Sean Taylor - A Hostile Hochuli Editorial
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From: http://afraidofedhochuli.blogspot.com
I know this is about 12 hours late but I have been trying to wrap my head around the tragedy that took place yesterday and came to a
You can read my original article on this ( Afraid of Ed Hochuli: Purely Senseless) or you can read this one. Or read both.
Yesterday Sean Taylor was shot. This morning he passed away leaving a Fiancée and a daughter behind.
There have been a lot of people griping that he must have done something or that this was something that could have been stopped by the NFL or the Redskins organization.
First of all, this sort of thing happens all the time. Every day people are murdered over drugs, arguments, lover’s quarrels and even something as small as a team’s rivalry, but this is something that puts a face on the loss of life.
Secondly, there was nothing that the NFL or team could have done (short of sleeping in the same room with every player every day). The argument is that they should set up mentoring for young players. They do, and until you prove to me that [Redskins Coach] Joe Gibbs, [Redskins Owner] Daniel Snyder or [NFL Commissioner] Roger Goodell could have changed this, I do NOT want to here that they could have done something to keep him safe.
Is it wrong that we glorify Sean Taylor after he has been murdered? I don’t know. But I do know that it is something that we should discuss.
Taylor was killed at his home in Miami. He had gone back with his Fiancée and 18-month-old daughter since he was injured and could not travel with the team. He spoke with Coach Joe Gibbs and told him about how eight days previous his home in Miami had been broken into. The perpetrator had broken in through the back door, rifled through drawers, stole nothing and (in a very Godfather-esque fashion) left a butcher knife on the bed.
Gibbs allowed him to go on the condition that Taylor was back at the facility on Tuesday.
Sunday night, after watching his team fall to the Buccaneers, Taylor and his Fiancée (who’s name I can not locate) put their daughter, Jackie, down to sleep.
At 1:45 a.m. on Monday morning, Miami-Dade County police were dispatched to Taylor’s home after his Fiancée called, stating that he had been shot.
They had woken up to a loud noise. Sean, sensing danger to his family (since they were all in the same room) reached under his bed for the machete that he kept there for protection. As he came back up, there was a figure at the door. Two shots were fired; one missing and the other lodging in his thigh, severing the femoral artery. Neither Taylor’s Fiancée nor daughter were injured. She had to call from her cell phone, because when she picked up the phone, there was no dial tone: the lines had been cut.
It sounds like a movie plot. That is what gets me; not the fact that it was an All-Pro Safety in the NFL, but that the story itself is such a strange one that it makes you think.
Taylor had a shady past that was marred with run-ins with police. Was his death a cause of this?
From ESPN on Monday: "Taylor has been fined at least seven times during his professional career for late hits and other infractions. He was also fined $25,000 for skipping a mandatory rookie symposium shortly after he was drafted.
In 2005, Taylor was accused of brandishing a gun at a man during a fight over some all-terrain vehicles that had allegedly been stolen. Last year, he reached a deal in which he pleaded no contest to two misdemeanors and was sentenced to 18 months' probation. The pleas prompted another fine from the NFL but kept his football career intact.”
For all intents and purposes it sounded as if he had matured; he had grown up. The quote that hits me is from Redskins teammate and close friend Clinton Portis: "It's hard to expect a man to grow up overnight. But ever since he had his child, it was like a new Sean, and everybody around here knew it. He was always smiling, always happy, always talking about his child."
He was never into interviews, stating that he didn’t trust the media, and he rarely let anyone into his inner circle. He didn’t trust that they would be truthful in their discussion of him, which is why his discussion with the media during Training Camp was so groundbreaking:
“I just take this job very seriously. It's almost like; you play a kid's game for a king's ransom. And if you don't take it serious enough, eventually one day you're going to say, 'Oh, I could have done this, I could have done that.' So I just say, 'I'm healthy right now, I'm going into my fourth year, and why not do the best that I can?' And that's whatever it is, whether it's eating right or training myself right, whether it's studying harder, whatever I can do to better myself."
[According to all accounts] His daughter changed him. The responsibility of a child made him happy and made him a better person; reconnecting with football.
To blame Taylor is to be short-sighted. I will argue all day long that until you give me proof that there was something else going on, I will use the info I have and state that the onus falls solely on the person who cut the phone lines, broke into the pale-yellow house in the nice neighborhood and shot a man while his Fiancée and daughter watched. It takes a heartless person to do that.
My hope is that they find the person that did this. I am not going to call for his head (we are not in an eye-for-an-eye society) but I do want to see the Justice System work properly.
I would like to see that his family is taken care of. I know the Redskins are a great organization and will do this, but it is my hope that the rest of his salary be put in to a trust fund for his Fiancée and daughter.
I would also hope that his daughter grows up knowing the good points of her Father, not the incidents that happened before her birth. The things that people said changed when she came into the world.
He deserves that much.
it is such a sad thing.
Thanks again