The Importance of Sports Video: Justice Edition
By Nick
For anyone who's been paying attention to the sports scene this Fall, you may have noticed a spike in players' being suspended for different acts on the field. A pulled ponytail here, an eye-gouging there... We've consistently heard the same responses from both the players' side and the spectator side. The spectator says, "There's absolutely no place for that type of behavior on the sports field." And the players simply say, 'These things happen all the time, (insert player's name) just happened to get caught this time, it's not a big deal." Maybe it's time for a re-evaluation of our sports justice system...
There are a few cases in particular that stand out. The first, happened in the second week of College Football, between Boise State and the University of Oregon. After the game had concluded, as it can sometimes occur, there were some words exchanged between the two teams. What ensued was certainly out of bounds:
Oregon's Senior Running Back LeGarrette Blount was appropriately suspended for the remainder of the season after the incident was reviewed on film. Provoked or otherwise, those actions simply cannot go unpunished. But this is a perfect example of why camera crews are continuing to roll film until every single person has left the stadium. You never know what can occur pre-, post- or during a game, and if the camera had missed Blount's punch, who knows if there would have been a suspension. It's difficult to punish a person based on hearsay or bystanders alone. The resulting suspension is exactly why we almost never see punches thrown, and in Blount's case, he threw away his Senior season for a sucker punch.
The second example that comes to mind happened earlier this month, when a New Mexico Women's Soccer Player, Elizabeth Lambert, was caught on film with a number of dirty, violent acts against the BYU Women's Soccer Team. Check the highlight below:
The baffling stat from this game is that Lambert was penalized only once (1 yellow card) over the course of the match. When officials went back and reviewed the footage, they found, obviously, a number of acts that could have been penalized and were ultimately viewed as dangerously violent. This in turn gave them no choice but to suspend Lambert indefinitely. Again, without the cameras rolling and keying on individual plays/players, those acts could very easily go unnoticed and therefore unpunished. It's fair to say we will not be seeing any ponytail-yanking any time soon, and now Lambert will forever be labeled by her actions on the field.
Everyone is realizing the importance of not only sports video, but thorough sports video and assessment of the footage. In both of the cases above, the players' actions were reviewed, and they paid the proper consequences. It's the occasions when the punishment does not fit the crime, however, that are a bit unsettling.
Take University of Florida's Brandon Spikes. In a game against the University of Georgia, Spikes attempted to eye-gouge a Georgia player during a pile-up after a play. As you'll see below, the zoomed-in cameras were at a perfect angle to catch Spikes in the act:
Anyone would agree that this is an inexcusable action. Though the RB wasn't ultimately injured, it was still a malicious attempt. So, what was his punishment? Suspended for the first half of the following weekend's game against sub-par opponent, Vanderbilt.
Needless to say, many analysts disagreed with that decision, and thought Spikes should have been more thoroughly reprimanded. But in a stirring development, the player on the wrong end of the eye-gouging, Georgia RB Washaun Ealey, thought Spikes shouldn't have been suspended at all, saying "We were just out there playing football ... We probably do it and other teams do too. It's all football. We're just out there trying to have fun."
What is going on here? Can eye-gouging and whatever else goes on at the bottom of a pile-up really be quantified by "just out there trying to have fun"? What kind of message are we sending to our players from a young age when they admit these acts are common and just part of the game? At what point do we finally say, these young men and women are trying to hurt each other in a non-sports-related fashion? It seems clear to me that the only way this type of dirty play is going to stop, is with the right consequences.
The video captured at games on a weekly basis has only improved and continues to get better. Having their actions caught on camera and available for public scrutiny and judgement is something that will certainly affect the players and be attached to their name, and likely will continue to for a long time. But that isn't punishment enough.
Officials need to take advantage of having this footage and recognize it as a privilege. The next eye-gouge attempt could be successful -- and then what?
