NFL Fans Loving Michael Wilbon's Brash Criticism Of League

Like him or hate him, Michael Wilbon always speaks from the heart. Sometimes that gets him into trouble, but sometimes people thank him for it. His most recent comments on the NFL falls in the latter category.

Wilbon was a guest on ESPN's First Take this week and the topic of college football players having a harder choice between going to the NFL as soon as possible versus taking millions in NIL money to stay in college caused him to switch gears.

Wilbon said that the NFL's ongoing push for an 18th game for each season should convince more and more people that the league doesn't care about health and player safety nearly as much as it claims to. He declared that the NFL lies so often without getting called out on it that he can never take them at their word.

"No league lies publicly like the NFL," he said. "No entity in this country lies as thoroughly, as convincingly, and as successfully as the NFL to try to sell, ‘We care about health and player safety.' They do not … It's a lie. It's a fraud. It's the NFL, and people aren't going to call them out on it. Usually, people just want their football, and whatever the NFL is selling, we as a culture will buy it.

"Don't ever say to my face if you're an NFL executive or a club executive, ‘Oh, we care about health and player safety. You do not.

"Just be honest about it. I had a journalism professor that said, ‘Say what you mean and mean what you say.' The NFL doesn't care about player safety. So half those things people pointed out are just like, OK, this is a great shock to the system. And so the NFL should make all the money in the world for every network, streaming service, everything else, but NIL is the devil? Stop."

Agreement

Plenty of NFL fans saw the comments and applauded Wilbon for saying what they have been thinking.

"Full stop, I'm probably done with ESPN once PTI is done. Seriously. Wilbon finally said out loud what I've been thinking for years now. The NFL doesn't give a (expletive) about player safety. I refuse to believe this when we're looking at more games than what's necessary," one user declared.

"They only care about it as it relates to their own players being able to stay on the field and perform. As a macro, it's certainly debatable," another remarked.

"He's 100% right, if they go to 18, gotta give 3 bye weeks & raise the salary cap to allow at least 60 guys on the active roster & like 11 on practice squad," a third wrote.

Of course, for every person who agrees with Wilbon, there's another who dismisses Wilbon for not acknowledging that NFL players know the dangers of the sport that they're getting into.

It's a debate that will probably rage for eternity (or until the NFL finds some way to turn the violent sport into a completely safe one without watering down the product).

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This story was originally published April 22, 2026 at 2:23 PM.