Descriptive Approach to Marcus’ Argumental Support
College football is a cult favorite in American culture. Anyone can find fans wearing their team’s colors and speaking confidently on the team’s behalf most Saturdays from late August to early December. In his article, “College Football is Bad Football,” David Marcus, an editor of the Federalist Paper, highlights why the beloved sport is overrated. Marcus gives his opinion to create an ignorant tone surrounding the sport, he demonstrates how college football fans are brainwashed to the dullness of the sport. Marcus states that each football season is a 5-month period of college students pretending to be athletically inclined. (4) Marcus effectively persuades the audience that college football is not satisfactory by incorporating an informal tone, comparing college football to the NFL, and using repetition of the age of the players and the crowd to support his argument.
Marcus uses a conversational tone to present a lighthearted argument and appeal to young readers. Football is a highly debatable topic, and by using an appealing tone, he clearly presents his stance to the reader without upsetting the audience. Marcus commonly paused in his article as if he were talking aloud to the reader. In line 5, he interjects with the word ‘well,’ creating a jovial tone before he presents his claim that college football is “not very good football.” (5) In the second paragraph, Marcus makes a joke about living in Indiana. (9) This shows that he is not taking this topic too seriously so neither should the reader. By avoiding displeasing the reader, Marcus can present his argument in a smooth way. The entire article is written in first person, not only does this create an informal tone, but it also makes the article more personable. Marcus’ casual tone improves his argument that college football is inadequate because it creates an easy read for a debatable topic.
While he employs a lighthearted tone to boost the argument, Marcus regularly compares college football to the NFL. By comparing the college level to the pro level, he successfully makes college football look foolish and inferior. This supports his argument that the college level is simply subpar. Irony is used in the article when the author states that one would be mistaken to compare college football to the NFL, then continues by doing so. He makes the analogy that college football is to the NFL as a child’s dance recital is to the Bolshoi. (27) This is a strong analogy for his argument because the difference between the skill level present at a child’s recital and at the Bolshoi presents a vast alteration in the skill set. Marcus also demonstrates the distinction between the tenacity of the two football leagues by explaining that the sole time that college football was acceptable was when the young athletes viewed the NFL as a goal to reach. (38) By stating this, he illustrates that the NFL is higher-level, and it should be an objective that college football players work hard to achieve. In the last paragraph of the article, Marcus boldly contrasts the two leagues by using adjectives to describe them. He represents the NFL as a ‘jewel’ while he describes college level football as “half a sport.” (60) This claim is straight to the point and provides a conclusion with a clear argument. When Marcus differentiates between the two levels of football, he supports his argument that college football is inferior by presenting a league that he believes is greater.
In addition to an informal tone and a comparison technique, Marcus makes use of the ages of both the football players and the students who attend the game to support his claim that college football is second-rate. Like comparing college football to the NFL, the reiteration exemplifies the foolishness of college football. Marcus first mentions the age of the crowd in the first paragraph. He uses the description of “drunken 19-year-olds” (3) to represent the atmosphere at college football games. The idea of underage kids drinking in the heat and passionately watching the game is not an appealing thought to the reader. In a second example, Marcus mentions age when he states that the teen football players play haphazardly. (33) This description of their performance makes the support of this game seem pointless. The author’s final use of age in his article is in the last paragraph when he reminds the reader that the players are still on their parent’s health care plans. (55) This exhibits how the players are not yet adults and still have time to grow before they reach their full potential. The repetition of the age of attendees and athletes creates a cretinous tone while reading the article. This supports the author’s argument that college football is bad because this tone makes the reader view college football as insignificant.
Marcus’ main argument in his article is that college football is simply “not very good football.” (6) He supports this claim by using an informal tone to relate to the reader. This makes the article an easy read that appeals to many different audiences. Then, he regularly compares college football to the NFL. He believes that the two leagues are not even comparable because of how superior the NFL is to college football. Finally, Marcus uses repetition of the players’ and crowd’s generation to illustrate the foolishness of college football to the reader. He repeats the ages of the players and the student crowd to simplify the idea of the college level of football. With all these techniques combined, David Marcus successfully supports his argument that college football is unsatisfactory.
Works Cited
Marcus, David. “College Football Is Bad Football.” The Federalist, 26 Aug. 2019.
