RedRamage

I totally do not understand the Global Markets Program. I don't get why teams need to make a "bid" for certain countries given that there doesn't seem to be a limit on how many teams can get awarded a given country.

https://theathletic.com/5367020/2024/03/25/nfl-hip-drop-tackle-ban/ The NFLPA was against it. So my problems with this: 1. How easy is it going to be to determine if the hips "swiveled" or not? I guess we'll see how it plays out, but this seems like it could be very subjective and if a player gets flagged for it a few things will refs start watching that player in particular more closely? 2. I don't like that it's conditional on landing on and trapping a runner's legs. So if a defender does a hip drop trying to avoid the legs and the runner spins at the last second to try to get out of it and hey... look at that, a leg is trapped. 15 yard penalty because the runner did something the defender had no control over.

Do we have the exact question/answer? Seems like a lot of paraphrasing going on...

Yeah, I'm sorta starting to think the same thing. If he was dead I would expect that someone would have found his body at this point. I don't think suicidal people generally try to hide their impending death... like he's not going to travel to the middle of some swamp and kill himself there. And even if he did I would expect his family/friends/etc. to be saying: "We don't know where he is, we're worried about him, etc." like you're saying. I'm starting to wonder if he fled the country. What he allegedly did may not be something you flee the country for, but he also may not have been of sound mind when he did it. If he panicked at the time... maybe he thought he'd killed her? Maybe he just wasn't thinking straight?... if he ran then, now it's kinda hard to come back three weeks later.

It's the paid part that I have an issue with. It's a public black eye. Sure, you're not using him on your team (if this happens during the season) but you're still paying millions of dollars to an accused woman beater. And the team is penalized to an extent cause they may want to give the player the benefit of the doubt and a chance to defend himself, but if they keep him on they lose the money and if he ends up guilty they would have been better off cutting him early.

I still think the NFL needs a way that teams can put players in a "limbo" state where they're not paid, but also not cut. With how things have played out this would NOT apply to Sutton's situation, but in a hypothetical situation... let's say Sutton turned himself in, cooperated with police, and claimed he didn't do the things he was accused of. What would the Lions do then? Do you keep the player on the team? Did you suspend him, but keep paying him (if the legal issues extend into the season)? Do you cut him and risk losing him to another team it turns out the accessor lied? From a PR perspective the NFL should have a way to distance themselves from the player, without paying him, until the case is resolved. Once it's cleared up the Team has "retroactively" cut him and recoup the money in escrow, or keep the player and he gets his back pay.

Yeah. As much as I preached "wait and see" when this first all came out, I don't think it's possible to defend Sutton at this point. There's really no reasonable way that he could NOT know that he's wanted at this point and evading, while not in anyway shape or form a proof of guilt, it looks very, very bad. And I'm sure the Lions have attempted to communicate with Sutton and I'm also pretty sure he has not reached out to them, which is more evidence for the employer that something is very off.

As much as I was pleading for waiting until we have all the evidence, there's enough evidence now that something ain't quite right. Should we throw him in jail because of that? Heck no! But is there enough here for the NFL to takes steps? Heck yeah!

It really, really doesn't seem like Holmes MO is to go after the big name FA/Trade acquisitions. This was easy enough to explain away early in that the team was crap and needed overhauls all over the place and spending big money on one or two big names was a bad use of resources. But the Lions right now are very much in that situation of "one key player away" if you buy into that mentality. They were 30 minutes away from the SB and really didn't lose any major pieces outside of Jonah Jackson. This would absolutely be the time that you go "all in" if you were going to do it. But Holmes hasn't and there's no evidence that he plans to or tried to but couldn't get the big name he wanted. So I don't think Sneed was a real option ever for the Lions. I think the Chiefs would be asking for more than Holmes was willing to give up. Holmes is sorta like the Anti-Dombrowski in that regard.

Why? Is Lamb carrying someone on his back?

But IF he had done it, then he would have fled in that manner. But only IF.

Yeah, any pretense of benefit of the doubt that I would have given him yesterday is out the window now. There's no way he doesn't know that the police are looking for him... well, unless he's not alive anymore, which would make a very bad, sad, awful situation even worse.

I'd be interested to see percentages compared to the normal population. I do expect football players to be higher... between the "big man on campus" to young people getting millions of dollars to bring conditioned to be physically violent for their job... yeah, I expect those things to cause a higher percentage to be getting into trouble with the law. But, I also expect that there's a higher percentage of normal people who've gotten into trouble with the law. Between brothers and brothers-in-law I've got 5. One had an arrest warrant out for him because of reckless driving (ended up that he just got a ticket so wasn't a huge deal), and another spent a few months in jail. I suspect another was arrested for a DUI, but I don't know that for sure. So you could say that 50% of my brothers has trouble with the law and you'd never know it based on who they are now. Now if they'd been football stars in their youth when these things happened, you probably would have heard about it.

