Nate Johnson dismissed from team effective immediately
October 4th, 2017 at 8:23 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 8:39 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 8:44 AM ^
Completely do not understand that. Baumgardner is a pretty damn good writer and I get NO "pro-MSU" vibe from him.
People just have a bone to pick.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:14 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 9:35 AM ^
Baumgardner's Mlive articles were sorry examples of "writing." Stylistically, they had multiple grammatical errors that made his works laughable, but he had the audacity to refer to himself as "a journalist." Here's hoping that the Freep will have proofreaders to fix Baumgardner's work for him. Substantively, his predictions relied on irrelevant comparisons such as UM's offense v. opponent's offense, even though those units would never go against each other head-to-head on the field. Mgoblog's relevant comparisons of, e.g., UM's offense v. opponent's defense are much more useful. You might be right about accusations of MSU bias, though.
October 4th, 2017 at 11:45 AM ^
Because I read basically every article he had, and thought they were pretty damn articulate.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:44 AM ^
Sorry, I don't feel too much sympathy for Brady. I get he loved Michigan and all that, but he could have done some serious damage to Shane Morris with the way that was handled. That was a complete abomination.
It's funny, I've been reading Baumgardner's articles since he started at MLive, and he's been nothing but a solid reporter who writes pretty damn well and is positive and negative when he needs to be. There are PLENTY of writers in this city who can't compare to his level.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:14 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 9:15 AM ^
Hoke lied about why Gibbons wasn't playing. Said he had a boo-boo. There is a big difference between not saying why he was suspended and lying about him being suspended. Yet another example of why I don't get the "Hoke was such a great guy" crowd.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:31 AM ^
Yeah but bro c'mon, hoke hugged his players and used simple 4th grade rhetoric in his press conferences, which obivously shows how great of a guy he is.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:33 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 10:02 AM ^
Is John U Bacon a sparty troll too?
http://michiganradio.org/post/brendan-gibbons-and-um-athletic-departmen…
Family matter excuse was for the bowl game, for the OSU game he claimed he was injured.
October 4th, 2017 at 10:47 AM ^
Hoke did not say he was dealing with a "personal/family" issue. He said Gibbons had gone home "due to a family matter." Not "personal". He said this 8 days after Gibbons had been expelled from the University, making him ineligible for the bowl game.
The fact that instead of saying nothing (such as "violation of team rules" or simply "he's not available for the game"), Hoke chose to lie, was a problem that Baumgardner, Bacon, and The Michigan Daily were all correct to criticize.
You are 100 percent correct that Hoke was prohibited from addressing it. But that prohibition is not a mandate to lie by making up an injury, as he did for the Ohio State game, or a "family matter," as he did for the bowl game.
October 4th, 2017 at 1:09 PM ^
Actually, he did not lie. He said that Gibbons wasn't traveling because of a "family issue," not an injury. Given that he's not allowed to comment on the nature of the suspension, and it was a personal and legal matter, I think it qualifies as a "family issue..." as in an "issue to be dealt with by his family." Being upset at Hoke for this is trivial, at best.
October 4th, 2017 at 1:27 PM ^
Actually, he did lie. From the JUB article I linked to earlier:
We still don’t know when the athletic department found out about the panel’s ruling. But we do know that, three days after the ruling, head coach Brady Hoke started Gibbons, who kicked three extra points in a 24-21 loss to Iowa.
Before Michigan’s next game, against Ohio State, Hoke claimed Gibbons had injured his leg. Before Michigan’s bowl game, on December 28th, Hoke said Gibbons had gone home due to a “family matter” – yet we know the university expelled Gibbons on December 20th.
October 4th, 2017 at 7:09 PM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 9:18 AM ^
What basically 99.99 percent of people in the press do. He was pushing for a story. Comparing that to the situation with RR is laughable.
