Grant Perry returns per JH
Wide receivers should be killer this year. Best since Arrington and Manningham? If we have better quarterback play from Peters/Speight and we land the grad transfer to lock down right tackle, we should be pretty good on O.
The team is loaded with receivers. I am really hoping Speight steps it up this year. There is a great opportunity to have a killer passing attack.
You have Grant Perry, Kekoa Crawford who looks legit (was pulled early from the spring game), Tarik Black tearing it up, DPJ a consensus 5 star and then guys like Oliver Martin, Schoenle, Nico Collins, Mcdoom etc. Going to be a lot of empty sets.
I think Ian Bunting could be a guy to watch out for.
Im excited for Bunting. He made some great catches in the bowl game
Is Harbaugh going to go five wide?. How about four wide with gentry or eubanks spread out, good luck covering that this year. Of course only possible with stellar line play. There is more talent and depth at WR in Michgan football history, lets see what they can do. With good QB play and a line that pass blocks well this is going to be a fun team to watch with quick strike capability everywhere you look. This team is young, but intimidating and should bring about a lot of insecurities amongst other football teams. Anyone not excited about Michigan football this year you need to check your pulse.
Talent is there for sure, but limited experience could hinder them. Best since Arrington/Manningham? Maybe in time, but not in 2017. Too many young guys out there and the OL play is 50/50 to be average at best.
So what exactly did he do?
Homer: To alcohol!! The cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.
Officially, it was 4 criminal charges:
- Injuring an officer - Felony
- Resisting arrest - Misdemeanor
- Sexual assault (4th degree) - Misdemeanor
- Minor in possession of alcohol - Misdemeanor
Unofficially. Perry non-consensually put his hands down a female's pants while drunk and standing in line for a club. Cops were called and Perry ran and in the process injured an officer's hand.
I expect that as a factual matter, the whole thing was vastly overblown and that the reason they got as far as setting a trial date was because the defense saw it as such.
More than anything, I had said at the time that Grant Perry ought to be in a good position for a Holmes Youthful Trainee Act plea. He's the right age, and the right sort of defendant (enrolled college student with no priors, good kid, plenty of support, mom is a teacher), etc. HYTA would allow him to defer any formal conviction for a year and with good behavior during that time, he'd avoid a criminal record. Many will recall that Frank Clark went the HYTA route after the home invasion/laptop charge.
Problem was, the two (2) CSC Fourth Degree charges. All CSC charges are generally exempted from HYTA availability, with just a few tricky exceptions for CSC-4th, which is what Grant was charged with. (You can get a CSC-4th charge for touching the inner thigh of a girl wearing blue jeans if you surprise her with your touch.) The fact that he was charged with two counts is curious. (Or maybe evidence of how petty and extreme the over-charging was in this case.)
So it will be interesting to see how any plea in this case is worked out. CSC-4th is a misdemeanor. There could be a plea to that misdemeanor, with no more than a fine, public service and probation. But there might also be a sex offender registration requirement. My best guess is that because this was a brief shoving match between two combatants (Perry and a woman he apparently did not know) over a place in line on a public sidewalk, somebody is going to think better about any "Criminal Sexual Contact" charge.
The other charges from Grant's night in E. Lansing were a felony/resisting an officer and a minor in possession. Both amenable to HYTA as far as I know.
This was always going to be a good case for some skilled defense lawyering. I hope MGoBloger/lawyer Jonathan Paul weighs in when we know more.
This:
"I think Perry's actions would be viewed quite differently here if he played for a rival."
So yeah; this Board, and the RCMB and the 11W forums (and you can check them all out, right now) are pretty terrible for reasoned discussion on anything concerning a rival player.
For my part, I defended OSU band director Jon Waters, and OSU's expelled QB/WR Torrance Gibson, with the same earnestness and principles that I criticized the expulsion of Brendan Gibbons.
Rest assured that if the alleged victim in E. Lansing had been a Michigan student with the incident occurring on campus, Title IX might have taken Grant Perry out of the football program and out of the University six months ago.
