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Cheaters and Killers – What’s Real Justice?

Posted on January 29, 2013 by rowdycmoore

I don’t want to sound sanctimonious and elitist. I really don’t.

Everyone is entitled to their own beliefs and opinions; I get that. But this – I just can’t understand this.

The professional football championship game is here – yeah, also never thought I’d be writing something about the NFL on this blog either – and the Baltimore Ravens are still alive, which means everyone is still talking about Ray Lewis. Talking about how he is ending his career on the highest of high notes. Ending a career that will certainly see him in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Completely ignoring that his career should have ended 13 years ago. By having him sent to prison for life.

Yes, everybody in the US sports media that wants to keep kissing pro football’s ginormous ass is just sweeping under the rug that Ray Lewis murdered someone at around this same time in 2000. Okay, yeah, I know he wasn’t found guilty of actually murdering Jacinth Baker and Richard Lollar. But he wasn’t found NOT Guilty either, despite what so many of his apologists cry. He was convicted of obstruction of justice for throwing his two friends under the bus AFTER admitting he gave false information. His two friends were found not guilty of murder, so no killer has ever been found. And evidence like Lewis’ missing bloody white suit continue to point a finger at him.

And at least one of the victims’ brother says he fully believes Lewis drove the knife, which s pretty strong to me. We believe Nicole Browns’ parents beliefs that OJ Simpson killed their daughter, why do we make it different here?

But what gets me most is what looks like blatant hypocrisy here.

At this same time, Lance Armstrong has finally admitted he used steroids to go from cancer’s death door to winning the Tour de France seven times – wins he has now been stripped of. Lance is being burned at the proverbial stake by the press as a pariah for the unforgivable sin of using performance enhancing drugs.

I don’t condone drug use at all. But let’s look at this realistically.

According to so many who follow sports: Cheating at the sport is unforgivable. Murder is forgivable AND forgettable.

And it’s not like these are the only recent examples. The baseball writers stood on their moral high horse by refusing to vote in a single entry into the Hall of Fame this year, sending their anti-PED message loud and clear. Meanwhile, Dallas wrapped their arms around Josh Brent in their support of him, chastising anyone who dared try to crucify him for killing teammate Jerry Brown in a drunk driving crash. Brown was his best friend, they all whine. He should just be forgiven and let go.

Yes, once again, forgive the guy who killed. Burn the guy who dared cheat at his sport, because HE’s the disgraceful person with no humanity.

And I’m gonna get called out for saying this and be declared a holier than thou snob. Just because I can’t just up and ignore this, believing that taking a life is a serious crime.

There’s nothing I can do here to change the opinions of people who believe that this new modern form of cheating should be permanently branded with a scarlet letter, but that football players committing acts of violence is perfectly acceptable because well, that’s just what they do.

Nothing I can do but shake my head and wonder why.

And hope this will be the last I hear of it for a long while…

Oh, Jay Ratliff was in a drunk driving accident? And Nellie Cruz is being tied to PEDs?

Here we go again.

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To Forgive is Human, At Long as He’s a Cowboy

Posted on December 20, 2012 by rowdycmoore

I try to talk about things other than the Dallas Cowboys on this site. And I definitely don’t like writing here about things not actually related to sports. But sadly, here we go.

No, I don’t have a ton of sympathy for Josh Brent, who’s reckless, uncaring actions left his former Illinois college teammate dead on the streets of Irving less than two days before the Cowboys’ game in Cincinnati. No, I don’t have a problem with the NFL office, desperate to put humanity in a league completely devoid of it, saying no, they don’t want a killer on their sidelines.

The crash that killed Cowboys practice squad member Jerry Brown was not an accident. It was completely preventable. Josh Brent had to know full well he had no business getting into the driver’s seat. He wasn’t even allowed to drive had he been sober – all he had was a suspended out-of-state driver’s license. His decision to drive with a BAC of twice the legal limit was a clear statement that his friend’s safety was not a concern. If it was, he’d have swallowed his pride and called a cab. If Dwayne Goodrich had ever spoken to Brent. it’s clear he didn’t get the message.

Yes, I’m sure he gets it now. And yes, I’ve heard all the pleas from Brown’s mother.

And before you judge me to be some holier-than-thou, glass house living, cast-the-first-stone prick, full disclosure: I have never been a perfect driver. But every time I have gotten a traffic ticket, I wanted to cut my license into a million pieces and never get behind the wheel again, because I knew my recklessness endangered the lives of everyone else on that road. But never have I gotten behind the wheel intoxicated; in fact, the horrors that have come from drunk driving are among the big reasons I don’t drink at all. (And NO, I’m not calling for a ban on drinking, don’t try to pin that on me.)

Is my anti-football, anti-Cowboys stance clouding my own judgement? Always possible. But maybe I’d be a little more sympathetic if I hadn’t seen such lack of sympathy toward others of late for being in less-than-worse situations.

Earlier this year, former Mavericks guard Jason Kidd was also in a drunk driving crash – one that thankfully everyone walked away from. Because he had signed with the Knicks just weeks earlier, he was prime fodder, and he was a target of ridicule for the Dallas area Twitterverse and airwaves.

But it’s not just related to athletes. Jane McGarry lost her job as the long-time news anchor at KXAS NBC 5 after being arrested for drunk driving. If my Twitter feed was to be believed at the time, some hosts at a certain sports radio station I don’t listen to humiliated and basically verbally abused her for the incident. (Again, I can’t verify that personally, but I have seen that station to be jerkasses toward women, especially those in media, sports or both.)

That same station also appears to still ridicule their former employee Gregg Williams, fired in 2007-08 for getting hooked on drugs. Greggo’s former co-host still won’t speak to him.

Then there’s the hate relayed at athletes for nothing more than actions on the field. Nellie Cruz still gets vitriol for Game Six in the 2011 World Series, as if people assume he meant to misplay that fly ball just to ruin THEIR lives.

And then of course, there’s the other Josh. Josh Hamilton lackadaisically dropped a fly ball that cost the Rangers the division, said bye-bye to the Rangers and signed a cash-laden deal with the hated Angels, saying in his press conference that the team and the fans in Texas never really wanted him. Cue the few baseball fans in North Texas taking after Cleveland fans and burning Hambone jerseys.

All of the above committed acts that the people in DFW apparently believe to be unforgivable and deserving of scorn.

None of the above acts led to the death of a human being.

Josh Brent’s did. He gets support and forgiveness.

Yes, he’s sorry for his actions. Supposedly, so was Jovan Belcher after killing his girlfriend. If Belcher hadn’t fired one last shot at himself, should we have then forgiven him for putting nine bullets in his baby’s mother?

My own preferences and biases can and do cloud my own judgment, probably much more than they should; I have never denied that. But you can’t tell me other are biased in the opposite way when that offer an olive branch to someone with blood on his hands and vitriol toward others who don’t.

You want me to be forgiving of people like Josh Brent? Try being a little more forgiving to others who don’t make tackles for the Dallas Cowboys and made mistakes with less devastating consequences.

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