For several years Richie Incognito was voted by players across the NFL, as its Dirtiest Player. As Dolphin fans, many of us chuckled that our man, Richie (he was never a boy), really had a special gift for getting under the skin of his competitors. Now, as more details emerge from the golf incident, the diatribe of profane and bigoted texts and the treatment of the Asian assistant trainer, we get a clearer message why Richie kept on winning the award. Maybe his bipolar sociopath tendencies made him unsuitable to be the O-line team leader to mentor young players. The good Richie, bad Richie description seems pretty accurate. Turner, as O-line Coach should have been monitoring the situation much closer and definitely not fueling it.
I am still of the belief that Jake Long was better able at keeping Richie in check and his departure to St Louis is when things unravelled. My hunch is that Jake was the one guy in the locker room who Richie respected. I can see Richie being suspended by the NFL. He's lucky the girl from the golf day incident didn't press charges with the police. The $30K payoff was a joke. The effort to suppress the incident and subsequent $50K fine by the team should have been flagged to the NFL that Richie was out of control.
Can anyone remember the advertisement that Richie did at the Palm Beach Croquet Club where he is the spokesman for proper behavior off the field? It was a great ad but now seems pretty ironic given the swathe of behavior related incidents that now surface.
Yes, it all makes more sense now.
I've only just this morning read parts of the report. Page 90 forward, about 25 pages and it's mind blowing to me. The Turner doll thing, and another assistant saying I heard about your sister. The coaches embarrassing a gay player over and over and Martin SEEING that. No wonder Martin didn't want to speak out, he sees what happens when you're seen as different. He was trying to fit in, over and over.
And I think we can say the unspoken here, that Martin is not only an ivy league, sensitive guy who was always bullied in school, and growing up black in white neighborhoods, but also that he's probably bisexual. In fact Richie hints at it over and over. So Martin was struggling with this part of his identity as well, while he's being abused by his closest friend, and ganged up on by other linemen. Martin is not blameless of course, I give him a lot of blame. But I understand why it all happened, now.
You're correct in assuming Jake Long held things in check, I thought that as well, in fact a long time ago. I just didn't know how much he actually held together. I want to finish reading this report, but I don't have plans to sit at a computer all morning so I'll read a few more pages tomorrow. I want to check the dates. Turner met with Martin May 2013 about the suicide, after the draft, so Ireland didn't have knowledge of this while making a decision not to draft a LT or hire Albert. But there had to be indications of problems before that, and I don't know why the team didn't get a replacement for LT knowing that Martin was deteriorating. Seems that the whole Dolphins FO had their head up their arse. Even when they got him a psychologist, it's an 84 year old guy, who never delved into the real issues. It's almost like a military mentality....have military docs on staff to patch them up and put them back on the front line.
And as you said, the flags were there over and over about Incognito, and the coaches let him stay on the team, and mentor your top LT prospect out of college. Unbelievable.
Lack of teaching, coaching, mentoring on this team.