I really do happen to think that as far as being a team disciplinarian, Urban Meyer is beyond reproach. I find no fault with Harbaugh, or Rodriguez. And with Brady Hoke, the problem was mosty his incompetent handling of the press and public statements, for a guy who otherwise cared about his players deeply and wanted to do the right thing. Dantonio; I dunno. That's a target-rich environment. Dantonio won't have to make a decision (or three decisions) on the current mess. (The mess du jour.) MSU's Title IX enforcers are going to take them out of school altogether.
Urban meyer beyond reproach. At first I thought the guy was making a joke. Shit just look at his coaching staff with the addition of wilson who was just fired from another big ten school for questionable stuff. I have always questioned osu's recruiting and with meyer I truly believe they are the new bama. I don't know about johnson but there is no doubt schiano new and maybe even witnessed sandusky in all his glory. Osu has the slimiest staff and by far the most obnoxious, uncooth and nastiest fan base in the big ten bar none. Urban Meyer is the ring leader of all this and it fits him like a glove.
...that has been widely reported, including the Daily and LSJ. But I haven't seen a .pdf of it. I always want to see police reports in the original. Because they are so often flawed.
Like the Taylor Lewan "threatened a witness" police (University of Michigan "Police," not AAPD) report, which was a really careless bit of crap-writing.
The description was that Perry grabbed her "groin region" in the altercation over places in line for a bar. I think that there was mention of "her vagina" as well, but again I presume that everyone was fully clothed (on a crowded East Lansing sidewalk at just past midnight).
I got the impression that the altercation was verbally nasty (with Perry a full participant in the nastiness, trash-talking and all) but barely physical.
I am just guessing, but it may well be that the two "CSC" charges might be converted to a misdemeanor simple assault and, as I outlined above, then subject to general HYTA provisions.
For those happy to have him back now, think about your rival's coach talking to a recruit's mom about how things are done in Ann Arbor. Not the picture I would want portrayed.
GRANTed!! Now let's Perry this into a strong season. Could use his experience with the young studs. Gonna be strong at WR this season.
GO BLUE!!
Happy the kid gets a second chance... There will not (and should not) be a third.
Here's the difficulty that always arises in these types of cases: criminal law imposes a different standard than what might make sense for an educational institution, and criminal cases proceed at a pace that might not make sense for decision-making in an educational environment. If a football team were simply to follow criminal courts on issues such as these, players who ultimately are acquitted would nevertheless be prevented from playing where the cases had not been fully adjudicated. That's not fair to the players. On the other hand, the lack of a conviction doesn't necessarily mean a crime wasn't committed, and nothing should stop coaches from exercising common sense where appropriate.
Bottom line is that you need good reason -- which is some cases may exist separate from a criminal conviction -- to assess the conduct of team members. Here, absent good reason to think Harbaugh acted unethically, we should give him some benefit of the doubt.
I understand how the criminal system works compared to non-judicial tribunals such as what schools employ. And while I recognize that student-athletes who are acquitted or plea would be "hurt" due to lost games/practices, in very few cases are the inciting incident not something they at least had a part in creating. I mean, in this case it is without debate that Perry was underage and had a fake ID, got drunk at a rival's bar, and got into some level of altercation with a woman that ended with police involvement. Everyone does dumb things in college and it shouldn't destroy your life, but Perry wasn't kicked out of school. Playing football is a privilege, not a right, and so doing a couple of dumb-but-illegal things opens you up to losing that privilege, even temporarily, in the event you are caught. So I have limited sympathy for him.
I don't mind him being let back on the team; again, he'll get some punishment and then move on with his life. But I'm just surprised Harbaugh would bring him back to the team so quickly while pending a court date.
Grant Perry has shown disrespect for women, for the police, and for his teammates (by kneeling during the playing of the national anthem while in his UofM uniform).
I guess we just have different standards.
Holy shit what a take.
are felonies. if they make it an 'attempted R & O', then it becomes a misdemeanor. that is a common resolution. that said, so many times the serious sounding felony of R & O is for totally ticky-tack nonsense and it is used as a bludgeon for some technical offense (even hesitation can be an R & O) that doesn't warrant any type of charge, much less a felony.