So what if he's an MSU grad? Doug Karsch is one of the bigger M apologists/slappies on air and he went to State. Get over it. He has not pushed ANY agenda one way or the other. In fact, he's definitely been more fair/favorable to Michigan over the years.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:13 AM ^
I don't disagree with your take here but that has no relevance to the Gibbons situation.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:49 AM ^
Out of all the MSM in Detroit, he's probably the best, or second to Wojo. So your criticism is weird.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:51 AM ^
I think Baumgardner was critical of Michigan in general when the team struggled, and generally pretty objective (even though he is an MSU grad). Hoke deserved criticism for his ham-fisted handling of the Brendan Gibbons debacle.
I think the story here is not much of a story from a program angle. Player gets into alleged domestic violence situation, the coaching staff does some preliminary investigation, and dismisses Nate Johnson from the program. Note that:
- The action by Michigan was prompt but not reactionary
- It's not like Michigan is recruiting players with known histories of being dodgy characters
- The coaches cannot really control 120+ players' conduct at all times, but they can control their reaction when those players get in trouble
- All of the players on the team are seeing that Harbaugh will react quickly for stupidity occurring off the field, and likely have known that from day one.
I strongly suspect Harbaugh took the alleged victim's, Michigan's, and Nate Johnson's interests into account in a serious fashion before he made the decision. And I suspect he followed UofM's protocols and sought advice as appropriate.
If the above is correct, there's not really that much of a story here.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:15 AM ^
There must've been overwhelming evidence against him. Or he just admitted to it. In which case Harbaugh almost certainly has a zero-tolerance, one strike and you're out policy.
Hope he can get his shit together. His life just took a big nosedive off the ugly tree and is probably going to hit every branch coming down.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:27 AM ^
just the first for something so serious. He suddenly went from 1st string punt returner to not seeing any action at all. While it's understandable that DPJ beat him out, it was Perry that came in to replace DPJ.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:42 AM ^
Maybe, maybe not.
In "Bo's Lasting Lessons," Bo described how he could forgive a lot of things, but he couldn't work with a liar. Maybe Johnson originally told a cover story that he later recanted - that could be enough to dismiss him even if the underlying offense turns out to be non-life-ruining.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:15 AM ^
Details won't be good.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:19 AM ^
Domestic violence incidents are often way less serious than the popular perception of them are. Perception being black eyes and broken bones, while reality is sometimes a guy punched a wall, screamed a bit, and threw an ashtray through a window.
For him to get kicked off the team I think this one is probably leaning more towards the former.
Damn shame.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:28 AM ^
You sound like somebody who got charged for something like this.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:34 AM ^
Or someone close to him?
October 4th, 2017 at 8:52 AM ^
First, yes, someone close to me was charged with it maybe 15ish years ago. I was stunned at how broadly the law was written. He got it tossed eventually, but it was an expensive pain in the ass.
Much later, an acquaintance worked as a facilitator for court ordered DV classes (like anger management, etc). He told me that there were guys in his groups that did horrendous shit and absolutely deserved to be in prison. And that there were guys (and a few women) who really didn't belong there.
It just bothers me when everyone assumes the worst about people. Obviously if he smacked some defenseless woman around he deserves whatever is coming his way.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:06 AM ^
This is a relatively complex issue. Domestic violence law enforcement is definitely tilted against males, and for good reason - when it does occur, it's usually a male at fault. I trust that most on this board get that you just don't hit women. But the world isn't comprised of the folks on this board, and a shit ton of people don't get that. Domestic violence is primarily male-on-female.
Ann Arbor used to be notorious for taking this to an illogical extreme. If there was a domestic violence call, the guy was going to jail and probably getting charged. The AAPD was taking a "arrest them all, let God sort 'em out" approach. So the guy who was getting punched by his girlfriend and pushed her to get her away was heading off to jail. That's bad policing, but it was common back about 15+ years ago in Ann Arbor. So I get where Hatter is coming from.
