Tweeted this but I will post it here as well.
Going to do a bit of a tweetstorm on the @kickingitwith3, @giants & @nfl situation. And it won't be popular because it's going to require some independent thought & moral spine.
Watching (almost) all the beats & the nationals jumping on the bandwagon and killing the team, the organization, the league...very easy and not particularly intellectually rigorous to do. Shows the rule is idiots who can't think for themselves and moral cowards who can't act independently.
Our populace (and media) is made up of people who refuse to try to understand there is nuance and imperfect information and good intentions and bad results which make simplistic judgments the refuge of such cowardice and jackassery. And it is sad to see. Everyone wants to have a hot take but that take is shallow & lacks context, full information & a desire to actually understand.
As I said before, publishing journals he did in therapy is really pointless. It doesn’t further the story. No new information was broken. We know what he did. He should be punished. But the journals being published? All it does is take something he did in the context of seeking help & put it out there for all to hem & haw about. And what is the likely result? The next time a man seeks help for similar problems, he might recall that these journals could come to light & he will forego a useful tool in the therapy.
Not one word of this is to absolve Josh Brown for the crimes he committed. But being so quick to judge & convict the @giants & the @nfl on this says more about the mob & our society than it does about the team or the league.
Obviously I feel very strongly about this. And I feel very strongly that Josh Brown needs to be held accountable for what he did. There is no excusing it at all. The proper forum is the legal system. But the Giants and the NFL? We have zero idea what really went on. What they knew and didn't know. What their considerations were and weren't. There are perfect intentions combined with imperfect information leading to imperfect actions.
And is the NFL and its teams really made to be a moral arbiter of anything? That IS what the legal system is for. I am comfortable and happy if my team doesn't have slimeballs. I am also comfortable that the team I root for (the Giants) has a moral compass and would not have done this simply for wins and losses. They might have been wrong but it wasn't because they condoned anything he did in the least. If they were wrong, it was lack of info or imperfect judgment.
If their sponsors and ultimately fans are turned off by things like this, then the NFL and its teams absolutely should care. They're also in a position to lead by example and have spoken out previously and said DV will not be tolerated.
This hack is crazy today.
I couldn't get on PayPal or my Credit Card providers website to pay some bills.
As for your point, bullshit. He abused his wife, he was arrested for that abuse and our "zero tolerance" policy was shoved aside. It doesn't make me intellectually weak to not want a man who puts his hands on his wife on my football team. Further, a man with daughters like Mr. Mara should simply draw a line and not allow it but he found a way to be OK with a wife abuser because Josh is just a swell guy and a good kicker. They knew about the Pro Bowl incident, and did nothing? They knew plenty and didn't act and hoped it would not reach the public. That's morally disingenuous and no matter how you want to spin everyone else as stupid the simple fact remains: The Giants knew plenty and kept this man around because it made football sense. Either draw your lines and hold or don't, don't declare zero tolerance then tolerate because he's YOUR guy. That's morally bankrupt behavior in the larger context of domestic violence.
The sad thing is that at least some this stuff was written as part of therapy and counseling which apparently did not work. I think they should be at least paying lip service to giving the guy help and support to never do this again (while making sure not to blame or minimize the victim) whether they cut him or not. Getting another kicker but not cutting him seems very strange. If it is just about money I would say it is a mistake, if it isn't I am in the dark.
There are personnel decisions that can't/shouldn't be made public. Those journal entries cannot be considered proof of anything other than a therapeutic device. The legal system should deal with him.
The Giants should deal with him too. He can be suspended pending the outcome of an internal investigation and he can be disciplined for any rule violations at the conclusion of the team/league investigation.
This type of behavior is intolerable and Ben McAdoo - in his first act as head coach said the team wouldn't tolerate this sort of behavior.
I am very troubled by all this -- and I don't think it can be explained away at this point. At the very least Brown is going to have to pay a price for lying about the significance of what happened.
