Does the NFL Need A Stricter Social Media Policy?

Miami Dolphins safety Don Jones is in hot water for tweets he made in relation to Michael Sam.

As you are most likely aware by now, the recent National Football League Draft saw the first openly gay player drafted in NFL history in Missouri linebacker Michael Sam. Many celebrated the pick, but when Sam was shown on television kissing his partner, some...not-so-nice tweets came out (to put it nicely). Among those that tweeted negatively were Miami Dolphins safety Don Jones, who would later be fined and excused from the team for what he said.

It even went outside the realm of the NFL. Ole Miss guard Marshall Henderson attacked SportsCenter via Twitter for showing the kiss, saying:

Henderson would later say that the tweets were a part of a "psychology experiment" for a friend of his who was also gay.

All of this bothered many, including Bleacher Report NFL columnist Mike Freeman, who questioned if the NFL needed to reform their social media policy. Many leagues, including the NFL, have social media policies that restrict when a player or coach can tweet, but there is nothing in the policies that talk about what someone can tweet about. Freeman asked league spokesman Greg Aiello about this, and Aiello's response was as close to perfect as you could get in such a situation.

"As far as comments on social media, players and all NFL personnel are accountable for what they say, same as we are when being interviewed by a member of the media."

New York Giants offensive lineman Geoff Schwartz added that perhaps the league could set guidelines for punishment on tweets, but that there's no way the league could police every player's Twitter account, so there should not be further policy on this (see the Tweet here).

I believe that the NFL's current stance on the content of tweets is the best way to go about it currently. As Schwartz stated, it would be near-impossible for any league, not just the NFL, to monitor the social media accounts of every athlete. Plus, playing Big Brother is no way to build trust between a league and its players - just ask colleges how well that works for them.

Maybe somewhere down the road, someone will find a better way to monitor player's accounts, but for now, holding athletes responsible for what appears on their social media accounts is the best practice for leagues.