old nursing student or struggling single mother degrading her womanhood by disrobing and gyrating in my lap for a $10 bill is the exact kind of sexism I’m proud to stand against.

That’s why on the rare occasions I’ve been forced to visit a club, I've tipped at least $20 per lap dance and have gone as high as $25 if the DJ played Zeppelin’s "Stairway to Heaven."

I was raised to carry myself as a gentleman at all times.

I needed help understanding Young’s meltdown. Luckily, my former Ball State football teammate Maurice “Mo Money” Honey has an honorary Ph.D from UNLV in strip club etiquette.

When Mo Money retired from the NFL in 2004, he relocated to Las Vegas, immersed himself in the community and started a grassroots political organization, The We Party Movement, which promotes the legalization of most drugs and prostitution, the lowering of the legal drinking age to 18, the raising of the legal blood-alcohol limit to 2.0 and several other radical social ideas.

“I’m a progressive libertarian who loved George W. Bush before he sobered up,” Mo Money told me when I reached him by phone Wednesday afternoon.

Mo Money is a write-in candidate in Harry Reid’s heated U.S. Senate race.

“If the voters send me to Washington and I can get an ounce of this purple kush to Pelosi, Boehner and Barack, all that gridlock is gonna open all the way up,” Mo Money said. “You know why we didn’t have global warming, oil spills and Hurricane Katrina back when the Indians ran America? The peace pipe, bro. When you on that good kush, you ain’t looking for trouble or trying to drill for stuff. You just wanna chill, Jason.”

Hmm. So is that what caused Vince Young to attack a Club Onyx patron who flashed an upside-down Hook ‘em Horns sign and trash-talked Young’s beloved Texas Longhorns? Had Young inhaled the right weed, he would’ve ignored the diss?

“Yes and no,” Mo Money said.

Wait. I thought you said good kush makes you mellow and non-combative.

“It does,” Mo Money explained, “in most people. Professional athletes are not most people. Pro athletes have a chemical imbalance in their brain. The arrogance that comes from being a professional athlete unleashes a ridiculously high amount of testosterone into the blood stream. The brain then overreacts and tries to counter-balance, sending signals that heighten an athlete’s insecurity and paranoia.”

Insecurity? Paranoia? Why would a pro athlete feel insecure or paranoid? The world worships them. Women throw themselves at them. Vince Young earned lifetime financial security before he was 23, before he even took a single NFL snap.

“C’mon, Jason, you can’t be serious,” Mo Money groaned. “Most pro athletes spend their whole lives focusing on developing their bodies more than their minds. They’re incredibly insecure. It’s why so many of them tattoo their entire bodies. Vince Young has his name tattooed across his back in big bold letters. He thinks he’s a human jersey. He’s not self-aware or self-assured. He’s a jersey. Jerseys don’t think. They react.”

That’s ridiculous, Mo. What about Bill Bradley, Jerry Rice, Sweetness, Jackie Robinson, the kid from Florida State who won the Rhodes Scholarship? There are hundreds of pro athletes who think and carry themselves with class.

“Those are the exceptions,” Mo Money said. “And the old guys went through a different maturation process as professional athletes. They didn’t earn instant millions. They weren’t instant celebrities at age 20. Walter Payton didn’t aspire to be Notorious B.I.G. He wanted to be a great football player.”

So what do you think Goodell should do to Vince Young?

“He shouldn’t single out Vince,” Mo Money said. “Goodell needs to realize he has a strip-club problem, not a Vince Young problem. Pacman Jones is a Pro Bowl corner if there is no strip club. You think Big Ben belongs in a strip club? Goodell should ban all of his players from entering strip clubs. Get caught in a strip club and the team can void your contract.”

Wow. That seems harsh, unfair. Half the league might retire. How would the players drop off their child-support payments? Hell, strippers might march on Washington. There’d be an angry Strip Tease Party that would make the Tea Party seem like a PTA rally.

“No doubt, it would be a courageous stand by Goodell,” Mo Money admitted. “If I’m elected to the Senate, it’s part of my political platform. I want to ban all men under age 30 and all active professional athletes from entering strip clubs. They’re not mature enough to handle it. All they wanna do is make it rain and listen to that loud, cussing rap music. A proper-functioning strip club is a place for a mature man of wealth to help a young woman work through her daddy issues.”

Sounds like change we can all believe in.

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