The prerogatives of need

I'll give Tampa Bay head coach Bruce Arians the benefit of the doubt here. Maybe he really does believe Antonio Brown has "matured," and that redemption really is possible for all humans on this mortal coil.

But Bruce Arians is also short some folks who can catch footballs.

And Antonio Brown can catch footballs like nobody's business.

So maybe redemption is not quite the noble aspiration it appears in this case.

Maybe this is just plain expediency talking, which it does a lot of in the NFL. And so Arians' Buccaneers have signed onto the Antonio Show, hoping against hope that the Show part is over.

He's worn out his welcome in three places with his Show, and he's still serving an eight-game suspension for all manner of bad acts. But once that's over, he's a Buc. And there goes all that happy talk from the NFL (and Arians himself) about how domestic violence is bad-bad-bad and we-stand-against-violence-against-women and blah-blah-blah, yadda-yadda-yadda.

Here's a thing you should know about Bruce Arians: He once got an award for  promoting gender equality.

And here's a thing you should know about Antonio Brown: He's been accused of multiple incidences of sexual misconduct and has been sued for sexual assault by yet another woman.

Of course, this makes him no different than a pile of other NFL players who've done league suspension time for beating up women or sexually assaulting women or otherwise treating women like dryer lint, and yet who remain gainfully employed by the NFL.

Either they're really good at throwing footballs or really good at running with a football or really good at catching and then running with a football. Which makes them good to go in the We Stand Against Violence Against Women League.

Bottom line is newfound maturity and "second chances" are fine things to say if you're Bruce Arians or anyone else, but no one says them about backup linebackers or running backs whose wheels are gone. Or, for that matter, quarterbacks whose only crime was to kneel quietly for the national anthem because he didn't think police officers should be shooting people of color in such a cavalier manner.

 But Colin Kaepernick, while certifiably far better at his job than a bunch of quarterbacks currently on NFL rosters, wasn't quite Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers. So he was blackballed by a league that makes a ton of bank on superficial displays of "patriotism."

Antonio Brown?

Well, shoot. He was perhaps the best receiver in football not so long ago. So of course Bruce Arians (and the league) can afford to be magnanimous, even if almost half of NFL fans are women.

Then again, they're still watching. So obviously they're still buying what the league is selling vis-a-vis Antonio Brown and his ilk.

Domestic violence? Sexual assault? All that stuff?

Bad, bad, bad.

And wink, wink, wink.