Sparty thuggery in Aspen is revealed
"The alleged victim, 26-year-old Benjamin Nichols of London, told police that the two males confronted him at the bar, and one of them grabbed him by the collar of his shirt. Nichols then knocked off the hat of Linthicum, who then punched him in the face, Nichols told police. Nichols then fell to the ground."
"Once on the ground, Nichols told me that the two males had then started kicking him repeatedly. Nichols showed me that his shirt had been ripped on the front and back as a result of the assault,” police said. Nichols also had an injury to his right eye"
"The two suspects blew off officers' repeated commands to stop, the report says. Fabrocini then came within about 8 feet from Linthicum and deployed a Taser, hitting the tight end in the upper part of his back, the report says."
http://www.aspentimes.com/article/20110420/NEWS/110429991/1077&ParentProfile=1058
They sound like very upstanding members of society.
April 20th, 2011 at 11:17 AM ^
$tooopid $party
April 20th, 2011 at 11:58 AM ^
Lord of MGoAvatars.
(clapclapclap)
April 20th, 2011 at 11:21 AM ^
with intent to do bodily harm
2 days missed spring practice.
zero tolerance
April 20th, 2011 at 11:29 AM ^
You have very efficiently summed up the Dantonio era of MSU football. Well done.
oh yeah thats right,Mr. Class Jim Tressel
April 20th, 2011 at 11:39 AM ^
You apparently have not seen the special items in Dantonio's office. He is exempt from most rules. I'll say no more.
April 20th, 2011 at 12:01 PM ^
Indeed.
April 20th, 2011 at 12:59 PM ^
Assault with intent
Two days missed of spring practice
Zero Tolerance
Hero.
April 20th, 2011 at 11:30 AM ^
April 20th, 2011 at 11:36 AM ^
Yes it did, but no one actually knew specifics of what the incident entailed.
So clearly, to Dantonio, punching a guy and then repeatedly kicking him while on the ground should only result in a suspension of 2 spring practices.
Zero tolerance for missed practice is probably what Dantonio means.
Hmmm...the Aspen Times articles mentions March 10 as the date the assault occurred.
The other question is what were these guys doing in Aspen? Spring break?
April 20th, 2011 at 11:38 AM ^
But really. The precedent was set with Glenn 'fastest when running between jail and the practice field' Winston, why is anyone surprised that the players missed only two practices.
We can talk about it all we want, but the example has been set in East Lansing. Anything short of a SECOND assualt with the intent to do harm or possibly something worse will be met with little punishment.
April 20th, 2011 at 11:59 AM ^
The beating of the victim and getting tasered are newly released info.
The original January story, IIRC, had only mentioned that both ran from police after committing an ambiguously identified infraction that read as an MIP (one is a minor) and/or drinking or intoxicated in public.
This is a bit more serious that a couple kids running from the cops because they were drinking in the public way and/or in possession.
But my opinion carries no weight in East Lansing.
April 20th, 2011 at 11:31 AM ^
the tradition continues. This story is about a month old. but it never really gets old
April 20th, 2011 at 11:36 AM ^
It happened a month ago, but the actual details just came out in court recently.
April 20th, 2011 at 11:40 AM ^
The last few years might have made me nervous if they were winning, and doing it the right way.
April 20th, 2011 at 11:41 AM ^
Slapping their wrists.
Whenyour elected officials don't give a rats ass about punishing thugs like why is it inumbent upon Douchetonio to do so?
I blame the courts which will undoubtedly let them go with slap on the wrists if that...
April 20th, 2011 at 11:46 AM ^
It happened in Colorado. Michigan courts have nothing to do with it.
The actual plea deals do, however, hand out pretty weak punishment: http://www.freep.com/article/20110420/SPORTS07/110420013/1055/sports07/MSU-linebacker-reaches-plea-Colorado-bar-spat
April 20th, 2011 at 11:53 AM ^
Lloyd Christmas told me Aspen was in California? That liar!
April 20th, 2011 at 12:17 PM ^
I'll tell ya where we'll go. Someplace warm. A place where the beer flows like wine. Where beautiful women instinctively flock like the salmon of Capistrano. I'm talkin' bout a little place called...Aspen.
I bet that's what that guy was thinking until some Sparty thugs beat the shit out of him.
The level of punishment seems about right for two young (i think) first time offenders. I wonder if the victim is filing a civil lawsuit for his injuries, thats where I would expected the hammer to fall a little more on them.