However, I had a colleague/mentor arrested about 15 years ago for domestic violence. He told a very convincing story of how he simply pushed away his wife, and she had a stitch come loose from crying, and now he was up shit's creek. Well, he failed a private lie detector test, but I was still inclined to believe him (he was my mentor, and I'd never seen him be violent - although he was tightly-wound like a MF).
Anyway, people also hated him and he got shitcanned from his job. It turned out after he left that there were a ton of emails from various girlfriends and his ex-wife alleging a shit-ton of the same behavior. Long story medium - just because someone convinces you that they're not a woman-beater*, that doesn't mean they're not.
*To be clear, this whole thing is focused on the straight world. I've heard and seen that domestic violence is also present in gay and lesbian relationships, but the gender (really biological sex) issue is not as present there by a long shot.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:43 AM ^
People still have ash trays?
October 4th, 2017 at 10:02 AM ^
No - because they all threw them through windows during domestic squabbles.
#StopAshtrayViolence
October 4th, 2017 at 8:32 AM ^
At this point in our society perceptions don't matter any longer. There have been FAR to many incidents regarding DV with our atheltes (college and professional). IMO there needs to be a 0 tolerance policy implimented moving forward.
If you're that "out of control" of your own actions that you cannot simply turn around and walk away from a bad situation without making it 100x worse than you simply don't need to be involved in what ever atheltic situation you're involved in. There should be no grey area any longer.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:49 AM ^
So you're saying that Lewis and Perry should be forever exised from the team?
October 4th, 2017 at 9:50 AM ^
Lewis was found to be not guilty. And from the details that came out, and the fact that he decided to go to trial instead of taking a plea, it's pretty clear he was innocent. People should stop slandering his name, even if just bringing it up as an example of a person the UM community still generally supports.
Perry's case had nothing to do with domestic violence.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:52 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 8:54 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 9:24 AM ^
Didn't the Lewis arrest happen after the season? He was getting ready for the draft, IIRC.
October 4th, 2017 at 12:25 PM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 8:57 AM ^
I disagree.
Look at Jourdan Lewis's case. Absolutely everything I've read suggests e's a great kid. He got in an argument with his girlfriend, the police were called, she said he hit her, he said he didn't. No one was injured in any way, and still he gets arrested and charged.
People lie about shit, exaggerate shit, etc. And women are just people. We should not drop all standards of evidence for accusations just because there is a perception of an "epidemic" (which is nonsense by the way, domestic violence has been decreasing steadily for at least the last 20 years https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/ndv0312.pdf).
October 4th, 2017 at 8:40 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 8:55 AM ^
Without knowing the details I say both.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:17 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 8:32 AM ^
If she is trying to kill you? I'd say self defense is required regardless of the gender if that person is trying to harm you.
As for striking a woman for no good reason, now that indefensible. But therein lies an issue with football which is violent in nature. It has the potential to bring that behavior out in other areas. Domestic violence is a problem among NFL players.
October 4th, 2017 at 8:39 AM ^
October 4th, 2017 at 8:47 AM ^
Search the interwebs. There are countless videos of women (often young) violently hitting men, embolded by the fact that "men should never hit women." There's some videos where the men are knocked out, while there's others where the man reaches his limit and retaliates. All of these are sad scenarios that aren't likely to happen to some people, but for others it's unfortunately part of their life.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:06 AM ^
Easy scenario right here: a person of any gender hurting my child is liable to get fucked up.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:36 AM ^
But it's perfectly acceptable for you to use violence against that child under the guise of "discipline".
Where TF is the societal outrage about that?
October 4th, 2017 at 9:44 AM ^
Insert a "smack some sense" joke here.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:51 AM ^
Is this sarcastic? There's a lot of outrage about people hitting children in the name of discipline.
October 4th, 2017 at 9:56 AM ^
Domestic violence is illegal in all 50 states. How many is it illegal to hit a kid in again? Oh yeah, zero.