It's already ugly.Blue In BC wrote:
Sorry, but I have to agree that the CFL made the correct decision based on the facts. If that isn't true, we have bigger problems than this issue.
You might also consider that the suspension has determined he is guilty and that an appeal is an excercise in rights and a determination is whether a suspension was fair based on the action.
If you take AJ Gass's win on his appeal. He was guilty of his action. The overturn was not of his action but of the severity of the penalty.
Throwing a helmet into space although by rule is a suspension is overkill, even though we understand why that rule is in place.
Regardless, win or lose the appeal, it is not good for the CFL that this overlaps a season. At a certain level, it would be better if he was found not guilty than guilty at the appeal level.
If he's found guilty after the fact, it's going to be ugly.
But the fact that it's ugly is the league's fault, quite frankly. They took a week to issue a suspension that should have been issued more or less immediately, if sufficient evidence exists. Even after taking five days longer than they should have, the commissioner then denied a stay, which was also contrary to established procedure, so the stay then had to be granted until an arbitrator can be found.
This whole process, as established by the AJ Gass precedent, is a cluster***k that the CFLPA and the league need to sit down, at the conclusion of the season, and straighten out.
And this is before we get to the crap that happens on the field that doesn't get called that leads to player injuries that various fanbases feel aggrieved for. And THAT in turn leads to roughing calls that probably shouldn't be even more roughing calls, which just makes the situation worse.
Regardless, no matter how much crying Elliot Friedman does, we are where we are because someone is injured, a ref made a debatable rule interpretation (in relation to both the call and the whistle as Blitz has stated in another thread), TSN turned off it's cameras, half the fans don't consider the refs reliable, and the league sat on the issue for a week. Jiminez is a lightning rod, probably because he deserves to be, but the bigger issue here should be the fact that the process is a complete disaster with the appropriate trickle down repercussions.
Stop *beeotch* about what "should" happen to Jiminez and fix the system, so the next time it does happen the process is actually played out quickly and efficiently for a change.