Looks like the tweet has been deleted.

Yeah, assuming it's true this is a bad crime and a bad, bad look for any team that would take him on. In theory he could rehabilitate himself over a few years and maybe make a comeback, but given he was never a star player and is already 29 I don't see that being likely.

Hey Mike, domestic abuse happens every day. I'm assuming you've never thoughts about mundane things during this time because your focus has always been on the victims of this abuse, right?

No, the Lions aren't legally guilty of anything. But public opinion =/= legal standing. If the court of public opinion says Sutton is guilty and a despicable person, the Lions be keeping him on the roster are also guilty (in the court of public opinion) by not disassociating themselves. Depends on if they are only paying him in season or if it's split over 12 months. My wife, a teacher, gets paid year round even though she only teaches ~9months.

Which again is part of the problem. This makes sense legally speaking, but optically the narrative is this guy threw his gf out a third story window and now is evading police... but the Lions are still employing him? Still paying him? Do they not care about women!?!? Do they not care about stopping domestic violence?!?

Saying we don't know all the facts is not "defending" him. And based on the information that is coming out, it's looking more and more like Sutton is attempting to evade the police. We still don't know all the fact, but it definitely not looking good and not leaning in his favor.

Which again is why I want that other special status... Based on what info is being thrown around it certainly seems likely that there's fire tied to this smoke. But we don't know for sure, and independent of this situation there may be other situations where it's less clear if there's fire or not. A team is in a catch-22... if they cut the player and he's found innocent, they potentially lost out on his talent. The player gets a public black eye because he was cut and losing out on his salary. But if a team doesn't cut the player right quickly and he's found guilty the team gets the black eye for paying and associating with a bad individual. A temporary status protects the teams and the players and the image. "We're temporarily disassociating ourselves from this player until all the facts are known and he has his day in court. If he's guilty, he's gone and doesn't get back pay. If he's innocent he's restore to full status and gets his back pay."

A.) I have no idea. I'm sure they tried to call more than once and left a message if they were able. That doesn't mean that Sutton say a number, recognized it as the same number, and figured it was an important call (ie, not a spam/scam call) and decided to ignore it. It does mean that Sutton has voice messages turned on, and if he does that his mailbox isn't full, and if it isn't that he actually checked and listened to his voice message. Now IF he really did throw his gf out a 3rd story window, he's got expect the police are looking for him and then it might be reasonably to think he's trying to hide from the police. But again this is conjecture. We don't know. Once we do know and if he is evading/hiding, then I'll be in agreement with GoBLue: Cut him now. B.) The except list still pays the player. I want a way for the team to NOT pay the player until the situation gets settled. Then if the player is found not guilty and the team wants to keep him, he gets all the money that was in escrow. If he's found guilty or if at any point the team wants to void the contract the money goes back to the team.

You're conjecturing a lot of things here... We don't know what the police have or haven't done to try to contact him. Are they just calling his cellphone? If it's an unknown number I don't usually pick up when I get a call. Did the police contact his agent or the Lions to ask if they could get them in touch with him? If so, did the agent or the Lions contact Sutton and he still didn't contact the police? I'm loath to take drastic action without proof of guilt. What the NFL needs to do (and other sport too) is have an "administrative leave" sorta situation where a team can put a player on this list. During that time the players paychecks go into escrow and the player is not considered as on the roster. This would let teams evaluate what's going on without penalty to them or the player until the facts are confirmed.

But what if the contract is voided? If there's a clause in the contract that let's the Lions void it if the accusation is proven true do the Lions get all the money back for the cap?

I don't think that's a given. If a team is looking at a closing SB window and their QB goes down in week 3 or 4 or something like that they may be willing to overpay for someone who they may view as more talented. I dunno if they'd go up to a Rnd 2 pick, but I could easily see someone paying a 4, maybe a 3 depending on various circumstances. That said I heard at least one report that the Bears want to question of who the QB is and who the leader of the team is. If Fields was still around that could have an impact on team dynamics. Then the question is if hanging on to Fields in the hopes that the just the right team has their QB go down so they can get a 4, maybe a 3 instead of a 6... is it worth the potential locker room issues?

Where's the part where he allegedly was racist?