EduClaytion

AFC North Blotter

For the love of the Chief.  What would Art Rooney say if he saw his beloved franchise piling up more citations than a frat house fight club.  The Pittsburgh Steelers were once the cleanest cut of all sports franchises.  Now, they’ve spiraled into a police blotter laughingstock. 

Maybe they’ve been brought down by the company they keep.  The AFC North division of the NFL continues to produce some of professional football’s finest idiots.  I’m surprised the league hasn’t realigned to get the Oakland Raiders in with the Cincinnati Bengals, Baltimore Ravens, Cleveland Brown, and em’ Stillers.    

 If you ignore these stories, Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger just dodged another legal bullet yesterday when the DA in the case announced no charges would be filed over allegations of sexual assault.  In the meantime, Super Bowl MVP receiver Santonio Holmes got in more trouble for smoking more weed (among other things) and proved that winning doesn’t make you mature when he posted messages to the public which might as well have said, “Dear Steelers, please get rid of me as soon as possible for being such a complete…”  You get the idea.  These events come on the heels of over two years of other legal problems for players Jeff Reed, James Harrison, and Cedrick Wilson.  

Let me be clear about Big Ben first.  He is not guilty of anything more than terrible judgment.  The showboating DA made this point repeatedly and inappropriately during the press conference to announce there would be no trial because there was no evidence and the alleged victim and her family were adamantly against even filing in the first place.  So Ben is innocent of criminality but guilty of stupidity.  College was fun and all, but what is an internationally-known super-millionaire doing in a college bar in Georgia?    

I wish he would talk to Sidney Crosby or Peyton Manning or one of the hundreds of other super high-profile athletes who never have these problems.  I suppose it is possible that every other star athlete on the planet is celibate, but I’m guessing they just aren’t mentally deficient.  

For a long time, Pittsburghers have enjoyed ridiculing the circus that is the Cincinnati Bengals organization.  In addition to being one of the worst franchises in sport history, the Bungals also managed to pile up more arrests than any other team in the league.  The tragic culmination of this pattern came last year when wide receiver Chris Henry was killed during a domestic dispute.  

Another division rivial, the Baltimore Ravens, have also spent more than a decade trying to prove to the world that they were the most thuggish franchise in football.  I would normally make the predictable Ray Lewis comment here, but more on him in a minute.  

Now the Cleveland Browns are getting involved in all the criminal fun.  Shaun Rogers might not be the most well-known name, but he certainly put himself on the map recently by trying to board a plane with a cocked gun in his carry on.  He said he forgot.  I believe him.  These guys are just brainless.  

The great irony is that the Ravens are actually the most well-behaved group these days!  The Blind Side movie got tons of positive press for the team.  They’ve also been pretty well-behaved in recent times, especially since the terrible death of former quarterback Steve McNair last summer.  No one disputes that Ray Lewis is the leader of that team, and Lewis was rocked by the shooting of his retired friend McNair.  He acted like a different person last season.  His interviews were subdued, his words extremely measured.  

That’s the exact reaction we saw from Chad Ochocinco, one of the league’s great characters.  Ocho broke into tears after the death of Chris Henry, one of his best friends.  The culture of look-at-me, no rules, run hard, bring an entourage escalates the stakes until violence inevitably breaks out.  Don’t forget we’re not that far removed from the nightmarish murder of the Washington Redskin’s Sean Taylor and the senseless shooting of Darrent Williams of the Denver Broncos.  

I hate to say it, but the NFL might be the new NBA.  What’s it going to take to stop this trend?  Sitting here judging these guys does no good.  Who hasn’t done a lot of stupid things in their life?  But to see specific individuals cycling in the same destructive patterns is a big red flag that something worse is going to happen.  You just read about four young and wealthy men who were looked up to by thousands.  Some of them were dads.  Today, they are dead.  You would think more of these guys would wake up and look around at the body count in their backyard. 

Now along come the Steelers.  Fans cry out that Santonio Holmes was traded.  Why would the Steelers do this!  I’m glad they are willing to take a stand in the direction of what’s right even to their own apparent detriment.  Maybe this stunner will be a wake up call to these guys to knock it off before real tragedy occurs in their lives.  You never know when you’ve run out of chances until it’s too late.  

Big Ben came through so much after that motorcycle accident that nearly killed him.  Is it so hard to believe that someone like him could end up dead?  If not him, who will be next? 

April 13, 2010 - Posted by educlaytion | News, Sports