Magic Headphones?

I saw a couple references this weekend to a gift. Apparently, Chad Ochocinco gave all his teammates a pair of headphones so they could all enjoy the flight to Indy for the Super Bowl. He apparently spent close to $30,000 on these headphones. So, we’re talking about some pretty nice headphones. Not a bad gift.

The weird part is that Ocho isn’t the first Boston sports figure to give a gift of headphones. Apparently, when John Henry first noticed the Red Sox clubhouse troubles last September, he tried to fix everything by giving everyone on the team a pair of headphones. When did headphones get magic powers? For me, the two gifts raise a few questions.

Did Ochocinco know about the Henry gift? Did he think it was a good idea, and copy it? Did he see how the gift worked for the Sox, and decide he wanted the same results for the Patriots? Or, did John Henry and Chad Ochocinco each independently come up with the same idea to motivate their team? I can’t decide which answer would concern me more.

I’m also surprised by the theory behind the gifts. In the case of the Sox, the clubhouse was falling apart. Team unity was crumbling. They needed help. As for the Patriots, there’s no dire issue that we know of…yet. They just needed to go as a team to Indiana and win one more game. So I’m curious. Is the best way to build team unity to give everyone devices specifically designed to isolate them from everyone else? Wouldn’t a better idea have been to take away their headphones?

Plus, these are all pretty rich guys, right? These are all pretty young guys, right? They all travel a lot, right? Why didn’t they all have a nice pair of headphones? If I get on the subway, all I see are people wearing headphones. Teenagers, businessmen, mothers, they’re all plugged into their ipods, ipads, and iphones. I would guess that these young rich men would have gotten headphones immediately.

Right?