DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Pure Football Forum Manziel (Continued)

I believe the issue is JM being a distraction not rehab or addictions. Bret Farve was addicted to pain killers at one point. What's more distracting drinking at a club or wearing a goofy hat chugging beer from a duck boat?

If it hasn't affected his play on the field is it really an issue?

Usually because it's something obscene or illegal or highly offensive.. not having some drinks back at your old college.

Pettine has never like Manziel (maybe it's because of the way he acted his rookie year, it might even go back farther than that in that he didn't want him).. he has looked for every reason to not play him and Manziel has provided him more than enough reasons... it honestly looks to me like Pettine is using this as his "final straw".. even though it is one of the most minor things we've seen... and Manziel has actually started playing better..

So if he were to run a dog killing operation go to prison or get under aged girls drunk and abuse them in the women's room or abuse his child or drive his car in to parking meters with under age girls he'd be OK just don't get yourself help from addiction by checking into rehab.

Because he's really, really good.

Slippery slope much?

So it's not really about a lack of professional integrity at all. But you'll never know if JM could be really really good if he never gets on the field.

This deserves quoting at least one more time.

If the FO feels this is such a volatile situation THE ONLY LOGICAL thing to do is watch him crash and burn - on the field and off. It's what you've invested all of this time, turmoil and money in, their response is to find a new way to screw it up (and we wonder how the team always finds new ways to lose). Where does it end?? These guys REVEL in their own misery, drunk on their own stupidity, and they worry about "Johnny" drinking some champagne? It's uncanny.

Hypocritical? We're not even a year removed from a "coach" helping the toxic "Josh Gorden" get smashed on an airplane. What a joke. I could put monkeys in a room and get better results.

I gotta be honest - I don't think the "light at the end of the tunnel" has ever seemed further away. I read posts here about QBS staying in school to avoid being drafted by the Browns and KNOW that I would not even be shocked if it happened. THAT'S rock bottom.

It's about professional integrity. And that Manziel wasn't immediately good. Roethlisberger never gave the Steelers a choice.

Johnny Football +
Canadian Club =

Johnny Canadian Football

Abusing women isn't a choice?

Which of these photos is Johnny's worse than?

http://www.complex.com/sports/2011/08/the-craziest-drunk-athlete-photos/1

the description of #2 sounds like JFF. too bad it was Big Ben.

Ben Roethlisberger

Just before Big Ben went on to win his first Super Bowl (and rack up a couple sexual assault accusations), some pictures surfaced showing that he already knows how to party like a champ. To win a Super Bowl you have to be aggressive, a little reckless, and very persistent—on the field, that is.

Ok besides this making no sense at all it shows your true intelligence. None.

Screw this franchise. The only reason i had to watch this pile of crap gets benched for having a couple drinks. To Hell with Petty.

To be honest I don't see the guy going out for some fun during the bye week as that big a deal unless the party lasted all week.

Of course, making a commitment to the team to be sober and then lying about it is a whole nother issue. I don't have much use for liars.

j/c:

I still don't know how I feel about this situation (I get both sides of the coin), but for those thinking consuming alcohol is the reason for the benching, are completely missing Pettine's reason for doing what he did, IMO.

Bingo! While we certainly have few facts available, it is highly probable that alcohol itself was not the reason for his demotion...

Well, I guess I'm eating crow this morning. I still think it looks like an old video but hey, I guess I was wrong.

Manziel needs to be turned over someone knee and spanked. How dumb can the kid get.

Don't blink, mac, for you may miss something...

This is it, in a nutshell. If this is the whole story ... this is as messed up as we've been.

If there is more, then we can re-think things. Maybe JFF was told by the team that there will be no more drinking, in which case I get it. He then violated a team rule/directive. Like all those people who got mad when Gordon "just had a couple of drinks" on a flight. He was told by the league no drinking and he drank. That's that.

One slight thing I noticed was that JFF said those pictures "could" be old. Meaning it's possible they could not have been old. Again, maybe he was told not to do it. And maybe he wasn't. He's always going to be in the public eye, he needs to be careful what he does ... if he isn't supposed to be doing it.

I can guarantee Jerry Jones is making the money sign just waiting to pick Johnny up for nothing.

j/c

We don't know the whole story but the story we're hearing is the front office is unified in this decision. I think most feel our GM is in over his head and quite a few think our HC is either in over his head too or just too damn stubborn to consider anything but his ideas.

