Incognito suspended indefinitely by Dolphins

[upstater1]

Sorry, I find "The Walrus" to be a questionable source.

Well, you're evading the question.

The Walrus is the site administrator with access to user IP addresses. He tracked it down to a company in Glendale, Arizona called Sonoran which is owned by Richard Incognito. Please tell me why this is questionable.

 

[upstater1]

Sometimes, yes. "Usually?" No.

I work in insurance claims. All day, every day is full of he said/she said accounts of what happened. Then we see a police report, and 95% of the time, it bears out that one person was full of it and the other was being honest.

And, this is an important distinction, in bitter divorce or custody battles, they tend to try to paint the other person as being terrible. They're not usually arguing about an issue of fact. "He's a lousy parent! No she is!" is a lot different than "He abused me! No, I didn't" In the first example, it's subjective. In the second, one of them is lying.

And I've seen police reports too that are real head scratchers.

 

[West Philly Patriot]

Why? The comparisons are fine. There was not any evidence against those guys at all in the case, and particularly early on. At this point, the only evidence against Incognito himself (not his hillbilly dad) is a voicemail in which, reading it alone, is impossible to tell whether or not he was simply busting Martin's balls or was really threatening him.



I think it's pretty safe to say that he has one at this point, if he didn't already have one.



It's not irresponsible at all. I brought up a few examples where "the truth is usually somewhere in the middle". It may, or it may not be, in this case. But we don't know that yet. If the fault lies with one person in this matter, whether it's Incognito or Martin, I'm sure they'll get their fair share of criticism. But that has yet to be brought to light and from everything we're hearing, it sounds like there's going to be at least a few more layers to this story.

While not impossible, this seems extremly unlikely. Hard to imagine any self respecting black man allowing someone to call him a half-N*gger just to bust balls as a friend. That seems incredibly hostile to me, i.e not friendly at all.

 

[Fixit]

Why? The comparisons are fine. There was not any evidence against those guys at all in the case, and particularly early on. At this point, the only evidence against Incognito himself (not his hillbilly dad) is a voicemail in which, reading it alone, is impossible to tell whether or not he was simply busting Martin's balls or was really threatening him.



I think it's pretty safe to say that he has one at this point, if he didn't already have one.



It's not irresponsible at all. I brought up a few examples where "the truth is usually somewhere in the middle". It may, or it may not be, in this case. But we don't know that yet. If the fault lies with one person in this matter, whether it's Incognito or Martin, I'm sure they'll get their fair share of criticism. But that has yet to be brought to light and from everything we're hearing, it sounds like there's going to be at least a few more layers to this story.

So you agree that one case never had any evidence, and the other already does. Yep, the only evidence we know of is the voicemail, which sure sounded playful. I know that when I'm busting a co-worker's balls, I call him up and say stuff just like that. Unfortunately, apparently the Dolphins don't think it was all for funsies, unless they asked the league to investigate just to spread the joy.

And you can't use a few examples to prove that the truth is "usually" in the middle. Most of the time, someone is telling the truth, and someone is lying. And the only indication so far that there are more layers to the story is people saying, "I bet there are more layers to the story."

Have fun with the Richie Incognito Defense Fund.

 

[Fixit]

And I've seen police reports too that are real head scratchers.

On occasion, yep. Most of the time, no.

 

[Fixit]

While not impossible, this seems extremly unlikely. Hard to imagine any self respecting black man allowing someone to call him a half-N*gger just to bust balls as a friend. That seems incredibly hostile to me, i.e not friendly at all.

There's also that little detail that Martin got pissed and left the team which indicates that it wasn't friendly ball-busting, but he was probably just being overly-sensitive to Incognito's world-famous harmless wit.

 

[Fixit]

Jesus, I hope I'm never on fire in front of some of you. I can see some of you standing there with a fire extinguisher saying, "Wait, let's not jump to conclusions. He might like it."

 

[yukon cornelius]

ducks quack

 

[shmessy]

.....At this point, the only evidence against Incognito himself (not his hillbilly dad) is a voicemail in which, reading it alone, is impossible to tell whether or not he was simply busting Martin's balls or was really threatening him.....

.

Very true, Kontra. You and I have not HEARD the voicemail, so yes, we are missing the tonality of this.

However the Miami Dolphins front office DID.

After spending 5 days telling the national press that there was nothing to see here and that Jonathan Martin simply had an emotional issue, they then heard the audio of the voicemail (along with other pieces of evidence that have not been leaked to the press).

Within an hour of hearing it, they did a full 180 and suspended Richie Incognito indefinitely while handing all evidence over to the NFL for further investigation.

Evidently, they saw and heard enough Sunday night to completely change course.

 

[shmessy]

Jesus, I hope I'm never on fire in front of some of you. I can see some of you standing there with a fire extinguisher saying, "Wait, let's not jump to conclusions. He might like it."

Well, you know, we'd have to first know what the "context" is.

 

[fnordcircle]

I'm wondering why you feel the need to comment on my skepticism multiple times, which seems even more bizarre.

