By: Billy BeerSlugger
My award for BeerSlugger of the week goes to Georgia running back Washaun Ealey who was supposedly victimized by an eye gouging incident this past weekend in the Florida vs. Georgia rivalry game.
Florida linebacker Brandon Spikes was suspended for half an upcoming game for apparently trying to gouge the eyes of Ealey but Ealey came to the defense of Spikes per an ESPN report.
“He shouldn’t, I think, get suspended at all. We were just out there playing football… He really didn’t gouge my eyes, He really didn’t get a chance to get close to my eyes… I’m pretty sure it goes on back and forth… We probably do it and other teams do too. It’s all football. We’re just out there trying to have fun.”.
It’s refreshing to hear a player, a freshman I might add, speak to the toughness of the game and not play victim even though his team lost. Spikes caught a lot of flack over the replay of him reaching into Ealey’s helmet. Guys like Mike Golic of Mike & Mike in the Morning saying that kind of behavior doesn’t have any place in football etc. Well I’d like to hear some former players that opposed Golic and hear that he was a saint on the field, that he never cut blocked anyone or did anything that would be considered to “not have a place in football”. Some of your hero’s, some of the best players in NCAA and NFL history employed dirty tactics to win games and needle opponents. It’s not a foul if you don’t get caught and it’s only within the last 5 or so years that with the help of technology we have been able to view these sorts of fouls and pick them out very easily. Like Ealey stated his team probably does it to other teams too. Spikes just happen to get caught on TV and then ESPN took hold of it making a “no harm-no foul” play into a national story.
We ask our football players to be on the edge at all times on the field, to play with emotion, to sacrifice their body to make a tackle or block a 250 pound player running at you for 40 yards at full speed on a kickoff. We ask this of our players and then when they let emotion get the best of them, when they step over that line we chastise them as dirty players and they are ridiculed in the mainstream media. Never mind if Spikes’ helmet went flying off on a play and he got hit, even if unintentional. Never mind if there was an obscene amount of trash talk on both sides and this is a huge rivalry game.
It’s great that Washaun Ealey, the supposed victim, can come out and shed light on the incident, “We were just out there playing football and having fun.”. To players like Ealey and Spikes, the game is fun and these underhanded things to get under the opposing teams skin and gain an advantage any way you can is just part of the game. What does everyone think happens at the bottom of a pile after a fumble recovery? Do you think the players are huddled together on the ground discussing the state of the economy? NO, the team that doesn’t have the ball is punching the guy who does in the gut, in the groin and gouging whatever part of the face that a player can get his hand into to try and get that guy to let go of the ball.
At least in Football you have pads and helmets, if a team wants to go after you in Rugby you’re pretty much due for a trip to the Emergency Room.
As for the suspension, he got caught he’s suspended for a half. Notice it was not an NCAA suspension but a team suspension. I’ve talked to people and they think Spikes should be gone for at least a game but Ealey wasn’t even hurt. It’s really hard to actually get your hand beyond a face mask and do damage. Just another case of ESPN making a bigger deal of something that happens pretty regularly and thus swaying public opinion on a player who for all we know could be the nicest guy you’ve ever met off the field.
I would have suspended Spikes for a Quarter and told him to not get caught again.
PS: For disclosure sake, I hate Florida football with a passion.
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