bad news dump usually happens on Friday. Not sure why it
didn't happen last Friday. Maybe they didn't want to drop
a turd into the combine punch bowl that really
probably hadn't thought about that. I really hadn't thought
about that. That's probably the case. Yes, probably think so.
Right
maybe even part of recent, maybe part of the reason is, do
it on a Monday. Make sure it does catch news. Make sure it
does set. An example for the rest of the league.
Maybe, this is something the NFL is. Yeah, they're not going
to shy away from this has got to be A firm. No. Like, yeah,
this can't happen. And they're just realize, they got to fight
this one head-on.
And for those of you who wonder what we're talking about Calvin
Ridley, the Falcons has been suspended for at least a year
for betting on games. During the time that he was on
the non-football illness list away from the team in Florida with
his
cell phone device.
Made some Wagers bet on the Falcons as part of a parlay.
$1500, he admits he
bet
and he gave up the goods when the NFL found out about it. The
NFL was alerted
to it by a third party, vendor. It's all electronic. It's all
available. It's not like in the old days when you had a bookie
and nobody knew anything about anyone and it was
easier to avoid creating a clear electronic footprint of
your activities. So if nothing else would Calvin Ridley, Did
was extremely
stupid. Here's why it's stupid.
Players are told,
I mean time. Yes.
That on football. Right? Can't. You just can't do it.
And we can talk about whether to what extent, we should be
showing some sympathy, some compassion, some understanding
the guy had stuff going on in his life. Obviously. He wasn't
with the team and
to what I look at it this way because
because my son's 25, he may be older than Calvin Ridley.
Whenever my son does something
really. Dumb, and he doesn't do really dumb things very often
anymore. But but when your child does something dumb,
there's usually an explanation for it. That isn't necessarily
dumb. It helps you understand the stupidity and at the court
still may be something very stupid.
But usually there's more to the story.
So I I just I look at it this way. This guy's the fifth
player in more than 100 Years of NFL football,
only the fifth player to be suspended for gambling on
football games and it is a severe punishment. It's always
been a one year and I will, they only want five times.
They've got much more flexibility than that, but it's
always been one year.
Alex, Karras, and Paul hornung in 1963
archly. Stir in 1983.
Josh Shaw, which I had forgotten about in 2019. He was
a manager preserve, right Cardinals. Yeah, one year. R
for him, it's always one year. Yeah, but I just I look at this
and I say,
hopefully, he appeals and people say, well why she
bothers already admitted to it? It's one thing to admit to it.
It's another thing to say.
Is it really deserve a whole year, right? Does it deserve
a full year? Because what? Because I want to see
the evidence that there was something he was doing that in
some way, undermine the Integrity of
the game, other than merely placing the bets, right?
Without any inside information. Oh, is he calling teammates? Is
he calling coaches as you try to get information about what
they're planning to do and the mere fact that it was a
parley bet tells me that he was just screwing around. This
isn't. Oh, I have some variations inside
an affirmation leave. Yeah, so I'm going to put a bunch of money
on that try to make a big score.
That's and and I understand you can't have a blurry line.
I'm just
I just I hope I hope that the commissioner ultimately
Takes a broader. Look at this,
especially in light
of the fact that the NF is currently making tens. If not
hundreds of millions of dollars, two hundred seventy
million. I think was the figure in estimated gambling revenue
for the NFL
this past year, from sponsorships seven,
different gambling, sponsorships
for the NFL. And I and look, I understand. And I've been
through this on Twitter. There's a certain hypocrisy
that's baked into it, but there are plenty of
Where you can't partake in
the thing that that the
company does to make its money, I get it. I just hope that
they'll be some Nuance, some sympathy, and some compassion
for Calvin Ridley in this case,
because he did admit to it right away. Because there is no
evidence that it was a broader issue
or that. He was undermining the Integrity of the game with
the use of inside information or actively on the field, trying
to engineer the outcome a certain way. He was on
the non-football on this list. He was detached from the team. And
he got bored on a Sunday and he made some bets. I'm not saying
it's okay. I'm just saying, let's not just have one year,
one year, one year, one year without regard to
the circumstances. If someone ever does this. It's a
pretty strong message. But, but maybe there should be
a little more flexibility. That's all I'm saying.
I don't disagree with you there. I mean first off. Hey,
it was, it's a dumb move. Right? I mean, we know that
with Calvin, really just to bring you back. What players
here, as far as, you know, gambling and how that goes.
It's really one of the First videos you watch when you
Come an NFL football player and get drafted. You go to
the Ricky, rookie Symposium, you know, they play a video about,
hey, here's life in the NFL. The first thing they hit on is
gambling
and how its prohibited in the NFL.
So, you know, that there's no way around not, knowing that
gambling is not allowed by NFL players or employees or
anything of that nature. Then you get to training camp, just
a few weeks later
after that rookie Symposium,
and you really see the same video, again.
There's going to be NFL officials that are going to be there
to kind of
Lay the land. Hey, here's some new rules in the NFL to be some
spoke smart person there. And again, you're going to see
another video that's going to tell you. It's just going to
spend three to four minutes telling you
gambling is prohibited and you're not allowed to do that.
So there's no way around it. Let alone everybody in
the locker room knows and you just don't mess around with that.
That's the so that to me is the first thing where I just go,
man. How could he do this?
How could you, how could you do this? And especially in this
way with an app downloaded and it's, you know, it sounds like
it was all through his name.
It's not even a friend's name or anything like that.
So but there's there's the first mistake certainly
there's no way around that in the NFL.
Now as far as that now the rest of the punishment. Mike I'm
with you. I mean
Common Sense here a little bit. We talked about common sense
and officiating a lot through the NFL season. This is one
where, you know, again, yeah, it's a star football player.
We know that again, Integrity of the game is legit and we all
want it to be, you know, No, perfect. And the way we you
know
as far as competitive and nobody cheating, but at the same time
to take a year away from a player,
you know for this I get it. Yes. It's betting
but you could still make the same mark on the guy by
suspending them. Eight games. Eight games is still everyone's
gonna go. Whoa. Wow, he's missing half a year. That would
get the point across.
For what much, how much money was it? Fifteen hundred dollars,
you know, again, no evidence of anything else.
I understand. There's like a No, you know, no,
you know, what do I want to say no-nonsense policy with this?
But come on here
to meet for a guy like Calvin Ridley
to lose a full year. That doesn't seem right either.
There's got to be, you know, some common ground here and
hopefully, he does appeal it and get some games. Knocked off
of this.
It did try to tweet his way through it, and hopefully,
he would have had better advice than what he got when he
tweeted his way through it. But again,
I don't want to say that that dumb decisions
justify this kind of punishment.