Oh ok so you do admit that your stance about this being Incognito's is bizarre, fair play.

 

[upstater1]

If I'm the team or NFL, maybe then I wait for a final verdict (although the team already appears to have made a verdict).

If I'm a fan, Incognito's long history of bullying people and beating people up makes me think that this is how he operates. He's done it so often in the past that he doesn't get the benefit of the doubt. I don't think he's the boy who cried wolf.

 

[Fencer]

To repeat, I think we can say with confidence that communication between Incognitio and Martin was received very badly. It is likely that both men are somewhat at fault. It is unlikely, however, that Incognitio is so clean in this that his punishment to date is excessive, nor that the criticism they deserve is remotely close to being equal.

 

[Fixit]

To repeat, I think we can say with confidence that communication between Incognitio and Martin was received very badly. It is likely that both men are somewhat at fault. It is unlikely, however, that Incognitio is so clean in this that his punishment to date is excessive, nor that the criticism they deserve is remotely close to being equal.

I'm with you except for "It is likely that both men are somewhat at fault." That may be the case (I'd bet that it's not), but there is literally nothing to suggest that at this time.

 

[Ring 6]

While not impossible, this seems extremly unlikely. Hard to imagine any self respecting black man allowing someone to call him a half-N*gger just to bust balls as a friend. That seems incredibly hostile to me, i.e not friendly at all.

This is where I think you can't really know the detailed meaning from your living room.
Black people use the N word to each other all the time. Clearly it is meant differently than a racial slur. But how do we know what the norm is in an NFL lockerroom? Is it possible that Incognito hangs with mostly a black group of teammates and for him individually, IN THAT GROUP, it becomes acceptable? We found out today, he calls Pouncey the N word with no hard feelings.
Something deplorable to you or I could be acceptable to others who have an ongoing relationship with each other.

Just as the 's##t down your throat' comment sounds deplorable, I've heard it made before just as I'm sure everyone else has, even in the movies. We don't know if that was an inside joke.

It also has been glossed over, IMO, that the vm was during mini-camp, where Martin did not attend, and then posted video of him working out alone on youtube.

There are so many pieces to this that are not known.
I think most people are drawing the LIKELY conclusion by guessing about the unknown facts, but there just are no hard and fast conclusions that can come from what we know.
There really isn't a conclusive statement that can be made yet (from our perspective) that doesnt have at least a somewhat reasonable possible explanation that would give a different perspective and perhaps conclusion.

 

[Ring 6]

Oh ok so you do admit that your stance about this being Incognito's is bizarre, fair play.

Obvioulsy not, but nice try.
Don't you have a grown up conversation to participate in?

 

[Fencer]

I'm with you except for "It is likely that both men are somewhat at fault." That may be the case (I'd bet that it's not), but there is literally nothing to suggest that at this time.

It's a general rule for communication problems. Since other Miami teammates don't have the same problem with Incognitio, we know there are some Martin-specific elements to all this, and so I'm guessing the general rule applies.

However, I'd be shocked if it turned out that the fault was remotely close to being equal. Incognitio is the bad guy here.

 

[Ring 6]

Very true, Kontra. You and I have not HEARD the voicemail, so yes, we are missing the tonality of this.

However the Miami Dolphins front office DID.

After spending 5 days telling the national press that there was nothing to see here and that Jonathan Martin simply had an emotional issue, they then heard the audio of the voicemail (along with other pieces of evidence that have not been leaked to the press).

Within an hour of hearing it, they did a full 180 and suspended Richie Incognito indefinitely while handing all evidence over to the NFL for further investigation.

Evidently, they saw and heard enough Sunday night to completely change course.

The content alone, regardless of intent or tonality could have caused that. Hell there is one word in there that could have caused them to suspend him all by itself.
I'm not going to get into this all over again, but you are speaking as if there is only one possible set of events and one possible reasoning, and I don't think it is that cut and dried.

 

[groganbootleg]

I want more information than a voicemail with no context before I go tarring and feathering someone, while you apparently don't really care about such unimportant things as facts and guilt/innocence, and that's the difference here. While I'm sure you wanted the members of the Duke lacrosse team executed the moment the first possibility of malfeasance was raised, I generally prefer having a bit more knowledge than that prior to cracking out the pitchfork.

He is a member of a strong union and his employer fired him for these offenses. Unless the union has filed a grievance we haven't heard about, they seem to be fine with his firing as well which should lead you to conclude that there is much more than a little smoke here.

 

[Ring 6]

It's a general rule for communication problems. Since other Miami teammates don't have the same problem with Incognitio, we know there are some Martin-specific elements to all this, and so I'm guessing the general rule applies.

However, I'd be shocked if it turned out that the fault was remotely close to being equal. Incognitio is the bad guy here.

Yes, there are many possibilities.

One though is that Martin is just weak, and Incognito is a bully so that was why he singled him out. To ignore that is to ignore things such as how Sandusky chose his vicitms and we certainly know they weren't to blame for being victimized.

That aside, I think there are some things to question from Martins actions, but we lack sufficient facts to judge them.