Originally Posted by Dirty Water II
Okay, let me set the record straight here. Brandon is a personal friend of mine, and all this speculation about his "shaky character concerns" need to be clarified. Meriweather is about the most polite and high-character guy you will ever meet. The incidents in which he has been scrutinized for this past year found the media placing a ton of undue blame on his shoulders - blame he certainly did not deserve given his virtually pristine record here in Miami.
The shooting incident involved an attempted murder on both he and a few other members of the Hurricane football team. Miami is not all sunshine and happy faces. Brandon lives in a questionable part of town. As a precautionary measure, he carries a licensed concealed firearm when he is in that neighborhood. On the evening in question, a random car pulled up to the curb outside his apartment where he and two or three other teammates were leaving out teh front door. An unidentified individual opened fire from the car at the players. Brandon tells me that he saw teammate and friend Willie Cooper hit by a passing bullet and, in defense of himself and his friends, returned fire in hopes of chasing the attackers away. If you carried a gun and all of a sudden found yourself the target of a drive-by, would you just stand there and do nothing because you thought it would hurt your image if you reacted?
The FIU royal rumble was pretty ugly and, for the most part, inexcusable. However, I have heard several accounts from UM players that are all consistent with one another. Story has it that FIU players attacked - not just ran into, but attacked - our holder on an extra point following a touchdown. The animosity built up after our FB, James Bryant (who is a dolt), used some provocative celebration tactics after said touchdown. Benches cleared, but what REALLY got the blood boiling for our players was the fact that the team chaplain, who was attempting to stop the violence, was also attacked by FIU brawlers. It was this instance in the whole melee that caused the violence to escalate to the level that it reached. Meriweather admitted himself that he completely lost it and should have shown much more restraint, but he had never been so enraged in his life.
These are not excuses for his actions, but rather just some information I thought some of you should know before making negative comments about this kid's character. For me, it's just frustrating to see a friend's reputation be attacked for reacting to situations the same way a lot of other people would.
IMO, Meriweather is an excellent fit for our defense. He's a quick, undersized, versatile DB with good instincts. He's very solid in coverage and is an outstanding open-field tackler. Despite his size, he's excellent in run support. Oh yeah, and he also said he would be thrilled to play in New England. Rodney is one of his role models and he would love to play with Asante (if he hangs around any longer).
