UF coach Dan Mullen defended his program’s values after a fourth incident involving a Gator and violence against women surfaced Monday. Florida sophomore defensive back John Huggins was accus…
www.orlandosentinel.com
Relevant excerpts:
Charges ultimately were not filed in any of the cases, a point Mullen emphasized when addressing reporters on Tuesday. The incidents, however, drew negative attention to UF during the offseason and
possibly played a factor in top recruit Chris Steele’s decision to leave the program this past spring.
WHAT? YOU MEAN IT WASN'T "HOMESICKNESS"? I AM SHOCKED!
“We do a lot of education on our team with that stuff.
Obviously I’m a big anti-violence against women person,” said Mullen, who has a wife, Megan, and two children, including a daughter, Breelyn.
OH, SURE. "OBVIOUSLY". WAIT, WHY IS IT SO "OBVIOUS" AGAIN? CAN YOU HUMOR ME AND JUST GIVE ME THE EVIDENCE THAT IS SO "OBVIOUS"? JUST ONE TIME, HELP ME OUT WITH THE "OBVIOUS" PART, I MUST HAVE MISPLACED THE "OBVIOUS" STUFF. OH, AND YOU KNOW WHO ELSE HAS A FAMILY THAT INCLUDES PARENTS AND SIBLINGS? THE FEMALE TUTOR THAT WAS CHOKED!
“I’m also a person that I really want to have all of the information as I make decisions and what happens in different situations and that’s one of the toughest deals. Because
you want to give people an opportunity to have rights, like everybody else in the United States are supposed to. But everybody wants to see ‘what are we doing’ instantly."
OH, AND YOU KNOW WHO ELSE SHOULD HAVE "RIGHTS" LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE IN THE UNITED STATES? VICTIMS OF CRIMES!
Huggins,
one of the team’s breakout players during the spring, has not practiced with the Gators since preseason camp opened July 26.
THE AUTHOR COULD HAVE ENDED THE ARTICLE ON THIS SENTENCE, AS IT EXPLAINS EVERYTHING WE NEEDED TO KNOW ABOUT WHY HUGGINS HAS NOT BEEN KICKED OFF THE TEAM (WELL, THAT AND THE INITIAL COUNTER RULES).
A day after the team staged its first of two scrimmages during preseason camp, Mullen said Huggins is not the only player who is sitting out. “We had several guys miss the scrimmage yesterday for different reasons,
taking care of different issues, stuff they have to handle personally, stuff they have to handle for me,” Mullen said. “Nothing that we don't have a great handle on, on each one of them.”
HANDLING STUFF FOR YOU, MULLET? LIKE WHAT? DID THEY HAVE TO PICK UP YOUR DRY-CLEANING? OH, BUT AS LONG AS YOU HAVE A "GREAT HANDLE" ON IT, THERE IS NO NEED FOR AN EMPLOYEE AT A STATE SCHOOL TO HAVE TO PROVIDE ANY PUBLIC DISCLOSURE OR TRANSPARENCY.
Mullen said Huggins’ absence throughout camp is not related to an Oct. 1 incident at the Otis Hawkins Center for academics. “That’s all been handled,” Mullen said.
HANDLED HOW? AGAIN, ZERO TRANSPARENCY. AND IT IS VERY POSSIBLE TO DISCIPLINE A KID FOR AN ACCUMULATION OF TRANSGRESSIONS.
A UF spokesman said Huggins has not been a camp due to a
“family issue.”
AS IN, "THE FEMALE THAT HUGGINS CHOKED HAS A FAMILY TOO"?
Huggins, a reserve defensive back and special teams player last season, appeared during the 2018 Gators first five games. He did not play during the five games following the Oct. 1 incident,
but appeared in UF’s final three games of the season.
SO, LET'S SEE, MULLET PUT HUGGINS ON DOUBLE-SECRET PROBATION LAST YEAR AND TOLD NO ONE. BUT WE ARE SUPPOSED TO HAVE FAITH IN MULLET TO DO THE RIGHT THING. BECAUSE "OBVIOUSLY".
Mullen said some of the games missed were punishment for the incident with the tutor. “That was part of it.
I mean, he was a true freshman, so he only was going to play in some games anyway for us,” Mullen said. “But his punishment was handled when all that happened.”
IN CASE YOU NEEDED TO BE REMINDED THAT HUGGINS IS BEING KEPT AROUND BECAUSE HE IS A "BREAK OUT PLAYER", MULLET ESSENTIALLY ADMITS THAT HE ONLY DOUBLE-SECRET SUSPENDED HUGGINS BECAUSE HE WAS A "TRUE FRESHMAN" WHO WASN'T GOING TO PLAY IN ALL OF THE GAMES ANYHOW. THINK ABOUT THIS. IF HUGGINS HAD BEEN NEEDED MORE, HE WOULD HAVE PLAYED MORE.
“
How many of them are actually charged?” Mullen said.
AND REALLY, THIS IS WHAT IT ALL COMES DOWN TO. IF THE GAINESVILLE/UF COMMUNITY CAN COAX, INTIMIDATE, OR PEER-PRESSURE ANY VICTIM OF A CRIME PERPETRATED BY AN ATHLETE INTO NOT PRESSING CHARGES, THEN IT IS LIKE A TREE FALLING IN THE FOREST.
The 47-year-old Mullen, who is entering his 11th season as a head coach, said handling incidents involving violence against women is a balancing act given the position he holds. “The hardest situation a coach is going to get into in dealing with anything in a lot of today’s world that could get into a sexual assault is when you get into a he said, she said situation,” Mullen said. “There’s two different stories, I guess, that are being reported. My job as a head coach is not to go in and investigate all that,
I hear, here’s one report, here’s the other report. They don’t match up. And it’s not my job to really make that decision on campus with how that works."
GOSH, POOR POOR MULLET. HIS JOB IS SO HUUUURRRRD. IF ONLY HE LIVED IN WORLD WHERE CRIME VICTIMS AND CRIME PERPETRATORS COULD GET THEIR STORIES STRAIGHT, SO THAT THEIR REPORTS MATCHED UP. OH, IT'S THE "HARDEST SITUATION" THAT A COACH CAN HANDLE, I'M SO GLAD HE'S GETTING $10 MILLION TO HANDLE SUCH A CHALLENGING JOB.
“I have to manage the situation, manage my players on those types of things and let the university process play or the legal process play its course.”
OH, WAIT, HE DOESN'T HAVE TO DO THE ACTUAL HARD WORK. WHY IS HE GETTING PAID SO MUCH AGAIN?
“Dan does a really good job at creating accountability,” Stricklin who worked with Mullen at Mississippi State, said. "
Sometimes accountability is negative consequences."
"SOMETIMES". OR, MORE ACCURATELY, "NEVER AT UF".
“I have teenage daughters I have not figured out how to make the decisions for them."
SO, STRICKLIN, DO YOU HAVE TO COACH YOUR TEENAGE DAUGHTERS ON HOW NOT TO STRANGLE TUTORS?
Mullen’s support staff member Otis Yelverton also was arrested and charged on April 22 for third-degree felony cyberstalking a former girlfriend. Yelverton, the football program’s assistant director of player personnel, was arrested and charged April 22.
I JUST LIKE THAT THE SENTINEL INCLUDED THIS LITTLE NUGGET.