Usually sports streakers wait until their is a time-out, half time, or some other stoppage in play before running out onto the field. And really, this guy is less of a streaker than a dumbass fan who actually runs onto the field during play in Saturday’s Miami v. Florida State game. He starts about mid-field, heads toward the end zone, takes his shirt off, manages to elude one security guy before being slammed to the ground by another. We have two videos of the incident, both taken by fans in the stands as the network TV crews always cut away from this kind of action.
The first video shows the incident in its entirety. The second video also shows some of the action, but also shows the tackling security guard getting congratulated on the awesome hit by his co-workers.
As some of you might already know, the University of Wyoming lost to the Air Force Academy on October 13 by the score of 28-27 after throwing away a 10 point lead at half time. Coaches hate to lose, especially by one point, but the Cowboys’ coach, Dave Christensen, took things a step further and decided to vent his frustration–post game–in a profanity-laden tirade against rival coach Troy Calhoun. Apparently Christensen thought Air Force had faked an injury late in the game to avoid using a time-out. And, while that may or may not be true, Christensen went WAY over the line verbally, yet still managed to shake Calhoun’s hand.
We’d post the video here, but it’s been pulled from YouTube and the only copy we can find is over at DeadSpin.com. An UNCENSORED version.
In addition to the F-bombs Christensen also manages to throw in a Howdy Doody slam, a “wooo!” and at the very end a “fly boy” crack.
And all of this on Military Appreciate Night at the stadium. Classic.
For his efforts Christensen has been suspended by the school for one game and fined $50,000.
We think it was the Howdy Doody part that sealed the deal.
From our “You Belong in Jail” Files: meet Petiola Manu, a player on the Salt Lake City High East girls soccer team. Before we go into details about what happened and have people start emailing us about how things happen “in the heat of play” that we don’t understand, take a look at the video from this incident between SLC High East and Wood Cross High on October 12th.
You can clearly see that Manu and the victim, Makenzie Clark, collide as Clark is actually tearing a ligament in her ankle during the play and falls to the ground in pain, as the ball goes out of bounds. End of play, right? Instead of offering Clark a hand or checking to see if she’s okay(even turning around and walking away would be better) Manu can be clearly seen moving toward Clark and kneeing her in the head as she’s on the ground . . . and then just calmly walks away, as if nothing happened. It wasn’t a fight or part of the game, just a knee to the head of someone already on the ground.
Apparently no one on the field saw this happen in real time and Manu was neither penalized or taken out of the game right away, although her coach admits she could see the player getting emotional and eventually pulled her out. It was only when the video was posted on YouTube that things heated up for the young player. Even then though, all we have so far is a complaint from Clark’s mother and a meeting between East High’s principal Paul Sagers, the girls soccer coach and Manu. The result? They would like to turn this into a “teaching moment” and show others how sports violence can get out of hand. “Teaching moment?” It’s called evidence against the accused. Oh, and the Utah High School Activities Association is investigating, but don’t hold your breath on that one.
For her part, Manu has half-heartily apologized claiming, ”It was a physical game and I let my emotions get the best of me. It was nothing personal. I was just really frustrated with the game. I wasn’t thinking. I was just running on adrenaline, and the game was tied at the time.”
Of course, “letting your emotions get the best of you” is pretty much the excuse of most crimes. And think about it: in any other circumstance, what Manu did to Clark would be a crime. If this happens at school, it’s assault. If it happens at the mall, it would be assault. It was NOT part of the flow of the game, and certainly not accidental contact.
Think about it: a knee to the head, delivered a certain way, can kill someone or certainly permanently disable them. Clark is lucky she wasn’t hurt more seriously.
We don’t usually take a stand in these types of situations, but in our opinion, Manu should be banned from competing in any high school athletics if she can’t control her emotions better, regardless of whether she has ever exhibited this kind of behavior in the past or not. And if the local cops can’t or won’t bring her up on assault charges, then Clark’s parents need to file a lawsuit of some kind. The goal here though, is not to put Manu in jail, but to hopefully send a clear message that this type of behavior cannot and will not be tolerated in high school sports.
