So, this guy? Ray Rice, this guy who plays football for the Baltimore Ravens? The one who punched his girl friend so hard he knocked her out, and was suspended by his team* the NFL for the whoppingly punitive two games?
Today a new video was released that shows the actual knockout punch, and the team has now fired him.
Before all they had was a video showing him dragging her unconscious body off an elevator and dumping her on the floor just outside it.
I don’t quite understand why the first video wasn’t enough.
Within hours of the video’s appearance on TMZ.com, Rice’s team, the Baltimore Ravens, tweeted, “The Baltimore Ravens terminated the contract of RB Ray Rice this afternoon.”
The video shows Janay Palmer, now Rice’s wife, being hit in the face in the elevator. Palmer then lunges at the running back before he delivers a blow that knocks her out. When the elevator doors open, Rice drags Palmer’s body outside, leaving her face down on the floor, her legs still inside the elevator.
The clip sparked outrage from fellow football players, coaches and fans, and many called for the NFL to cut Rice sooner. Herm Edwards, a former coach for the New York Jets, said he would have taken action before the video was released.
The most depressing part of the story is that Janay Palmer went ahead and married him.
*Thanks to Nick Little, Leo Buzalsky and others who corrected my howler.
Your closing sentence, it smells
I’m slightly encouraged that there was enough outrage over the NFL’s/Ravens’ original decisions to barely punish Rice at all that this happened. This being the leak of the second video, and the subsequent indefinite suspension and firing.
I hope it may be that the first video would be enough now that the powers that be have heard everyone’s outrage at this. I wouldn’t even be shocked if the second video had been leaked to give the league a reason to reopen the decision.
The NFL claims they only saw this second video today, despite having asked the police for all relevant video. It would be really stupid of them to issue that claim if it weren’t true, but it certainly doesn’t smell right. Why ask the police and not the hotel? Why wouldn’t the police share it? etc.
The justice system has gone easy on him too, he is in a “pretrial diversion” program where he will avoid prosecution if he participates in classes and does a period of probation, but why? It seems like a guilty plea or an open-and-shut trial and a prison sentence would be more appropriate. 30 days, and then these classes and probation.
Not only did she marry Rice, she defended him at their joint press conference after the first video surfaced:
http://deadspin.com/ray-rice-sometimes-in-life-you-will-get-knocked-down-1580795933
“The NFL claims they only saw this second video today”
Except that there were reports all summer that NFL officials had seen the video from inside the elevator. It will be very hard to convince me that they chose the minuscule original “punishment” under the assumption that that video would not be seen by the public.
“was suspended by his team”
I think he was suspended by the NFL, which has since changed its rules on such suspensions. But I do think the Ravens had the ability to enact a longer suspension of their own, had they wished to do so.
It’s a well known fact that we have to be super sceptical when bad things happen to women.I mean with no film of her actually being hit at the time it would have been irrational to jump to any conclusions. There could have been a perfectly reasonable explanation for a man to be dragging an unconscious woman out of a lift.
BTW.The above comment contains sarcasm.
How much you want to bet that she got tons of pressure to stay with him, in order to protect his career?
@Leo Buzalsky, #5
Those rules really haven’t changed all that much: http://deadspin.com/so-whats-actually-new-about-the-nfls-new-domestic-viole-1628098179
From the article:
As stated above, Goodell had leeway – under the current CBA – to issue a six game suspension off the bat and he didn’t.
Current NFL penalty for smoking weed (and just weed, no PED) on a second failed drug test? Season long suspension (16 games):
http://deadspin.com/josh-gordon-faces-a-season-long-ban-from-the-nfl-for-sm-1574255378
Also, BTW, the Baltimore Ravens deleted this tweet – just this morning: http://deadspin.com/the-ravens-just-deleted-that-terrible-janay-rice-tweet-1632105673
I’ve heard all kinds of ugly MRA stuff on the radio about this today. The bottom line is that Rice is trained to inflict injury, and he’s three times her size. There’s no way she could have hurt him, whereas–as we all saw–it was nothing for him to knock her unconscious.
Deen @8:
Don’t know, but we already have Hall of Fame coach Mike Ditka lamenting that there are two victims here:
“The most depressing part of the story is that Janay Palmer went ahead and married him”
My 0.02 – in terms of financial stability, social stature, and -sadly- likelihood of being the victim of future domestic violence; she may have [quite rationally] concluded that staying with Ray Rice was the least shitty option available to her as a woman of color in the USA in 2014.
And yeah, I find that quite depressing.
Her marrying him is unbearably depressing. Le’s hope she gets away as soon a possible.
I haven’t seen either video, but I recognize the deep unwillingness to recognize that ‘Guys like that’ are around you in real life. Even if they are just 1-3%, you still know someone ‘like that.’ And the culture of sport in the US seems to attract and cultivate just ‘that kind.’
Exactly, which (I think) one reason the NFL and the team should drop him. The culture of sport especially football in the US is deeply fucked up.