So with Haslem's blessing being identified with his GM and HC in supporting this action do you feel there will be any changes in the front office and coaching or does this move marks his intentions to let them stay?

All I can think of at this point is Curly splapping his own face and going yuk yuk yuk. Eww boy.

THe kid was just handed the keys to the car last week. Then he does this.

As for is it real, man, I swear to you, I looked at that video and thought, that's old. But him not saying it's old "FOR SURE" and the Browns who are right there and undoubtedly have much more proof that he did it last week, I guess I'll just shut up.,

The kid just Blew it.

I don't think he broke any league rules otherwise, wouldn't he be suspended? So it must have been an agreement between him and the Browns that he broke.

Let's hope not

The consensus from leadership could mean they stay - or they are gone.

I have only heard petts take so we don't know if the rest of the org was as convinced that this had to happen or if they went along to get along

j/c:

The Manziel Mistake

Manziel, a first-round pick in 2014, was a party animal in his first season with the Browns. After his rookie year, he entered substance-abuse rehab and spent 73 days there. Earlier this year, he admitted to police that he had been drinking after he and his girlfriend were investigated for having an argument. Last Saturday in Texas, he was recorded on a phone having a good time, presumably with alcohol, during the bye weekend. On Tuesday, Browns coach Mike Pettine, saying he was disappointed in Manziel, named McCown the starter. “At this point, we’ve decided it’s best to go with Josh as the starter going forward,” said Pettine.

The fact that Pettine said “going forward” leads me to believe this is not a one-week assignment. Making Manziel the third-string quarterback is further proof this will not be temporary.

So what does this mean? It means Manziel is likely finished in Cleveland. The next coach—and I would say it’s at least probable if not very likely that Pettine will be a two-and-done coach for the ever-changing Browns—will begin the same process that every Cleveland coach since Bill Belichick has undergone since the infamous benching of Bernie Kosar: finding the elusive “quarterback of the future.”

Let me say first I understand that Manziel is quite a knucklehead, who tells authority figures what they want to hear about being serious in his responsibility as a quarterback in the NFL. Then he goes out and does what he darn well pleases. The Browns, quite possibly, already have decided there is no chance Manziel is the quarterback of the Browns’ future.

If they have decided this, Cleveland should immediately cut Manziel.

If they have not decided this, Cleveland should play Manziel for the last six weeks of the season.

The only reason for the 2-8 Browns to show up and play out the end of another miserable season is to see if Manziel has any chance to be the quarterback going forward. There are many reasons to like McCown, who is a better quarterback than you think but only a short-term answer to the quarterback quandary at age 35. But he is going to be the same quarterback next September—presumably the Cleveland caretaker, if the franchise is smart—as he is now. That’s why the only smart thing is to see if Manziel has the chance to be more than that.

I think it’s a mistake to play the last six weeks of this season for some noble cause about showing to your team and to your immature quarterback that some principal about being a good citizen and non-partier on the bye weekend is going to trump the most important task the franchise has. That task is finding the quarterback for the next decade.

This just doesn’t help that. That’s why it’s a mistake.

http://mmqb.si.com/mmqb/2015/11/24/cleveland-browns-johnny-manziel-nfl-partying-demotion-mailbag

Good post to add Memphis

I read this article this morning and thought it summed up what I was trying to express yesterday.

J/C

First of all this is not to judge anyone on either side, but I have to say I'm shocked at how much outrage their is on here, and the topic of it all is Johnny Manziel! I don't know that I can think of another player (at least in the many years I've been on the board) who elicited so much emotion after having done so little on the field - and I'm not saying whose fault that is, either.

Anyway, I'm torn on this issue. On one hand, it seems ridiculous to bench a guy for going out for a few drinks and having a good time. Where I struggle is this isn't just an ordinary 22 year old kid. This is a kid who was handed the keys to the castle as others have pointed out. How can he not know that this isn't going to look good? He truly doesn't get it. There's a history here that suggests he may never get it.

Comparisons to Big Ben are ridiculous, in my opinion. I'm not condoning or diminishing in any way what he may or may not have done. That being said, when was the last time you heard anything of that sort about him? He appears to be a guy who learned or at least is smart enough to stay out of the press. Not to mention, it's a totally different organization.

