Steinberg occupies a position that is very dear to those of us who've held it over the years: sports columnist at The Post. If all he wants to do is be popular--and I think Dan is better than that--then the readers of The Washington Post sports section won't be very well served. Telling readers how great they are as sports fans was never one of my priorities. The only thing worse than people who can't stand to hear an unpopular or unflattering opinion is those that are too afraid to state one.

God, I'm glad I grew up in a time when kids followed sports in the newspaper and on TV and knew every sport.

Lombardi, Shula, Landry and Gibbs were innovators. Bill Walsh was a visionary . . . .

Professional football is the most violent thing your eyes have ever seen.

Players suffer coaching changes all the time; it's life in the NFL.

People here don't identify themselves by their sports team.

Nothing is a violent as football and I bet you like. Just say you don't like it, or can't identify, don't come up with excuses like "It's too violent" while you wear some team's NFL jersey.