Ray Rice cut by Ravens

[BlueDevil 8,687]

The ravens have cut ties with ray rice after the video of him knocking out his fiancé was released. Personally I thought it was the only move. Thoughts?

[Dalton26 16,892]

I'm 50/50 on it. I hate what he done and don't agree with it one bit, but I also don't agree with punishing someone twice.

In my opinion they should have waited for all the facts. Players complained about taking so long punishing Irsay and him getting off easy(even though a player wouldn't have been suspended for the same charge) but now they're essentially complaining that Rice should be punished harder and the league should have waited.

Like I said I'm not a fan of double punishment but I don't think they got it wrong by terminating him either. Next time hopefully the league will wait for all the facts before handing out a joke of a punishment again.


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[JuwantGrimeShakes? 533]

Guess he won't get another standing ovation.

Though, if he has his friends kill his wife and then makes a plea deal to avoid murder charges himself maybe he can still get a statue.

[BlueDevil 8,687]

I'm 50/50 on it. I hate what he done and don't agree with it one bit, but I also don't agree with punishing someone twice.

In my opinion they should have waited for all the facts. Players complained about taking so long punishing Irsay and him getting off easy(even though a player wouldn't have been suspended for the same charge) but now they're essentially complaining that Rice should be punished harder and the league should have waited.

Like I said I'm not a fan of double punishment but I don't think they got it wrong by terminating him either. Next time hopefully the league will wait for all the facts before handing out a joke of a punishment again.


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Yeah I'm with you on the double punishment. Part of me thinks the ravens almost had to do it from a PR standpoint.

[BlueDevil 8,687]

Now Roger Goodell has suspended Ray indefinitely. Too bad they couldn't get it right the first time. He's unemployed because of TMZ not the NFL.

[Dalton26 16,892]

The Ravens don't get off easy in my eyes.

"@JasonLaCanfora: So while the actual footage today was new to the Ravens visually, the description Rice gave them was in line with what the video displayed"

After the incident they tweeted:

"@Ravens: Janay Rice says she deeply regrets the role that she played the night of the incident."



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[Naturalhoosier 15,424]

Now Roger Goodell has suspended Ray indefinitely. Too bad they couldn't get it right the first time. He's unemployed because of TMZ not the NFL.

He's unemployed because he made a jack-wagon decision. Who cares how it came to light?


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[BlueDevil 8,687]

He's unemployed because he made a jack-wagon decision. Who cares how it came to light?


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I'm glad he's unemployed. I'm just saying it was handled wrong in the first place before the video came out. It shouldn't have came to this.

[Hovadipo 56,036]

Everyone in this mess looks pretty stupid. From Rice (I'll get to that in a minute), to the Ravens, to Goodell. The Ravens should be ashamed (and punished) and Goodell should be punished somehow, but not sure how that would work. As for Rice, he deserves everything he gets here. And then some. I have 0 sympathy for someone who hits a woman. His wife has her own issues, but this entire situation is disgusting.


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[Dalton26 16,892]

It still baffles me that if you beat your wife you get 2(now 6) games but if you smoke weed and get caught(even if it is 3 times) you get a year.


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[BlueDevil 8,687]

It still baffles me that if you beat your wife you get 2(now 6) games but if you smoke weed and get caught(even if it is 3 times) you get a year.


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I'm interested to see how the 49er situation will go if that other dude is found guilty for DV.

[WayneFleekHoosier 48,312]

I agree with Hova.  This was handled horribly at every level.  Usually the NFL does well with PR things but this off season was a shit storm and they missed the boat on many things this off season.

 

I'd say its time to make all punishments EXTRA extreme and try to CLEAN up the NFL.  The time is now or their IMAGE is going to take a big hit like the NBA did some years back.

[WindyCitySource 600]

Rice is complete scum... knocks his fiance out cold and on top of it, didn't even look remorseful. He just stood there staring at her lifeless on the floor. Drags her out of the elevator like his equipment bag and even uses his foot to kick her limp legs out of the way of the closing door. 

 

I agree with everyone who is saying that whether or not the NFL had this video, the 2-game suspension was a complete and utter joke. But I don't believe for a second that the NFL didn't have access to this video. He should have been suspended indefinitely from the start and he should be in prison. I don't care if his fiance started it, or came after him first or whatever (even though the video suggests that's probably not even true). A professional football player does not need self-defense against a petite woman in an elevator. You're telling me he can't restrain her and calm her down? He had to pop her in the face instead? Because he was defending himself? Unless she's got a got, she's no threat to you, Ray Rice. Have fun being blacklisted from football. You're lucky to be a free man as it is. I'm glad the right to play NFL football has been taken away from you. 

