IF JUSTIN TUCKER IS THE NEXT DESHAUN WATSON, HE’LL BE KICKING NEXT SEASON
The NFL should be ashamed for allowing Watson to play and deposit his guaranteed $230 million, which means allegations against Tucker in Baltimore won’t mean much when the league determines his future
Turns out he wasn’t the perfect placekicker. And in spas throughout Baltimore, Justin Tucker is accused of being abusive and gross with nine female massage therapists. But what we already know about the NFL’s punishment gauge is stunning to the senses, assuming Roger Goodell and his people wouldn’t ban him from the league.
The commissioner has allowed Deshaun Watson to make $138 million in guaranteed money the past three seasons. He will make $92 million more in guaranteed money the next two seasons. He is expected to play again for the Cleveland Browns, who acquired him from Houston in the worst trade in pro sports history — is there any doubt? — AFTER he was accused of sexual assault and inappropriate conduct during massage sessions.
By more than two dozen women.
Let Watson make his money, determined Goodell, amid a stretch when he recorded the league’s lowest quarterback rating last year before a right Achilles tendon tear. All he did was serve an 11-game suspension and pay $5.69 million with a fine and service time. He keeps the rest of his $230 million contract. So will Tucker — once known in Maryland as “Thank God for Justin Tucker,’’ the most accurate kicker in league history before missing eight field goals in midseason — simply going to continue with the Ravens no matter what the lawyers and Goodell’s people discover about him?
Three more women spoke to the Baltimore Banner, including one who accused Tucker of leaving ejaculate on a table after he stroked her inner thigh. A Thursday story quoted six therapists as saying he exposed his genitals — brushing two of them with his exposed penis with more ejaculate emerging. He was banned from two spas, the story said.
One therapist, describing herself as “M” in the Banner, said she “made it a point in previous sessions to expose (Tucker’s) erect genitals to me by untucking the drapes, regardless of how many times I have to re-drape him and tell him he is messing up the drapes. … Additionally, at his most recent appointment, he made it a point to run his fingers along my inner thigh.” She said she found “a large spot of ejaculation on my bottom sheet” under the area Tucker was positioned.
Any good attorney will point out the incidents occurred from 2012 to 2016, as Tucker was helping the Ravens to a Super Bowl championship in 2013. Why now? When the Banner posted its first story, Tucker wrote the stories were “unequivocally false” and that he’s the victim of bad journalism. He said the newspaper "takes innocuous, or ambiguous, interactions and skews them so out of proportion that they are no longer recognizable. ... This is desperate tabloid fodder.”
Tucker wrote: “Throughout my career as a professional athlete, I have always sought to conduct myself with the utmost professionalism. I have never before been accused of misconduct of any kind, and I have never been accused of acting inappropriately in front of a massage therapist or during a massage therapy session or during other bodywork.”
Years ago, the Ravens tried to help running back Ray Rice until a domestic violence video appeared, forcing them to terminate his contract. Owner Steve Bisciotti cannot protect Tucker with the same blind faith. When Watson was available three years ago, head coach John Harbaugh said the franchise has a zero-tolerance policy and wouldn’t pursue him. This week?
“We take any allegations of this nature seriously and will continue to monitor the situation,” said the Ravens, who won’t be dumping Tucker anytime soon.
The Super Bowl begins this week. Last season, Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce messed with Tucker before the AFC championship game. Mahomes removed his kicking tee. Kelce threw his helmet and kicked footballs. This week, they will be asked about Tucker’s legal problems. Just what the NFL needs.
“I just thought it was all some gamesmanship, all in good fun,” Tucker said then. “But it seemed to be taken a little more seriously. I'm totally willing to let it all go. I really don't see it as a big deal. I think if you just see the whole interaction and then you just see us at the coin toss — we're all dapping each other up and then we just get on with the football game.”
The dapping is over.
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Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.