The Time Has Come for Someone to Put His Foot Down. And That Foot is Me.
Neither the Cincinnati Bengals nor the Tennessee Titans have had a pleasant off-season to date. Well, looking on the bright side, at least they’ll both be saving some cash this season…
NFL.com is reporting that Commissioner Roger Goodell has informed Adam Jones of the Tennessee Titans and Chris Henry of the Cincinnati Bengals that they have been suspended without pay. Chris Henry was suspended for the first eight games, while Pacman gets to take the entire year off (insert your own, ‘gonna be tough to make it rain now’ joke here…).
The Commish did not leave room for misunderstanding in his letter to each player, either:
“Your conduct has brought embarrassment and ridicule upon yourself, your club, and the NFL, and has damaged the reputation of players throughout the league. You have put in jeopardy an otherwise promising NFL career, and have risked both your own safety and the safety of others through your off-field actions. In each of these respects, you have engaged in conduct detrimental to the NFL and failed to live up to the standards expected of NFL players. Taken as a whole, this conduct warrants significant sanction.”
He concluded with, “bad player! That’s a VERY - VERY - BAD player!!”
Obviously, something needed to be done here. The level of violence, arrests, and cross-dressing incidents by league players has reached an apex this off-season, and with these suspensions, Mr. Goodell sends his message loud and clear.
However, one counter-point. In the rush to yell, “serves them right!” and “this type of behavior is completely uncalled for,” let’s take a moment and realize that the NFL is filled with players that perform violently on the field of play, and that some of them are going to have trouble finding the ‘on/off’ switch in every day life. I’m not condoning either player’s behavior, but let’s not act all shocked when a football player gets arrested. This type of thing has been going on for quite sometime in the National Football League - it’s the ugly underbelly nobody likes to talk about.
More importantly, let’s hope Jones and Henry don’t use this spare time to go after each other a la 2Pac and Biggie Smalls. That would be bad.
Hopefully, they use this time constructively & try turning themselves around. Hey, it’s never to late…
Just over 20 years ago, one player physically assaulted an opposing team’s General Manager in the head after a playoff game. Know where he is now?
General Manager of the Detroit Lions.
That could be you someday, Pacman! (Oh, like he’d be any worse…)
NFL, Roger Goodell, Suspension, Travis Henry, Pacman Jones, the hammer falls
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