Why it’s time for the NFL to crack down on domestic violence

Over the past few days, sports fan or not, you’ve probably heard about the disgusting story on New York Giants kicker Josh Brown, how he abused his now ex-wife more than 20 times over the course of their marriage, and that the Giants and the NFL more or less turned a blind eye to it.

Brown had originally said that his allegation of abuse against his ex-wife in May 2015 that led to his one-game suspension to begin this season was just a “one-time moment.” However, we now know that this is not true.

Now, documents released recently by the Kings County Sheriff’s Office in Washington tell a different story in the case of Brown. Part of this release included journals and emails coming from Brown that were turned over to the police following his arrest in May 2015.

He said in one journal entry, “I have abused my wife.” Another email sent to some of his friends read, “I made selfish decisions to use and abuse women at the age of 7,” he said. “I objectified (women) and never really worried about the pain and hurt I caused them.”
This whole ordeal has turned into a mess, and the blame is being put on the Giants and team owner John Mara. They made their first mistake two months before training camp in 2015 when they found about Brown’s arrest and decided to not do anything about it. What makes this even more revolting is that they made the decision to sign Brown to a two-year contract extension later that spring with more than plenty of free agent kickers looking for jobs.
The NFL began its investigation after 10 months, and at the end of it, there was yet another brutal mistake made. Brown was suspended for only one game. According to the NFL’s domestic abuse policy, the minimum suspension is supposed to be six games for first-time offenders of this type of issue. Still, the Giants didn’t cut Brown.

The first good decision was made today when the Giants decided that Brown would not travel to London for the team’s game against the Rams on Sunday.

However, as interesting it will be to see what type of discipline the NFL hands down to Brown and possibly the entire Giants organization, the NFL has made a colossal mess out of this one already. This is yet another example of the NFL’s front offices making mistakes about suspensions for different types of offenses. Ray Rice was suspended indefinitely by the league for his elevator video of him abusing his then-fiancee in September 2014, for which he has been reinstated, but his football career is more or less over. Greg Hardy was suspended for 10 games in July 2014 for assaulting an ex-girlfriend, as well as 18 months of probation. From what we have seen, both of those have been one-time incidents for these players.

I just can’t see why the NFL cracked down so hard on these players for one-time incidents. If these newly-released documents are true, the one-game suspension looks awful for the NFL. Brown, who abused his wife more than 20 times, is not seen as that bad, but Rice and Hardy, who I’m not defending in the least bit, are menaces who are bad for the league? I’m not excusing the latter two for their behavior, it just makes no sense to me as of right now. The NFL is conducting an investigation, and Brown should be suspended for much longer than those two.

The Giants are always stressing their “values” and what a classy organization that they are, but what they have done in this case is totally irresponsible and wrong. This throws all of those “values” out the door. They did the right thing for the first time earlier today when they made the decision to not have Brown travel with the team.

However, more needs to be done about this. The Giants need to cut him, and do it soon, as this situation won’t get any better anytime soon. The NFL needs to wake up. This is a man who is 37 years old and is clearly in the twilight of his career. Whether or not the Giants terminate his contract, a very long suspension is necessary for this case. This one is much more vile and terrible than the ones involving Hardy and Rice. Josh Brown has no business, in any way, shape, or form, to ever set foot on a NFL field again. Goodell should force Brown into retirement by the means of some type of very long ban. I would even be okay with a lifetime ban, even though that has next to no chance of happening. I think a two-year ban is the punishment that best fits the crime in this particular case. Goodell needs to wake up and hand down one of the most harsh suspensions in NFL history. it only makes sense.