Moral behavior is incentivized through many channels, only one of which is the legal system.
“'I have four daughters and seven sisters, and I know I have to face each one of them,' Mara said."
John Mara is a fraud. At least someone like jerry jones doesn't constantly hit you over the head with the pretense of him having some superior moral compass as an organization.
The only thing I will agree with on mortchristensen is that these journals that were done for rehabilitation purposes being used against him is a bit of a raw deal. But 2 things about that...
1- he should have been gone before this
2- my level of sympathy for him on a scale from 1-10 is about negative 100,000. I feel about as bad as I do for OJ Simpson on getting oversentenced on the memorabilia thing
God knows we were dying to know your hot take.
This type of behavior is intolerable and Ben McAdoo - in his first act as head coach said the team wouldn't tolerate this sort of behavior.
I am very troubled by all this -- and I don't think it can be explained away at this point. At the very least Brown is going to have to pay a price for lying about the significance of what happened.
I feel the same way. I can't imagine that the Giants didn't ask Brown what happened and one of two things happened: 1) Brown lied, in which case that was reason enough for the Giants to terminate the relationship immediately now (I can't believe McAdoo still supported Brown in his presser) or 2) they knew the extent of his abuse and were OK with it. The whole thing is sickening and the Giants deserve all the bad press they're getting.
I refuse to believe after the Pro Bowl incident, that anyone in the Giants establishment could have thought that this was an isolated incident
Why would the Giants side with Brown if they didn't have him and his family in their best interests, as opposed to covering up abuse? He's an OK kicker but not a top-notch one--they could have replaced him with little drop-off. We just don't know but we're all coming to conclusions and I think that's the gist of mort's post.
Why would the Giants side with Brown if they didn't have him and his family in their best interests, as opposed to covering up abuse? He's an OK kicker but not a top-notch one--they could have replaced him with little drop-off. We just don't know but we're all coming to conclusions and I think that's the gist of mort's post.
Agree with Randee..Nothing wrong with Mort's OPINION here. It's cogent(something we're not used to on here), well thought out and much of it on target in my OPINION..
I posted something similar last night on the baadbill thread that was unfortunately deleted this morning. Of course, mine wasn't nearly as eloquent.
we could use some expert analysis on our mess of an O line if you're not too busy in the near future, nobody does it better.
Tell Kendrick I said Hi...
As for your point, bullshit. He abused his wife, he was arrested for that abuse and our "zero tolerance" policy was shoved aside. It doesn't make me intellectually weak to not want a man who puts his hands on his wife on my football team. Further, a man with daughters like Mr. Mara should simply draw a line and not allow it but he found a way to be OK with a wife abuser because Josh is just a swell guy and a good kicker. They knew about the Pro Bowl incident, and did nothing? They knew plenty and didn't act and hoped it would not reach the public. That's morally disingenuous and no matter how you want to spin everyone else as stupid the simple fact remains: The Giants knew plenty and kept this man around because it made football sense. Either draw your lines and hold or don't, don't declare zero tolerance then tolerate because he's YOUR guy. That's morally bankrupt behavior in the larger context of domestic violence.
As Randy said, it makes zero sense for the team to keep a kicker (a good kicker but not irreplaceable at all) if they knew there was a lot worse stuff out there. They didn't know of the depth and extent of things. And what they DID know fit into what they have done in the past where players they had (Collins, Peter) had done things but shown remorse and a desire to reform. That is all it was.
And if this was such a cut and dried case, why has the DA still decided not to press charges? Even with the journal? But the NFL and Giants, without all the info but under the impression the violence was isolated and in the past (with the player in therapy and saying he knows his issues and is working on them) are the ones getting killed?
I don't see it. If a mistake was made it was being trusting. It was in not realizing there was more out there (though how do you know there is stuff you don't know). It certainly wasn't made in deciding to risk all that has happened in the last few days for a kicker in a year when the team is still in building mode. Even a good kicker.