When it came to finding some persuasive articles to blog about, like usual, my first thoughts were of sports. I actually remembered one article that I used for research on my civic issues blog when I blogged about the pay for play debate and then found another article about whether or not the Pro Bowl should exist.
Article 1: The NCAA Pay for Play Debate: Should College Athletes Get Paid?
In his article, Drew Lipsky does a very good job at persuading the reader why the college athletes should not be paid above the cost of education. He starts off his article by giving background on the whole debate and why it has come about. He then proceeds to name a few reasons as to why people believe that college athletes should be paid and explain their reasoning. Lipsky then counters these arguments to explain why arguments like that of ESPN’s Michael Wilbon, cannot work in reality. These counter-arguments include quotes from people in the industry and other strong factual evidence to support Lipsky’s claim. Overall, Lipsky does a good job at persuasion by showing both sides of the argument and then providing a convincing counter-argument to the one side.
Article 2: Why the NFL Should Get Rid of the Pro Bowl
Andy Ribery tries to persuade the reader in a different way than Lipsky did. Instead of showing the argument he disagreed with and then disproving it, Ribery went with a more straightforward approach. However, he did use a lot of comparison games between sports. He showed why the NFL’s Pro Bowl is the least interesting of the All-Star Games and how it receives the lowest TV ratings. He then goes on to argue why the Pro Bowl doesn’t work due to the violent nature of the game of football. He brings up the issue of injuries during the game that are unnecessary and how it can only get worse down the road. His points about the violence of the game and the lack of effort of the players do provide a very convincing argument, which makes this article a good persuasive article.