A Big Bully
Blake Leeds
After playing high school football at Mountain Ridge High School in Glendale, Arizona, Richie Incognito was recruited to play college football at the University of Nebraska. Despite being redshirted, during his freshman year was the first Cornhusker lineman to start in the season opener. However, during the season, he exemplified many behavioral traits that would continue to haunt him for the rest of his career. Following countless fights, penalties, and suspensions, Richie Incognito withdrew from classes at Nebraska and transferred to the University of Oregon. Things didn’t turn out much better there as he was dismissed from the team one week later. Richie Incognito then showed up at the NFL Combine in 2005. While there, he impressed scouts with a good performance, but unfortunately, was projected a later round draft pick due to his inability to behave on and off the field. The St. Louis Rams drafted Richie Incognito with the 81st pick in the third round of the 2005 NFL draft. He did not play a down in the 2005 season but in 2006, went on to start all 16 games for a high-powered Rams’ offense. The next year, he only played four games after suffering a knee injury that required him to miss the rest of the season. It was later discovered that he had been doing a lot of partying during his rehabilitation. In 2009, Richie Incognito was pulled during a game against the Tennessee Titans after head-butting two players. Head Coach Steve Spagnuolo benched him for the second half, but this wasn’t his first time benching Incognito that season. Two days after the incident in the Titans game, the Rams waived him after saying they had given him numerous chances to clean up his act. The Buffalo Bills decided to take a chance on him while they and the Miami Dolphins were the only two teams to make a claim. He started the final three games for the Bills and after the season they decided not to re-sign him. In 2010, the Miami Dolphins got their chance and signed Richie Incognito to a one-year deal. That season, he started all 16 games and after that year, earned himself a three-year deal from the Dolphins. While cooling his act down during his career with the Miami Dolphins, whenever he committed a penalty it would be followed with a remark about Incognito being a dirty player. There was a vote in 2009 that awarded him the NFL’s “Dirtiest” Player. Aside from all the problems that Richie Incognito has encountered throughout his career, his worst and most recent came during the current NFL season. The issue has to do with thought to be friend and fellow offensive lineman Jonathan Martin. According to TheScore.com, it all began October 20th when Martin left the team unannounced after an incident in the cafeteria. It was said to be a mental breakdown and he reportedly went to get mental counseling. The next day, reports appeared saying Martin was “the target of extreme bullying by his Miami teammates, and was forced to endure an ‘abusive environment that developed during [his time] with the Dolphins.’” (TheScore.com) Later the NFL Player’s Association decided to conduct an investigation of Richie Incognito’s role in Jonathan Martin’s departure from the team. After Martin makes an official complaint, Incognito was suspended for “conduct detrimental to the team”. Then evidence begins to surface and a voicemail left for Jonathan Martin from Incognito had many remarks that were racially offensive. During the investigation, it was found that Miami Dolphins’ coaches asked Richie Incognito to “toughen up” Jonathan Martin prior to the season. At this point, the situation has become a major headline and many people are weighing in, taking both sides. (TheScore.com) Many players on the Dolphins have come out and spoken saying things that have added questions to the investigation. “‘I think if you would have asked Jon Martin [before he left Miami] who his best friend on the team was, he would've said Richie Incognito,’ Tannehill said. ‘The first guy to stand for Jonathan when anything went down on the field -- any kind of tussle -- Richie was the first guy there. When they wanted to hang out outside of football -- who was together? Richie and Jonathan.’" (Breech) When this story broke, it took the nation by storm. This wasn’t just an issue dealing with the sports world, this was a bullying problem, which allowed anyone to express his or her opinion. As soon as the media got their opportunity to cover this story, everyone weighed in. There was a twitter explosion and the news spread like wildfire. Initially, when the story became public, experts, players, and any person with a twitter account voiced their opinion on the subject. As more information surfaced, so did the tweets. Media had a tremendous affect on the downfall of Richie Incognito for a few reasons. The everyday journalist sees this story from the outside looking in. They see Richie Incognito as a dirty player with a track record that makes him an ideal candidate to be a bully. However, immediately he was accused, his entire team, who knows him much better than almost anyone else, jumped at the chance to have his back. They went out of their way to say things as I mentioned quarterback Ryan Tannehill did before. Thus, when the media got their hands on this story, they expressed a biased opinion against Richie Incognito. They more they got their beliefs out, the bigger the hole was being dug for Incognito. This caused the everyday person to see and hear negative things about him and instantly back the victim of the situation, Jonathan Martin. Drew Feniello explains, “As the media tends to do, they jump the gun on how and why the situation occurred, most of the time making biased judgments that can affect the way we as fans look at both teams and players.”
Without media exposure, I believe this investigation would have gone quickly and smoothly. Feniello continues, “While none of us know what exactly transpired in the Dolphins’ locker room, one thing we know for sure is that the media has turned this situation, where a grown man is going through depression, into a circus.” The supporters of Richie Incognito are the people who believe in the people who see their relationship first hand, and don’t turn a blind eye to what goes on in an NFL locker room. A very powerful opinion that helped me choose what side I am on is that of Lydon Murtha, former Miami Dolphins offensive lineman from 2009-2012, before he was cut after an injury. He was on the team when Jonathan Martin was drafted and got to see the situation first hand. He first attacks some allegations put on Incognito like making Martin pay for rookie dinner, where he goes onto say many rookies pay for this meal as he paid $9,600 for his. (Murtha) While addressing their relationship, he says Martin was “standoffish and shy” and Incognito took him under his wing. Incognito was a leader of the team and would get in anybody’s face if they made a mistake, not just Martin. Also, Murtha explains that he has seen Incognito say the N-word to Martin’s face and watched him laugh about it. The next two allegations he attacks are the trip Martin supposedly paid for and the incident in the cafeteria. Every year the offensive line takes a trip to Las Vegas in which they pay ahead of time. Martin agreed to go on the trip and the last minute backed out, not for a family emergency, but because he was not interested in going anymore. Now, if the trip is pre-paid, it would only be fair to make Jonathan Martin pay his role so the trip isn’t ruin. The last issue was how the offensive line stood up at a table as Martin sat down and Murtha explains, that has happened many times over the course of his career and it happens to everybody. (Murtha)
The reason I take Richie Incognito’s side of this dispute is because I think this whole situation was blown out of proportion. “The media has blown this entire situation out of proportion, leading us to believe Incognito is this monster. With bullying having such a strong impact in the lives of people, especially kids, the media has now made Richie Incognito the face of bullying in America, without ever having heard a statement from Jonathan Martin.” (Feniello) People are hearing a second, third, and fourth account of the story and believe it, rather than someone who is with the two everyday. I think Lydon Murtha’s article should be taken more seriously along with the comments made by Miami Dolphins’ players, which is why I back Richie Incognito. In this circumstance, I think the media got it wrong, and are poorly depicting a situation in which they don’t even have the facts.

Works Cited
Breech, John. "Ryan Tannehill: Jonathan Martin and Incognito Were Best Friends." CBSSports.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
Feniello, Drew. "Richie Incognito: Locker Room Bully or Media Made Monster?" The Beacon :. N.p., 14 Nov. 2013. Web. 20 Nov. 2013.
Murtha, Lydon. "Incognito and Martin: An Insider's Story." The MMQB with Peter King Incognito and Martin An Insiders Story Comments. N.p., 6 Nov. 2013. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
"A Timeline of the Incognito-Martin Case." The Score. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Nov. 2013.