Jerry Coleman: Ravens Address Cutting Rice
A whirlwind of emotions at the Castle on Monday as the Ravens cut ties with running back Ray Rice, and terminated his contract after TMZ released the full video tape of Rice being involved in the domestic violence incident with his fiancé Janay Palmer.
Teammates of the 6-year veteran were taken aback when they walked into the doors to get ready to start preparing for the Steelers, and heard the organization had cut Rice. All eyes were on Head Coach John Harbaugh, who was left to speak without any sign of GM Ozzie Newsome or owner Steve Bisciotti . the Head Coach responded to what transpired Monday. One question on everyone's mind , why didn't the Ravens see the full footage of the video?
"I don't know why that would be a hard thing to understand. It wasn't made available. It wasn't there for us," Harbaugh said.
It is still seems to hard to grasp that the NFL legal team nor the Ravens origination did not see the full tape, but now Rice will not return to the Ravens practice facility or in any NFL locker room for awhile.
The reaction was shook and hard to swallow for the team, defensive end Chris Canty, had a hard time holding back the tears about the situation and Canty himself has effected by domestic violence in his life.
"It was a deplorable act. He made a terrible error in judgment. It's all very sad," Canty said.
One of his closet supporters on roster Torrey Smith, did not condone his act but wanted to continue to support him. Playing with Rice for three seasons, they have become close during that time, but now with the bombshell being dropped Monday, Smith is still willing to help repair the future of Rice but not just him Janay as well.
"What matters is what you see, and people tend to judge you by what [they're] seeing. It wasn't a pleasant sight at all. We tend to forget … We all focus on Ray, but there's still a victim in that in Janay. She's like a sister to my wife. We're trying to support her just as much as we support Ray."
When asked about the tape and if had a chance to speak to Rice since he saw the video Smith responded by saying, "I reached out to him, but that's not really an issue to talk about ... Everyone was stunned. It's not a good-looking video at all."
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