April 20th, 2011 at 11:44 AM ^
Seeing as this happened in Colorado, you're probably right that the Michigan courts won't do much.
Federalism FTW.
April 20th, 2011 at 12:37 PM ^
You are arguably the worst poster on this site. Just shut up.
Arguably?
April 20th, 2011 at 11:43 AM ^
Pride comes before the Tasers.
April 20th, 2011 at 11:49 AM ^
Michigan State comes up with a good kicking game. How do they do it?
April 20th, 2011 at 11:56 AM ^
hide ya kids, hide ya wife
April 20th, 2011 at 11:59 AM ^
It's clear his reputation for discipline is media created. Strange to see who the media attaches to, and who they go after. What's the determinative criteria for their attitude towards a coach?
I deeply lament our continuing problems with this kind of stuff. I hope that fellow MSU students and grads do not brush this off.
April 20th, 2011 at 12:13 PM ^
That's probably out the window already. Dantonio needed to set an example at some point down the line and hasn't. For some reason it seems that nobody with any publicity cares.
FWIW I think that needed to happen with the Glenn Winston case. How he was ever legally allowed to set foot on MSU grounds again is beyond me.
April 20th, 2011 at 12:28 PM ^
I agree - complete thug who had no business in any higher education institution.
April 20th, 2011 at 12:31 PM ^
If Dantonio had sent a message with that, I doubt you would be seeing the same problems with your program that you are today.
People would have taken notice and that includes players in bars in Aspen. Just that little extra second of, "will I risk my football career/chance at the NFL for doing this?" is usually enough.
I'm sympathetic to universities who are more willing to allow people to continue their education after making some pretty big mistakes. However, playing on the football team is a priveledge and a position that is representative for the school, and not something that he deserved after that degree of thuggishness.
Does Dantonio still have a reputation as a disciplinarian? Not living in Michigan anymore and MSU's general lack of national coverage means I'm not too up on the media's current take on him, but I seem to remember him catching a lot of flack for letting Rucker play against Iowa. I kind of thought that move busted up his reputation, more or less.
As far as I know, anyway.
He did get some flack for the Rucker thing, but he has also been credited for "giving second chances," etc...
There has been little, if any, press that I've seen calling Dantonio out on discipline issues, and challenging the "master of discipline" meme.
What's the word on RCMB? Any outrage, or more rationalization?
Edit: Answered my own question. SMH: http://michiganstate.247sports.com/Board/93/Details-of-the-Aspen-Arrests-1945607/1
I don't go on that site.
Where are the respectable MSU blogs?
One of these days, my travels will take me up to East Lansing. They do have a fairly nice campus.
Visiting friends once or twice, boredom and the desire to go for a nice long drive the others. It's a decent town; there are some beautiful dormitory buildings on campus. I don't know about downtown Lansing though.
Downtown Lansing has the Capital Building which is a pretty impressive looking building.
There's a link to it from this site (on the left side, under Big Ten Blogs -> Michigan State).
FWIW, I've seen Brian speak highly of the guys who run it as well (e.g., the "Boom Tila Tequila'd" post after the M-MSU game last year).
Most sites are so fucking ideological though (e.g., enlightenedspartan) that I have no desire to participate or even visit.
I checked The Only Colors a few times in basketball season, and the content seemed decent for the most part. How are the commentators, ideologically-wise?
P.S. I've played on the carillon in the tower in the TOC logo--that's the one on State's campus, correct?
Beautiful spot on campus, arguably the most so. That's pretty cool - you didn't retain any residue that would make you unwelcome in AA parts?
As far as TOC and ideology go, it's hard for me to say. Their content is not as good as here (Brian has something unique here IMHE). Ideological bullshit is inevitable on any such site (including here), but unlike the ES, where it's so apparent, TOC's ideology would be much less pronounced. Moreover, it would obviously comport with my own immediate/unreflective bent, which makes it harder for me to trace.
Notwithstanding that, I think M folk would find it tolerable.
Carillonneurs are an unusual bunch. We're usually so dazzled that we actually found the tower and that the tower carillon is open that we completely forget where we are. I had fun playing and meeting some of the MSU carillon department. If I was contaminated, it was hopefully neutralized by my Ohio heritage, which made it...challenging, at times, to be a college student in the State of Michigan.
Anyways, thanks for the TOC breakdown. I'll check it out from time to time when I want the facts about MSU athletics.