NFL YET Helps Boys and Girls Clubs

By Richard Diaz
Love of Sports Correspondent

As the only member of the big three that really doesn’t have an offseason, it tends to be difficult for the NFL to maintain a positive public image.

I know they have the largest gap between the final game of the season and their first preseason game. Yet, for as large as that gap is, I challenge you to go a single day without hearing something about the NFL.

Unfortunately, the type of stuff that makes the news isn’t always positive. Pacman Jones can do a billion charity hours and all they’ll say is that it’s a charade. Chad Johnson wants to play on a team that’s building for the future rather than regressing, though all we’re told is that he’s a pompous distraction. For all it’s worth, that’s just wrong.

So, rather than play into the popular ignorance of reporting the negative and hiding the positive, I’m going to show some love to the NFL for helping society build towards a better tomorrow.

Unbeknownst to most of the general public, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Northeast Florida, along with Mayor John Peyton, the NFL and other local contributors recently celebrated the opening of the National Football League’s Youth Education Town (NFL YET).

With its doors opening to the Brentwood and Northeast Florida community, there’s no doubt the NFL YET is the centerpiece of an overall revitalization project in the Brentwood area.

The facility will house a computer lab, family resource center, learning center, teen center, arts and crafts room, game room, gymnasium and cafeteria. It’s a very localized project, but it’s nice to see such a powerful organization reach out to help an area that wasn’t devastated by a natural catastrophe, yet was still in need of help nonetheless.

The Boys & Girls Clubs is doing so much to help this community that’s home to a large percentage of children that demonstrate a high need, and the NFL YET will be a place that’s open and readily willing to help hundreds of families.

It’s a place that’ll boost the educational opportunities for at-risk children in Brentwood and its surrounding communities and will create opportunities for economically disadvantaged youths. Additionally, NFL YET places an emphasis on expanding academic, physical fitness and job related skills by means of giving set youths the high-tech educational and recreational tools they’d otherwise have little to no access to.

That, my friends, is reason enough to give some Charitable Love to the NFL YET.

In a landscape that’s filled to the brim with negativity, I can’t help but appreciate the NFL for being a charitable force. While still admirable, it’s nice to see an act that isn’t preceded by something horrible or commercialized for ratings.

I know it can be hard to find good things under all the non-news that’s reported, but in the grand scheme of things, the charitable acts of the entire league certainly outweighs those of a few bad apples. When you see that, you realize how much love the NFL truly deserves.