Ray Rice released by Ravens and banned indefinitely by NFL

adrian522 wrote: »

I don't understand what has changed today?

He originally got a 2 game ban with his team sticking by him. No new information has come to light since then. Everything we know today we knew weeks ago.

This is completely hypocritical from Godell and the Ravens. Both of those moves should have been done originally (contracted terminated and Rice suspended indefinitely).

Hazys wrote: »

Before i say this, i believe Ray Rice is a scumbag and i thought the 2 game suspensions was a joke but does anybody think that the indefinite suspension (i presume will be a year) and cutting is too harsh?

Its not like Rice is the first NFL player to beat his wife/gf sure Dez Bryant allegedly punched his mom. Ray Rice punched a women in the face. He is a professional athlete with a huge strength of advantage and it was nowhere near a fair fight but at the end of the day it is assault. How many players have assaulted weaker individuals outside bars and clubs,etc in the past couple of seasons? Dozens but none got a year ban.

I think Rice is a "victim" of how badly the NFL and the Ravens handled the situation. If the NFL originally banned Rice for lets say 8 games and the Ravens http://b-static.net/vbulletin/images/icons/icon4.pngcondemned him, i think that mostly would have been the end of it. Sure some people wouldn't have been happy with only 8 games but at the end of the day he assaulted somebody, he didn't murder somebody like Hernandez, or kill and torture dogs like Vick or manslaughter somebody like Stallworth. So i don't think he deserves a year ban.

People were outraged at the 2 game ban and rightfully so, it was a joke (especially since Gordon was banned for a year for weed). The outrage only grew because of that. Once the video came out today, the NFL and Ravens saw the back lash over night and tried to cover their tracks by banning and cutting him. No way the NFL and Ravens didn't see the video because there were multiple reports saying that they did. They came out lying through their teeth and with their actions today, they are pretending to show fake outrage, when all they realized today was this was going to hurt their bottom line.

IMO the NFL and Ravens have come out extremely badly in this.

bruschi wrote: »

This is what I don't get. He hit his wife and knocked her unconscious. Got a 2 game ban and the ravens publicly backed him.

What did people expect to see in the video? Why does the video make any difference now? Ravens have handled this horribly, and I don't get how people can praise them for this.

infacteh wrote: »

i see the wife has reached out on Twitter

Knex. wrote: »

Well, being the cynical bastard that I am, my thought process on the above:

"I stayed with this fuck, because he's absolutely loaded and can give me the lifestyle that I want. Now you've not only taken away that lifestyle from both himself and me, but I'm stuck with him and his soon to be broke ass for the foreseeable future".

Knex. wrote: »

Well, he's still missing on on a fair whack of money, and its not like he's gonna get a job in media or college ball for a hell of a while after this.

More money than I will ever see, but still, a big enough hit on what they both expected to have, I would think.

poldebruin wrote: »

I agree the NFL, Goodell and the Ravens have all handled this poorly, awfully. But why should Goodell resign over this. His job is not to hand out punishment in lieu of the American Justice system.

Rice is suspended indefinitely. I'm sure the suspension will be lifted after some requisite amount of time, but unless Rice pulls a Vick PR move, he is done in the NFL. Someone mentioned that had Vicks deeds been caught on video, he would never have been brought back, and I agree 100%. It might actually benefit Rice's cause to have served some time in jail for this, and return to the NFL a chastened and reformed man.

Sept. 9, 2014

Dear Ravens Stakeholder:

You deserve an explanation.

What happened with the Ray Rice incident? How could it come to this? Why didn’t we act earlier?

As a PSL holder, suite owner, sponsor and supporter, you have a stake in us. You have invested in us – emotionally as well as financially, trusted us, and believed in us. We value that trust and owe you full disclosure.

First, let us say that we did not do all we should have done and no amount of explanation can remedy that. What we can do now is share with you everything that occurred and vow to learn from all that has happened.

Here is how the situation unfolded, and here are our thoughts behind the decisions we made.

On the morning of Feb. 15, we learned that Ray and his then fiancé, Janay, had been arrested at an Atlantic City casino, and both had been charged with “simple assault” resulting from an altercation with each other. After the couple was taken to police headquarters, and after a report was written, they were allowed to leave together.

A number of Ravens’ representatives talked with Ray during the course of that day. His explanation was that after he and Janay had consumed a great deal of alcohol, they had had an argument and that they struck each other.

We at the Ravens organization issued a statement to the media that we were aware of the incident, that we had talked with Ray, and that he deserved the due process of law.

We then began our own process to discover as much as we could about what happened. We talked with representatives of the casino, the police who arrested the couple, the prosecutor and a lawyer who represented both Ray and Janay in the case. Soon after, the video of Janay and Ray coming out of the elevator became public.

We contacted the casino management and asked if there was video of the incident from inside the elevator that we could see. The casino would not share such video. We asked the local New Jersey police and the police refused as well. We asked the prosecutor’s office and that office refused. It was our understanding at that time that Ray’s attorney had not yet seen the video. NFL officials had been informed, and we know they were also trying to retrieve and/or see the video.

Assessing the situation at of the end of February, this is what we knew: A player who had been a model citizen in the community and terrific teammate for six seasons had been charged with simple assault against his fiancé. At that time, his fiancé Janay had been similarly charged.

Ray and Janay both told us nothing like this had happened before. He was showing great remorse; they were meeting regularly with our team chaplain and were diligently attending couples counseling.

In March, the prosecutor dropped the case against Janay, but elevated the charge against Ray from simple assault to aggravated assault. At this point, we decided to defer action until completion of the court proceedings. We stopped seeking to view or obtain a copy of the video. We halted our fact-finding. That was a mistake on our part.

In May, the prosecutor recommended, and the judge agreed, that Ray should be accepted into a pre-trial intervention program that will eventually have the assault charge dismissed from his record, pending a year of good behavior.
The police had seen video from inside the elevator. The prosecutor and the judge, who had also seen such video, allowed Ray into the program that would eventually clear him of the assault charge.

On June 16, Ray and Janay met with Commissioner Roger Goodell, who then announced on July 27 that Ray Rice would be suspended for the first two games of the season. Ray subsequently met with the media and answered questions.

Yesterday morning Sept 8, all of us saw the video from inside the elevator. It is violent and horrifying. I immediately came to the office and called a meeting with Dick Cass, Ozzie Newsome, John Harbaugh and Kevin Byrne. The meeting was relatively short. The decision to let Ray Rice go was unanimous. Seeing that video changed everything. We should have seen it earlier. We should have pursued our own investigation more vigorously. We didn’t and we were wrong.

We are moving forward and believe we can help put more of a spotlight on intimate partner violence, while increasing education and awareness to this issue to all in our organization. Our recently announced partnership with the House of Ruth is a start.

We view ourselves as a family. Like families, we have used tough love in the past (fines, benching and releases) with repeat offenders. Because of his positive contributions on and off the field over the last six years, Ray had earned every benefit of the doubt from our organization. We took everything we knew and decided to support Ray Rice until we could not.

We hope that Ray will continue to work to be the best husband, father and person he can be, and he will turn this awful situation into something positive. We also have learned a great deal and will continue to strive to be an organization and team you and Baltimore will be proud of. I am sorry we let you down.

Sincerely,

Stephen J. Bisciotti
Owner, Baltimore Ravens