I grew up watching NFL football in the mid-nineties, back when Norman Julius Esiason’s nickname, Boomer, spoke more to his strong arm as a quarterback than to his pontificating on sports talk radio.
Regrettably, I didn’t have the pleasure of knowing him in utero, when he apparently received the nickname from Mama Esiason. According to the New York Times, it was his prolific prenatal kicking that made him Boomer.
It’s unclear as to whether said kicking was truly an effort to encourage labor at an earlier time or if it was just to call attention to himself. Which is not unlike his recent rant against New York Mets infielder Daniel Murphy’s decision to miss the first two games of the baseball season.
On April 2, Esiason’s co-host, Craig Carton, bemoaned the fact that the Mets had to call up a minor league replacement as they awaited Murphy’s return from paternity leave. Carton clarified that Murphy’s wife gave birth on Monday (around noon) and it would have been legitimate, in his mind, to miss the game that day.
However, especially since the Mets’ second game was not until Wednesday, Carton wondered aloud about the legitimacy of Murphy missing Wednesday’s game as well. “I mean, what are you doing?” Carlton said.
Esiason then took it a step further: “Quite frankly, I would have said ‘C-section before the season starts, I need to be at opening day…’” His explanation had something to do with being able to send his kids to college. In conclusion, Boomer said, “Get your ass back to work.”
Esiason has since offered a statement to apologize. And, as far as predictable and presumably involuntary apologetic statements go, this one seemed fairly sincere:
My deep apologies to both Daniel and Tori Murphy for creating an intrusion into a very sacred and personal moment in their lives, and that’s the birth of their son, Noah. Daniel is the Mets’ second baseman, whose brief paternity leave led to a flippant and insensitive remark that I sincerely regret. (In the) meantime, I’m very grateful to my many friends over at the March of Dimes who graciously reached out and re-educated me that if a pregnancy is healthy, it is medically beneficial to let the labor begin on its own rather than to schedule a C-section for convenience. In fact, babies born just a few weeks early have double the risk of death compared to babies born after 39 full weeks of pregnancy. As their promotional campaign says, ‘Healthy babies are worth the wait.’ And as a proud father, I couldn’t agree more.” ( From CBS Local)
In fact, I must admit I was fairly impressed by the depth of his apology. He went past the threshold of “I’m sorry if you were offended” and went on to explain exactly where he felt he had offended and even sought to remedy his wrongdoing with education. Perhaps some of us are more aware than others about the inherent risks associated with major surgeries, but that’s another story. Again as far as politically-correct sorrys go, bravo. Truly.
What’s still unresolved, however, is what seems to me to be a curious cluelessness regarding the point of paternity leave, particularly in reference to Carlton’s intimation that any time off “now that she’s had the baby,” is essentially overkill.
“There’s nothing you can do anyway,” he says. “You’re not breastfeeding the kid.”
To Boomer’s credit, he initially defends Murphy by saying he has the legal right to take some time off. But it’s then that he proceeds to give his endorsement of elective Cesareans.
Believe it or not, an additional, unassociated New York-based sports radio host is also struggling to comprehend what good a little old man can be to a woman and their child she had just delivered.
Mike Francesa, also a nationally-renowned sports personality, called paternity leave a “gimmick” and a “scam” while discussing the Murphy story on his own show. “I guarantee you are not sitting there holding your wife’s hand. . . . I had three kids. . . I was at the birth and was back to work the next day. I didn’t see any reason not to be working. Harrison [Francesa’s son] was born at nine in the morning. I worked that day. What was I gonna do, sit with my wife in the hospital?”
What seems to be the sticking point for Carlton, who to my knowledge has not apologized or taken back any of his statements, as well as Francesa, who has publicly refused to do either, is that yeah, while everybody likes a few days off, there’s nothing specific to childbirth that merits a man excusing himself from work any longer than it takes to witness the birth itself.
Carlton and Esiason did mention the role a father would play in setting up a “support system” as something he could nobly do within the 24 hours they have allotted by virtue of their sports radio authority. Hell, Francesa even said, “You can hire a nurse to take care of the baby if your wife needs help.”
Hmmm. I don’t know, guys, I think I’m really starting to believe that “there ain’t nothing to do,” as Carlton says, so don’t try to convince me that the woman might need help. Sounds like a gimmick. Maybe even a scam!
Of course, what’s been missing from most of this conversation is, you guessed it, the woman. I’m not sure I need to take the time here to explain how a man could be helpful in the days immediately after childbirth. But if any of our aforementioned radio heads want to know, they could probably just ask the women who have given birth to their children. As the saying goes, better late then never.
More broadly, though, what’s really at stake here is fatherhood. Is a man a father simply by impregnating a woman? In the literal sense, yes. But anyone who’s ever had a father worth the name--or moreover, anyone who’s never had anything more a literal father--can tell you that fatherhood doesn’t end with a sexual act. That’s merely when fatherhood begins. Our at least should.
So bravo to Major League Baseball for instituting its 3-game paternity list policy in 2011 (yes, Murphy only missed two games), which allows its players to step away from their professional duties and focus on their fatherly duties. Even if that means (gasp) simply sitting with their wives in the hospital.
But of course fatherhood is more than that. It’s even more than changing diapers in the middle of the night. But that’s definitely part of it, as Murphy has learned firsthand.
"We had our first panic session,” Murphy explained to reporters once he’d returned from leave. “It was dark. She tried to change a diaper, couldn't do it. I came in," he said. "It was just the three of us, 3 o'clock in the morning, all freaking out. He was the only one screaming. I wanted to."
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