SmokingTarpan

Pretty sucky, wonder what the league will do to him.

Story: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/200...x.html?cnn=yes

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7-4dLBWiz0

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

B. Clawhammer

Yeah I saw this on sportscenter last night. What a shame it is coming from a "professional" football player. It's worse than the Marcus Vick episode I think last year or the year before. The NFL should really throw the book at this guy and let everyone know this kind of play is completely unacceptable. He'll probably only get suspended for a few games and a fine.

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|TG-33rd|Clawhammer
[squadl] [sniper][unit]


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Acid

He's gonna get it. The NFL can't just keep letting these rich boys get away with their temper tantrums.

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sordavie

"The coach called Haynesworth's actions unacceptable and promised he would be punished by the Titans even if the NFL disciplines him. 'It's ridiculous to get to that point. Two back-to-back penalties like that, there's no place for it,' Fisher said." -from the end of the CNN article in the first post.

Unless CNN is totally misquoting the coach, Fisher, I find it really funny that what he thought was ridiculous was the back-to-back penalties and not the stomp-on-the-head.

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Acid

But isn't what they always say? "Oh I promise you he will be punished...." "Here's another few million if you stay on the team for next year's season."

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sordavie

It's not that the promise of punishment is funny to me. What's funny is the object of ridiculousness in the coach's eyes. What we all find ridiculous is the fact that one professional football player stomped on another's head during a game. What the coach finds ridiculous is that the player in question recieved two penalties in a row.

The promised punishment seems to be a punishment for recieving two back-to-back penalties, as if anyone who recieved back-to-back penalties would be punished in the same way. What there is no place for is back-to-back penalties, says the coach. Anyone who recieves them will be punished. Maybe CNN is quoting out of context or in some weird way, but it still seems a strange thing to say, given your player just stomped on someone's head. So strange that I find it funny.

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Acid

Yeah, that too. It's just the normal crap they feed to the media. The coach was worried about the loss of yardage on the play, while seemingly unconcerned about the actions that caused the penalty.

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tau_neutrino

I dunno if Fisher was aware of the severity of Haynesworth's actions at that point. Parcells said after the game that he didn't see what happened.

On a happier note, good to see VY out on the field again, even if he didn't do that well in his first start vs a good D.

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TacticalGamer TX LAN/BBQ Veteran:

sordavie

I take it that Fisher knew that Haynesworth had stomped on somebody's head, even if he didn't know the severity of the outcome. That's evidenced by CNN describing Fisher as having called Haynesworth's actions unacceptable in the sentence directly preceeding the quoted material.

The natural way to read that paragraph is as a narration of the same speech or press conference given by Fisher. Surely Fisher wasn't saying that Haynesworth's getting back-to-back penalties unacceptable. He might say that in another context, but in the context of wondering whether Haynesworth's actions dictates punishment by the team as well as the league it would be astonishing if that's what he's saying. The league does not punish for back-to-back penalties. Since Fisher knows that the league is considering punishment, the most straightfoward reading of the end of that article is to take Fisher as calling Haynesworth's stomping on Gurode's head unacceptable.

One should find the act of stomping on an opponent's head in any competitive sport ridiculous. That's so whether or not the outcome is severe. The mere forming an intention to cause severe damage to someone's head is appealing enough (maybe boxing is different--then again, we do require boxers to wear gloves or pads of some sort on their fists). It doesn't matter whether Fisher knew how badly Gurode was hurt. What matters is whether Fisher knew that his player had stomped on someone's head or not. All indications are that he did know this.

This all makes the first quoted sentence, "It's ridiculous to get to that point. Two back-to-back penalties like that, there's no place for it," really funny. What's Fisher calling ridiculous in this sentence? Presumably it's the act of stomping on someone's head. But wait. The next sentence gives us reason to think that's not what he was talking about. Clearly he says in the next sentence, there's no place for back to back penalties. So that makes us think the referent of that point in the first sentence are the back-to-back penalties.

Of course, maybe it's not so bad. That's why I thought maybe CNN might be quoting out of context here. It seems pretty hard to quote out of context in this case though. Still, I find it really funny.

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xTYBALTx

We don't know if something may have instigated Hayneworth's response. Not that that would justify his actions - but it might make such a player's coach slow to deride him.

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Acid

True, we still don't know what caused it. Was it just dissapointment that he missed a block?

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Kerostasis

@ Sordavie: To me it would make a difference how long after the incident they got that quote. If they interviewed the coach after the game, I'd expect him to have calmed down and given a more "human" response. But if that quote is taken from an on-field reporter who talked to him just a few minutes later, I can totally see him saying something like that.

Picture yourself as the coach of a team. You see one of your players on the field do something incredibly stupid, hurt another person AND get a penalty hurting your whole team at the same time. While you're still staring aghast at him, trying to wrap your head around the situation, you see him arguing with the refs and pulling ANOTHER penalty on your team, even though he's not even on the field anymore! He's out of the game, ok, makes sense considering what he did. But does he have to cost your team another 15 yards on the way out?

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SmokingTarpan

And the penalty is...

Five game suspension, without pay.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/200...x.html?cnn=yes

Seems kinda light, but it's the league's longest suspension ever at more than double the previous record (2 games).

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Beatnik

Yeah that could conceivably be assault with a deadly weapon (in some states, at least). I think the punishment by the league is pretty reasonable, but that shouldn't necessarily preclude or substitute for applicable criminal charges.

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whistler

What he did was disgusting. I'm sure tempers flare out there but what he did was not acceptable in-game nor in community. I couldn't go out and kick my neighbor in the face without being reprimanded... I think criminal charges would be ideal for this guy.

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