A PALATIAL TALENT
SPORTS FANS, it's time to start acquainting yourselves with the name Channing Crowder. He may be the best mix of talent and felonious instinct to hit major college football since Lawrence Phillips. And the smart money here says that Crowder will be a better player than Phillips ever was, which means that he is a budding sportscrime figure with true staying power?potentially, the next Sebastian Janikowski or Isaiah Rider.
Crowder, a 6'2'' 236-pound linebacker for the Florida Gators, was one of the best defensive players in college football last year, earning honors as the SEC's Defensive Freshman of the Year. The son of former NFL DT Randy Crowder, Channing has 4.55 sideline-to-sideline speed and is a tackling machine in the mold of LaVar Arrington. At 20, he already has an NFL body and if he declares early next year will likely be the first linebacker chosen in the draft. Mel Kiper, Jr. achieves his full four-and-3/4 inches at the very mention of him.
But Channing has another thing going for him. He is a knucklehead of the first order. Review... once in conjunction with a spectacular nightclub-battery incident in which he and fellow Gator defensive lineman Steven Harris beat fellow UF student Brian Assent unconscious, smashing his eye orbit and forcing him to undergo extensive plastic surgery. The other was a drunken-vandalism charge from last March, in which he went rampaging through the streets of Gainesville, tearing the mirrors off of parked cars. He missed the opener against San Jose State because of the battery incident, but came back afterwards to put in a spectacular season, racking up 106 tackles.
Now Crowder is in trouble again. He was arrested last weekend on disorderly conduct charges, which might perhaps not be worth mentioning, except that it occurred in exactly the same place as his first battery arrest, the Palace nightclub. And the circumstances were eerily similar to that arrest, as Crowder and a fellow teammate were in the process of hunting down another man at the club for a "fight" when police intervened. UF safety Jarvis Herring was charged with resisting arrest without violence after he refused to let officers cuff him.
According to police reports, Crowder began arguing with a man at the Palace when a police officer told him to leave. Crowder complied, sort of, wandering halfway across University Avenue before stopping, holding up traffic. He continued shouting at the unidentified other man. When police warned him again to leave, Crowder refused. The unidentified man, gauging the physics of the situation, then took off running down the street. Crowder gave chase, with 40 or 50 onlookers following. Police joined in the chase and eventually arrested Crowder in the parking lot of another nightclub. He was taken away and spent a night in jail.
UF coach Ron Zook has had a tough time living up to the legacy of Steve Spurrier, but he has proven to be a first-rate college coach when it comes to breathless praise of the American legal system. As he did after the first battery incident, Zook took a page out of Gary Crowton's book and warned against judging his player before the court case was over.
"We'll let the judicial process run its course," Zook said in a statement. "Then we'll completely evaluate the situation."
Crowder has a good chance of getting off in this case because there was no actual contact between him and the unidentified man, and also because he apparently did not resist arrest, which shows his continuing maturation as a football player. The discon charge will be only a misdemeanor. Furthermore, his vandalism charges had recently been dismissed because of lack of evidence, which means his only prior to date will be the Assent incident. Expect a one-game suspension and another sterling season.
HISTORY AVERTED
Houston Texans defensive back Marcus Coleman narrowly avoided history last week when a judge's ruling that he have a guardian interlock device attached to his Mercedes was overturned. Had the ruling been upheld, Coleman would have been the first professional athlete to be forced to blow into a tube in order to start the ignition in his car.
Coleman was arrested a week and a half ago after he crashed his Mercedes into a curb on Kirby Street in Houston. When he got out to change his tire, police arrived and administered a field sobriety test, which he failed. He admitted to having had four drinks and was booked on a DUI.
The judge in the case initially ordered that Coleman attach a guardian interlock device, which is a machine that attaches a breathalyzer to the car's ignition. However, Coleman's attorney, Rusty Hardin, successfully argued that this was not necessary since Coleman's arrest came as the result of an "incident," not an accident. The cornerback is scheduled to reappear in court on May 27.
Coleman has already had a difficult offseason, watching his starting corner job go up in smoke on draft day. Houston not only selected standout South Carolina cornerback Dunta Robinson in the first round, but allowed Robinson to tell reporters that he had been given Coleman's job. The former Jet will now be moved to safety.
THE BUTLER DID IT
Hate it when this happens. Butler University officials had to grapple with that most unseemly of public relations problems last week?the arrest of one of their assistant football coaches in a crack house in Gary, IN.
Jimmy Graves, 41, the offensive coordinator for the Butler Bulldogs, was arrested when police raided a crack house in Gary and discovered the coach sitting at a dining room table behind a pile of cocaine. Making matters worse: Graves lent his University vehicle to one Sammy Smith, the target of the raid and the suspected supplier of the crack house. The car was discovered with several guns in it.
Graves was apparently supposed to be visiting high schools to identify juniors for recruitment at the time he was arrested. Gary detective Travis Jolly explained that Graves told him what his actual activities were.
"He said he had smoked a little crack that day, and he was about to smoke a little bit more," Jolly said.
Graves has been suspended pending an investigation.