If some agreement about behavior, spotlight, drinking etc. was made (and I don't know that there was)I actually applaud Pettine for making this decision. I have to agree with Columbus in that I still think there must be something more behind the scenes. If Pettine, Farmer, and Haslam are in agreement on this, I think there's a good chance that Haslam stays the course in the off season and gives these two more time. It really seems to me like a case of burning the bridge too many times. An organization still trying to find its way doesn't need these kinds of distractions.

this sums it up perfectly.

What advantage is it to the team to cut him now? Keep him at least until the draft and try to get something for him.

You are right, there is none at all. I'm just frustrated right now, which very rarely happens. I hate that I love the Browns.

Wouldn't get much for him. We'd only screw up the draft pick, anyway. I think the point of cutting him would be to wipe the slate clean and start fresh, rid the team of the distraction (not saying I want that, but I understand the thought behind it).

I think we're all frustrated with this mess.

now wouldnt that be the perfect end to the season? having Austin Davis play well enough to confuse the QB situation even more......

geesh...lets not even talk about that

Here is why I blame the Media:

Click the link in Steve's post. Look at all the famous ballers drinking and partying. Pick any one of them. Got your choice?

OK.

Now, imagine the media targeting the guy you chose and follows him incessantly. Imagine them digging up any camera phone pic they can obtain showing him intoxicated or better yet, a video that shows him bouncing around to some Hip Hop music. Imagine them posting all such pics and videos on their websites.

Take it a step further. Imagine that the media doesn't do this just once, that they spend a serious amount of time and interest searching out the internet and tracking down the player compiling pics and posting them online. See them doing this at least monthly, posting drunk pics online every few weeks.

Now imagine TV shows dedicated to celebrity news picking up on this and creating segments on their show to this one player and these pics.

Now it's on National TV. The nation sees it.

Getting their pics on National TV inspires the pic collectors become even more intense in their stalking of this celebrity. They find more pics and more pics get to National TV.

Consider now that it doesn't have to happen every day. It doesn't even have to happen every week or every month. But a half dozen pictures shown on National TV spread over a year and all over the internet makes this one player look like the biggest boozing party guy in sports.

Which is what they've made Johnny Manziel look like.

Never mind all the other players who go to bars to drink and party on the weekends when they're off work because after all, we've only seen one or two of their pics in their entire career. But because this one particular player has been targeted and pushed into the faces of the general public so much it makes him look like the worst of them.

Johnny is that player.

He doesn't drink and party any more or any more often than the others. But he has become the face of drinking/partying players. It's all because of his success and fame and the fact that the media targeted him for that reason.

After all, the more famous you are, the more famous I get for associating myself with you even if it's in the name of "negative news", heck, all I'm doing is my job... reporting.

This irresponsible, boozing, party animal who simply can't stop no matter the circumstances has been created by the media.

And notice, if you will, that the media takes no responsibility at all. Rather they take the holier ground and gang up on him on National TV, the very same National TV they used to desecrate him and create a larger-than-life persona that is not only fictional but is career damaging and in it's wake leaves a young man in his personal life shaken and bewildered.

Truth is, he's just a normal guy who, at 22, likes to throw back a few on the weekend. He's just like and no different than any other player, and most fans, who do the same thing.

But the media attention has served to portray him as the worst of the worst and he is now paying the price for all that attention and being the object of the media's targeting.

At this point he is expected to not be himself. He is expected to not be like his NFL peers. He is expected to live a secluded existence avoiding the paparazzi at all costs due to the detriment they cause in his life and in his career.

He's built his career on who he is and what he can do. Now he is expected to no longer be who he is. And what he can do has been taken away from him simply because he does the same things his peers do. The same thing everybody else does.

Don't give me that, "he didn't do what he was told and he lied". Sure he promised to not be a distraction. But it was not his actions that made him a distraction. Just as all the other players who did the same thing did not create a distraction.

It was the action of the media that blew it out of proportion that made it a distraction.

At this point I'm pulling for Jerry Jones to land this guy and save him from this dysfunctional franchise in which he cannot just be himself, like his team mates, and cannot ever be successful in this environment. I believe Jerry Jones, who has a certain amount of respect league-wide, will do what Mike Pettine and the Cleveland organization could not do and that is to "Pffft" the whole thing, paint Johnny as no different than anybody else, and diminish the interest in persecuting this kid. Johnny can then be home in Texas, permitted to be himself, as is everybody else, and play football.

Football is his dream but this glory seeking media frenzy has made accomplishing that dream impossible for reasons that have nothing to do with football but everything to do with creating for him a persona that segregates him from all other players who are simply able to be themselves and play football.