Agents may coach players through the politically correct reformation of a social gaffe, but Twitter and other social networks are quickly teaching NFL stars a very important social network lesson: the Internet never truly forgets.
This year, Twitter has been aggregating the best and worst of the NFL each week. Ray Rice's disturbing assault on spouse marred the tail end of the preseason and pushed the troubled running back's name to the top of Twitter's list of most-mentioned NFL players during the first week of the 2014-15 season.
Overlapping Rice's rise to infamy, Adrian Peterson's child abuse allegations, and images alleging to depict the excessive disciplining of his son, caused the Minnesota Vikings running back to move from second into first place on Twitter's most-mentioned list.
"I have learned a lot and have had to re-evaluate how I discipline my son going forward," stated Peterson in a letter posted to Twitter. "But deep in my heart, I have always believed I could have been one of those kids that was lost in the streets without the discipline instilled in me by my parents and other relatives [sic]."
Peterson is accused of disciplining his four-year-old son with a tree branch known as a "switch." The welts and blisters left on his son from the lashing caused the Vikings to initially inactivate the running back, thought by many to be the league's best runner, before moving Peterson to the league's exempt list and keeping him away from the team indefinitely.
While its hard to find large numbers of Twitter users who don't agree Peterson's alleged disciplining of his son was over the top, many athletes chose to walk the line between supporting and admonishing the form of punishment the running back chose to deliver.
"When I was kid I got so many whoopins I can't even count! I love both my parents, they just wanted me to be the best human possible," tweeted New Orleans Saints running back Mark Ingram.
But not every athlete could toe the line of Twitter's expectations of decency in a public forum. In a tweet that has been deleted, Atlanta Falcons wide receiver Roddy White jested that he'd lose his fantasy football matchup because Peterson was inactivated by the Vikings.
After being checked by Twitter users, White added a new post to the social networking site to apologize.
"I should not have made light of a very serious situation. I understand the strong feelings about this issue and I shouldn't have said that," tweeted White.
While domestic violence rocked the NFL and Twitter during week two, the top tweet from an NFL player was actually related to news inside the lines and on the field.
After a 21-30 loss to the San Diego Chargers on the road, the passionate Seattle Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman took to Twitter to stand up for his team's defense and shoot down accusations that the group's weaknesses had been exposed.
"Lmao Exposed? .... Complete 3 passes 0 touchdowns 0 explosive passes.... These guys make me laugh," tweeted Sherman.