--Matt
SPORTS FANS, it's time to start acquainting yourselves with the name Channing Crowder. He may be the best mix of talent and felonious instinct to hit major college football since Lawrence Phillips. And the smart money here says that Crowder will be a better player than Phillips ever was, which means that he is a budding sportscrime figure with true staying power?potentially, the next Sebastian Janikowski or Isaiah Rider.
Crowder, a 6'2'' 236-pound linebacker for the Florida Gators, was one of the best defensive players in college football last year, earning honors as the SEC's Defensive Freshman of the Year. The son of former NFL DT Randy Crowder, Channing has 4.55 sideline-to-sideline speed and is a tackling machine in the mold of LaVar Arrington. At 20, he already has an NFL body and if he declares early next year will likely be the first linebacker chosen in the draft. Mel Kiper, Jr. achieves his full four-and-3/4 inches at the very mention of him.
But Channing has another thing going for him. He is a knucklehead of the first order. Review... once in conjunction with a spectacular nightclub-battery incident in which he and fellow Gator defensive lineman Steven Harris beat fellow UF student Brian Assent unconscious, smashing his eye orbit and forcing him to undergo extensive plastic surgery. The other was a drunken-vandalism charge from last March, in which he went rampaging through the streets of Gainesville, tearing the mirrors off of parked cars. He missed the opener against San Jose State because of the battery incident, but came back afterwards to put in a spectacular season, racking up 106 tackles.
Now Crowder is in trouble again. He was arrested last weekend on disorderly conduct charges, which might perhaps not be worth mentioning, except that it occurred in exactly the same place as his first battery arrest, the Palace nightclub. And the circumstances were eerily similar to that arrest, as Crowder and a fellow teammate were in the process of hunting down another man at the club for a "fight" when police intervened. UF safety Jarvis Herring was charged with resisting arrest without violence after he refused to let officers cuff him.
According to police reports, Crowder began arguing with a man at the Palace when a police officer told him to leave. Crowder complied, sort of, wandering halfway across University Avenue before stopping, holding up traffic. He continued shouting at the unidentified other man. When police warned him again to leave, Crowder refused. The unidentified man, gauging the physics of the situation, then took off running down the street. Crowder gave chase, with 40 or 50 onlookers following. Police joined in the chase and eventually arrested Crowder in the parking lot of another nightclub. He was taken away and spent a night in jail.
UF coach Ron Zook has had a tough time living up to the legacy of Steve Spurrier, but he has proven to be a first-rate college coach when it comes to breathless praise of the American legal system. As he did after the first battery incident, Zook took a page out of Gary Crowton's book and warned against judging his player before the court case was over.
"We'll let the judicial process run its course," Zook said in a statement. "Then we'll completely evaluate the situation."
Crowder has a good chance of getting off in this case because there was no actual contact between him and the unidentified man, and also because he apparently did not resist arrest, which shows his continuing maturation as a football player. The discon charge will be only a misdemeanor. Furthermore, his vandalism charges had recently been dismissed because of lack of evidence, which means his only prior to date will be the Assent incident. Expect a one-game suspension and another sterling season.
HISTORY AVERTED
Houston Texans defensive back Marcus Coleman narrowly avoided history last week when a judge's ruling that he have a guardian interlock device attached to his Mercedes was overturned. Had the ruling been upheld, Coleman would have been the first professional athlete to be forced to blow into a tube in order to start the ignition in his car.
Coleman was arrested a week and a half ago after he crashed his Mercedes into a curb on Kirby Street in Houston. When he got out to change his tire, police arrived and administered a field sobriety test, which he failed. He admitted to having had four drinks and was booked on a DUI.
The judge in the case initially ordered that Coleman attach a guardian interlock device, which is a machine that attaches a breathalyzer to the car's ignition. However, Coleman's attorney, Rusty Hardin, successfully argued that this was not necessary since Coleman's arrest came as the result of an "incident," not an accident. The cornerback is scheduled to reappear in court on May 27.
Coleman has already had a difficult offseason, watching his starting corner job go up in smoke on draft day. Houston not only selected standout South Carolina cornerback Dunta Robinson in the first round, but allowed Robinson to tell reporters that he had been given Coleman's job. The former Jet will now be moved to safety.
THE BUTLER DID IT
Hate it when this happens. Butler University officials had to grapple with that most unseemly of public relations problems last week?the arrest of one of their assistant football coaches in a crack house in Gary, IN.
Jimmy Graves, 41, the offensive coordinator for the Butler Bulldogs, was arrested when police raided a crack house in Gary and discovered the coach sitting at a dining room table behind a pile of cocaine. Making matters worse: Graves lent his University vehicle to one Sammy Smith, the target of the raid and the suspected supplier of the crack house. The car was discovered with several guns in it.
Graves was apparently supposed to be visiting high schools to identify juniors for recruitment at the time he was arrested. Gary detective Travis Jolly explained that Graves told him what his actual activities were.
"He said he had smoked a little crack that day, and he was about to smoke a little bit more," Jolly said.
Graves has been suspended pending an investigation.
--Matt
