(Editor’s note: to be sensitive to readers, this article will not contain the video footage released by TMZ nor will there be a link)
UPDATE (2:20 pm, 9/8): Per the Ravens’ twitter account, Ray Rice has been released.
UPDATE (2:45 pm, 9/8): Rice has now been suspended indefinitely by the league.
UPDATE (8:00 pm, 9/8): CFL Commissioner Mark Cohon has ruled that the CFL will honor the NFL’s league-wide suspension.
UPDATE (9:00 pm, 9/8): TMZ is claiming that they have evidence that the NFL knew about the new video.
Most readers are aware of the fact surrounding the Ray Rice/Janay Palmer case up to this point. A recap of the timeline follows:
February 2014: Rice and his then-fiancee Palmer are arrested and charged with assault after being caught in a physical altercation on video at the Revel Hotel in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Rice is seen dragging Palmer, who appeared unconscious, out of the elevator.
March 2014: Rice is charged with third-degree aggravated assault. In the same week he is charged, Rice marries Palmer. Rice is given a warning after a trial in Atlantic County, NJ.
May 23, 2014: Rice and Palmer hold a press conference hosted by the Ravens.
July 2014: Rice is given a 2-game suspension by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.
August 28, 2014: Goodell makes a public statement that he made a mistake in not being more punitive, and announces a new set of NFL guidelines for players charged with domestic abuse/violence.
September 8, 2014: A video surfaces on TMZ containing raw elevator footage that shows Rice punching Palmer and knocking her out, and then hitting her again after she falls to the floor.
Roger Goodell was correct in his statement at the end of August that he and the league got it wrong. Ray Rice should have been hit with a tougher punishment, and the 2-game suspension was an insult to the millions of victims and families who have had to live through domestic abuse and violence. On top of that, the fact that Janay Palmer somehow felt it necessary to feel apologetic for “her role” in the incident is a crying shame.
This statement was clearly endorsed by the Baltimore Ravens as an organization, and also led to the school of thought that Palmer may have in some way provoked Rice into hitting her, a line of thinking that was unfortunately verbalized on national tv by Stephen A. Smith – comments that ultimately led to a brief on-air suspension for Smith. If further proof was needed of misplaced priorities surrounding this incident, one need only look at the reception Rice got when the Ravens opened training camp in mid-August:
In spite of the plainly misguided sentiments of fans, public outcry about the punishment (or lack thereof) continued to build as the season’s opening approached, and Goodell, in a letter to all NFL owners last week, stated a revamping of the league policy surrounding cases involving domestic abuse/violence. In the letter, Goodell announced that violations of the Personal Conduct Policy regarding such matters would result in a 6-game suspension the first time, and a year’s ban for a second offense, and that the policy would apply to all NFL employees and personnel, not just players. Part of Goodell’s opening of the letter included the following: “I didn’t get it right. Simply put, we have to do better. And we will.”
(full text of Goodell’s letter can be found here)
While the resolve shown by Goodell and the league’s front office is admirable and generally commendable, the fact remains that all of the NFL’s actions up to this point regarding this incident have been reactive. Nothing was going to be done about the toothless punishment issued to Rice, due to a prohibition on retroactive application of suspensions under the league’s collective bargaining agreement.
Just for perspective, under the existing terms, consider the following……..
Robert Mathis: tested positive for the drug Clomid, a fertility drug, after using it in an effort to get his wife pregnant. Banned for 4 games.
Ray Rice: caught on video dragging his unconscious fiancee out of an elevator, charged with aggravated assault. Banned for 2 games.
And then came today’s bombshell, when TMZ released the video footage taken from inside the elevator, before Rice dragged the unconscious Palmer out. While grainy, as to be expected from video of this type, Palmer and Rice are seen walking into the elevator, and as Rice settles close to Palmer in the elevator, he appears to slap her across the head and step back. As she steps forward to him, he delivers a left hook that knocks her right out, and her head appears to hit the elevator wall on her way down. It was a disturbing and sickening bit of footage, and now puts the league in a quandry.
The NFL front office issued a statement a few hours after the video was released, stating that, the video “was not made available to us and no one in our office has seen it until today,” even though requests had been made to the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office to review the same evidence that law enforcement had reviewed. This is the only official statement that has been made thus far, by lunchtime of today.
The backlash from fellow players has begun, as evidenced by this tweet from Denver Broncos defensive lineman Terrance Knighton:
And from recently-retired linebacker London Fletcher:
As for the NFL’s statement that it did not view the video until this morning, that leaves more than a few questions:
Why did they not receive this footage? If the league has an interest in enforcing player conduct rules, why are local law enforcement authorities apparently uncooperative?
And finally, are we all supposed to sit back and simply accept right now that the investigative team of a league that has been clamping down hard on player conduct both on and off the field ever since Goodell’s tenure as Commissioner began in 2006 was unable to practice the same level of diligence and effort to secure access to the video as a gossip website put into it?
Regardless of whether or not the NFL was in fact unable to see the elevator video until this morning or if that was a cover-up statement, the following thoughts still linger over the league’s response to this incident:
- They did not respond in a timely manner.
- The suspension was not punitive enough.
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Regardless of what happened that night in February, the league stood idly by while one of its teams held a sham press conference where a victim of domestic abuse ended up apologizing for “her role” in the incident.
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If the league statement this morning is to be believed, then the NFL’s investigative team did not push hard enough to obtain all the evidence they needed in order for the Commissioner to fully adjudicate this incident, which leaves the final thought of….
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Either the league is lying, or it issued a punishment with insufficient evidence, or it has been incompetent in its handling of this incident. Or all of the above.
Calls for a retroactive application of a stiffer punishment for Rice are increasing, and some are even calling for Goodell to step down. It will be interesting to see if the NFLPA will attempt to fight what would clearly be a violation of the CBA if the league tries to apply any further ban to Rice. As justifiable as the action may be, never doubt the power of the labor movement in professional sports. Unfortunately, as the fallout from this incident continues to unfold, it appears that everyone involved will continue to be backed further and further into a corner.
Every part of this story is simply further proof that when it comes to domestic abuse, there are no “winners.” Perhaps the best thing that has happened out of this is a renewed sense of urgency by the league surrounding an important social issue, even after taking into account its missteps thus far. Domestic abuse and violence has reared its ugly head in the NFL before, and will likely continue to do so, but we can always hope that after an incident like this, everyone from the Commissioner down to NFL fans will have learned something from it.
(Featured image: AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)