As it turns out, the NFL’s arrest streak is alive and well at 80 months
By some unforeseen miracle, the NFL just kept the most outrageous streak in American sports alive. And, no, we’re not talking about the string of ludicrous officiating calls against the Detroit Lions.
After former San Jose Mercury News reporter Mike Rosenberg professed on Twitter last week that September marked the first calendar month since July 2009 that an NFL player had not been arrested, everyone from the Tech Times to Time Magazine ran with the story. It was kind of a big deal.
As Rosenberg noted, the NFL has averaged an arrest per week for the past five years and logged at least one for 79 straight months. September supposedly marked the second time in Roger Goodell’s tenure as commissioner that the league had gone without an arrest for a calendar month — the first month during a season that didn’t feature an arrest in 15 years. The streak was snapped. It was a new beginning.
Except …
It turns out Tennessee Titans rookie wide reciever Dorial Green-Beckham was arrested on Sept .30 — over an unpaid $92.48 speeding ticket, no less, according to The Tennesseean. Presumably home for the bye week, DGB was stopped by police in Van Buren, Mo., for driving 65 miles per hour in a 55 mph zone. Forget for a moment that nobody should be pulled over for going 10 mph over the speed limit, and consider this: Green-Beckham signed a four-year, $5.6 million deal with the Titans on June 1.
Green-Beckham probably had that $92.48 in his ashtray, and his failure to pay the ticket kept alive an 80-month NFL arrest streak that has included everything from a quarterback’s “purple drank” to a tight end’s three counts of first-degree murder. For the record, Green-Beckham’s own marijuana arrests at the University of Missouri don’t count, since they came before the Titans drafted him in the second round.
So, Goodell & Co. will have to hold off on the champagne that’s been on ice since The Black Eyed Peas’ “I Gotta Feeling” was the No. 1 song on the Billboard charts and “Bruno” was No. 1 at the box office.
If only DGB had been around when Cris Carter reminded the 2014 NFL draft class to get a “fall guy.”
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Ben Rohrbach is a contributor for Ball Don’t Lie and Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @brohrbach