[WindyCitySource 600]

Ray Rice being a complete piece of S*** aside, everyone comes out of this looking terrible. If the NBA can force an owner to sell his team over a racist email, hopefully there is some recourse for a commissioner that slapped Ray Rice on the wrist after beating the hell out of a defenseless woman.

 

The Ravens are just as bad, standing behind him the whole time, writing fluffy PR pieces on his behalf, trotting him to applause in the pre-season, and having his VICTIM join him for a press conference after the suspension was announced. 

 

Unfortunately, Goodell will stay commissioner (earning millions of dollars) and the Ravens (since they have now cut ties with RR) will just take back their support and everyone will play dumb until this goes away. And it will. It always does. 

[Hovadipo 56,036]

The NBA had its coke era, and nearly went under. The NFL is currently smack in the middle of its own woman-beating era and it doesn't even matter. The NFL isn't going anywhere, anytime soon. People may be mad that Rice hit his wife, or the guy from SF allegedly hit someone, etc. but everyone will still tune in tonight, Thursday, and Sunday (myself included). This is unprecedented and someone needs to take control. Goodell isn't the person to do it either. As long as he keeps lining his pockets, he'll keep giving out slaps on wrists and spewing out BS about drugs are the enemy while his employees are committing crimes against humanity.

That will conclude this episode of "Monday Morning Hova Ranting". Tune in next week for a special, 2 hour episode with special guest, Bobby Fisher.


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[TrueHoosier62 1,593]

Not to in any way excuse Rice's behavior, (frankly, I found the video unbelievably disturbing), but I'm concerned about what appears to be justice by way of national public opinion polls. The Rice incident was an act of domestic violence, which according to our state and Federal laws, carries it's own set of punishments. If Rice was found guilty, as surely he should have been, there are costs for such actions, including jail times, fines, counseling, and service.

It appears the NFL and the Ravens tried to strike a balance between punishing a player for conduct detrimental to the image of the NFL, and imposing harsher penalties in the event they overstepped their legal bounds and invited a counter suit. Undoubtedly, image is everything to the NFL these days, with polls and media attention magnifying any transgressions.

I wonder though, at what point is enough, enough? 

Again, I think Rice should, if he hasn't already, face justice. If he has indeed faced that justice, then I think we run the risk of allowing a mob mentality to dictate punishment based on emotional factors such as a league and team trying to save face.

[WindyCitySource 600]

The NFL and its star players will forever fall victim to the court of public opinion. Justifiably so...

 

These players are supposed to be role models. Obviously not every player is the perfect role model, but when the league slaps these guys on the wrist and allows them to continue to play, it sends the message that assaulting a woman is OK. In this case, the justification being that a woman put her hands on Ray Rice first, so the fact that he knocked her out was bad enough to be suspended for 12.5% of one season but beyond that, it's alright. That's the problem.

 

Roger Goodell chose a star player's marketability over doing the right thing. Public figures lead public lives.

 

Knocking a woman unconscious is not a transgression. It's assault and it's a crime. Ray Rice's football career shouldn't even be the topic of discussion right now. He should be in jail. And despite the fact that he has somehow avoided legal punishment, his employer felt the need to dock him 12.5% of his multi-million dollar salary for just one year.

[KingPG21 6,584]

Wait, so this was in line with what Rice told the Ravens? And they still didn't take action until the video was released. Really couldn't have handled that any mote poorly if you are the Ravens

[OliviaPope40 6,514]

Even if Ray Rice's NFL career ended Monday -- and it better have -- this story didn't end with it. He's a monster? Got it. He's done with the Baltimore Ravens? Terrific.

But we're still here, waiting for more information. Because the story isn't over yet.

The NFL has some explaining to do. So do the Ravens. And so does the Atlantic City (N.J.) prosecutor, come to think of it.

But the biggest questions should be asked of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell: What did he know -- and when did he know it?

Because now we know exactly what Goodell should have acted upon harshly long before now. ...

Before, we thought. We imagined. We filled in the blanks about what happened in that Atlantic City elevator in February between Ray Rice and his fiancee, now his wife, Janay. And they were ugly blanks to fill, because what little we knew, what little we'd seen, was ugly enough. We watched a video that showed the doors open and Ray Rice emerge from the elevator, dragging Janay like a rolled up sleeping bag. Only she wasn't asleep. She was unconscious. How did she get that way? Like I said, we imagined. We filled in the blanks.

But now we know, after seeing another video that we can't un-see. What Ray Rice did to his fiancee on that elevator is now a matter of public record, not something to imagine but something we saw, and that changes things.

And not just the NFL career of Ray Rice.

It changes what we think about Goodell, the invertebrate behind that spineless two-game suspension Rice received in July for knocking his fiancee unconscious. It changes what we think about the NFL, which was offering on its website official Ray Rice jerseys -- in pink, for God's sake, for women -- hours after the video went public Monday.

It changes what we think about the Baltimore Ravens, because even if they did find the gumption to do the right thing on Monday and release the monster previously known as tailback Ray Rice, they're the same franchise who welcomed him back with open arms in July. Coach John Harbaugh -- a husband, a father of pre-teen girl -- called Rice "a heck of a guy." A Ravens senior vice president wrote a blissfully ignorant piece of ass-kissery where he tried to assure the outside world that the Ray Rice he knew was "a good guy."

It changes what we think of that decision by the Atlantic City prosecutor, who presumably -- surely -- saw the same video we saw on Monday, the one where Ray Rice appears to spit in Janay's face as she walks toward the elevator, follows her inside and looms ominously into her space. Rice goes to another side of the elevator, then responds to her walking in his direction by knocking her out with one punch and then standing there, unconcerned that his wife is motionless on the elevator floor. The Atlantic City prosecutor presumably -- surely -- saw that video before deciding not to charge Ray Rice to the full extent of the law, instead letting Rice to enter a pre-trial intervention program that would keep him out of prison and allow him to have the conviction removed from his record.

Now we know what happened inside the elevator, and things are changing. The Ravens , who at first tried valiantly to air-brush Ray Rice's image -- as if beating up a woman was a tattoo that could be retouched -- gave up the gig after the video went public and released him. For that we owe a debt of gratitude to TMZ, which traffics in celebrity nonsense but did a public service by obtaining and releasing that video, regardless of its motives. The world now knows exactly what Ray Rice did to his fiancee in February.

What Goodell knew, and when did he know it, is a question NFL owners should demand he answer, and with the transparency that has been lacking throughout this grotesque affair. Working for the NFL as its iron-fisted commissioner -- he's iron-fisted most of the time, if not when a player knocks out a woman in an elevator -- Goodell is one of the most powerful forces in sports and yet, ultimately, a stooge for the owners. That's what most sports commissioners are, lackeys who do what the owners want. That's Goodell: The owners' gopher.

And the owners' gopher just undermined every single one of his bosses, because the NFL looks horrible today. It has looked bad ever since Goodell decided a two-game suspension was fitting for Rice, but with the release of that video on Monday, the NFL now looks more nefarious than spineless. How could the league see that video and give Rice just two games?

Which is where this story gets really interesting.

Did Goodell see that video before deciding on that suspension in July? The NFL says no, but that stretches the bounds of credulity. The most widely read NFL reporter, Peter King of Sports Illustrated, wrote in July that the NFL had seen the video -- and for nearly two months King wasn't asked to correct that assertion. Another well connected NFL reporter, ESPN's Chris Mortensen, talked about the video weeks ago and described what happened with accuracy, including the way Janay's head ricocheted off the handrail on her way to unconsciousness on the elevator floor. On Monday morning, Hall of Fame receiver Cris Carter (now an ESPN analyst) tweeted that he'd seen the knockout video "long" before Monday.

That's three different people who traffic in Goodell's circles, all of them indicating that the video was widely available -- yet we're supposed to believe that it wasn't available to Goodell?

That's a question for NFL owners to get answered about a commissioner who has repeatedly botched this case. Whether Goodell saw the video or not, he definitely thought it was a good idea to get the victim's opinion on how severely he should discipline her abuser -- and when Janay Rice asked Goodell to go easy on her husband, Goodell complied. He thought he was protecting the shield, I guess.

Instead, Goodell stained it. Because we can't un-see what we saw Monday. We can't un-know what we know today.

All we can do is ask, and hope the owners ask as well: What did Roger Goodell know, and when did he know it?

http://www.cbssports.com/general/writer/gregg-doyel/24701553/ray-rice-video-demands-more-answers-from-roger-goodell

[BlueDevil 8,687]

Things getting even more sticky with this as a law enforcement official says he sent the NFL the tape 3 months ago.

https://twitter.com/sportscenter/status/509808056709173248