From the Lantern:
Ohio State redshirt senior Jake Stoneburner and redshirt junior Jack Mewhort have been suspended indefinitely from the football team, according to a Sunday night report from the Toledo Blade.
Stoneburner and Mewhort were arrested early Saturday morning for allegedly urinating in public and running from police.
Mark Collins, a Columbus-based attorney, said the football players learned of their suspension Sunday, and would be barred from the Woody Hayes Athletic Center until their case is resolved.
The arraignment is scheduled for June 11 at the Delaware County Municipal Court.
Stoneburner told NBC4 Saturday night that he expected charges to be dropped Monday.
Representatives from the Department of Athletics did not immediately respond Sunday night to The Lantern’s request for comment regarding the suspensions.
Shawnee Hills Police arrested Stoneburner and Mewhort for “obstructing official business” at about 2:30 a.m. Saturday by the Bogey Inn near Dublin, Ohio.
Police said they spotted Stoneburner, Mewhort and a third person unaffiliated with the OSU football program, Austin Barnard, urinating in between buildings. When they attempted to confront the three individuals, police said they ran away.
Two of the suspects were found trying to hide in between vehicles in a parking lot being used for this past weekend’s Memorial Tournament. The third person fled into the woods, but was ultimately caught by police after threatening to use a police dog.
Seems pretty harsh to me. I get that Urban is trying to send a message but this seems like overkill (If they do end up missing any signifigant playing time). They peed behind a building and ran....BFD.
I assume the suspension will end when the case gets resolved. Seems pretty standard.
I don't think this is necessarily too harsh. Indefinitely means that there is no set time. They could be back next week or (hypothetically) in six months. It just gives the staff time to decide what to do and for the case to resolve itself.
Hopefully the charges resolve themselves and Urban gives them a fair but not too harsh punishment. They aren't missing anything too significant right now, so suspending them "indefinitely" allows Urban to take a hard line on run ins with the police, but shouldn't hopefully make him unfairly punish them for a really stupid incident.
From the Toledo Blade:
Police in Shawnee Hills, Ohio, a Columbus suburb, spotted the two players and a third man not connected to the football team early Saturday urinating outside a restaurant near Stoneburner's house, located just off the course at Muirfield Village Golf Club.
Collins said the men dashed away when they saw a spotlight, unknowing it belonged to police. He said Mewhort and Stoneburner stopped about 40 yards away from the restaurant and did not attempt to hide.
I have no problem with a blanket team rule that any player lawfully arrested will be at least initially suspended indefinitely until the team/coaches can do their due dilligence. But if the Toledo Blade's version is accurate, there's no crime here even under the broadest reading of the obstruction statute. If the story is accurate, neither of them should miss a minute of practice, let alone game time. The process and the press are sufficient "punishment," though it's not clear any actual punishment is necessary or justified.
For the Common Man and the Torg listeners.... "let him live".... These are words from a bitter 20/21 year old that made mistakes.
He's been a star athlete much of his life but soon he'll learn life isn't fair and he might start being on the other end of the fair spectrum now. And that apples and oranges aren't the same thing. I don't fault him, I'm in my late 20's and still learning life lessons.
For all of you that are pissed at the local LEO's for doing their job, you are likely the same folks that get pissed when an officer shows some type of discretion. How do they know when the right time to take action or not take action is? How do you appease all of the masses? They let the guys go without chasing them and it turns out they are wanted for more than just Public Lewdness? Maybe they stop one of these guys in a car and they've drunk just one too many, they let them go. They seem alright but then they inadvertently kill someone. You can't please everyone! You are going to accuse me of engaging in a "strawman argument" (still don't know exactly wtf that is) but officers have to think of every possible scenario before making decisions. Stop your bitching. If you can better the world by serving, have at it. It has been ruled that running from the police is grounds enough to create reasonable suspicion. Maybe they didn't know it was the police as has been previously reported? That still doesn't alleviate the grounds of suspicion. I am not stating that their actions were egregious, far from it and I have done the same more times than I can count. I don't think I'd be running from the police over it. I can understand some type of startle response and initial flight. I just find all of the bile toward a law enforcement officer doing his job sickening.
I don't always take names when I kick ass but when I do, they most often belong to a Wolverine.
I am not upset at the guys for what they did. It was stupid and a lesson they can learn from. I am more pissed off at a lot of your comments on here fellas. Some of you should be ashamed of yourselves.
I don't always take names when I kick ass but when I do, they most often belong to a Wolverine.
all 3 were urinating, at the same time, in a dark alley at 2:30am. Maybe there is more to the story, that we really don't want to know about.
This will blow over as nothing... Nothing to see here, move on...
@JohnBlairGoBucks, not to start conspiracy theories or anything, but that was my initial reaction as well. I mean, is getting caught peeing in an alley really something to run and hide in the woods over?
Stoneburner told reporters that charges will be dropped.
Gene Smith told us there would not be a bowl ban.
>Equates heavy NCAA infractions to an extremely minor run-in with police offers.
>Profit.
Whether the punishment these two have received is legitimate or not, and whether or not these two guys miss any substantial time, I'm all for Urban taking a hard line and possibly suspending them for some game time.
I honestly don't think what they did was egregious whatsoever, but this is the PERFECT opportunity for Meyer to lay down the law from the get go and set the tone of discipline for his tenure at OSU. These guys are team leaders, yet were arrested. That should be unacceptable no matter what.
Let's be real here, the win/loss record this season means squat. Sure, it matters when you look at gaining momentum, recruiting, etc., but I think this opportunity is more important for the long term. Time to draw a line in the sand and get it through the guys' heads that this will not be accepted at OSU on Urban's watch.
"What we do in life echoes in eternity"
Can't say I didn't see this coming
Why? Due to UFM's history at Florida or other information?
I don't always take names when I kick ass but when I do, they most often belong to a Wolverine.
they probably ran, because theres a good chance they were drunk. its pretty rare that you urinate outside at 2:30am on a friday night, sober. the funny thing is that they were right near the golf course, and therefore close to urban meyers house, shouldnt affect the story, but just coincidence.
It will be interesting to see if he comes down hard on them as an example. I doubt he will, but it would be interesting
Last paragraph of the story: it seems weird that the third guy threatened to use a police dog just before he was arrested. Gotta love The Lantern.
Urban Meyer's history. Pretty much has a zero tolerance, doesn't matter if you're Tom frickin Brady. You do crap like this, there is gonna be repercussions. It may seem harsh, but these kids need to know that Meyer is for real and hopefully they think twice before they do something stupid like pissing in front of cops then taking off. I don't blame Meyer, I would of done the same thing. Meyer did the right thing here, I'm just curious how many games he is going to suspend them, he might suspend them for two games then come back when we play Cal. If not, it will be at least 4 games before B1G play starts with Sparty.
Stoneburner can probably kiss any dreams of being a captain goodbye.
@GENESTARWIND 4 games for urinating? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills! If the charges are dropped, which from the account I read, they should be. I don't expect them to miss a practice let alone a game. In fact I suspect they be getting extra practice, working on their cardio.
@william
My point is, when you're at the mercy of an outside party, it probably doesn't help to back them in a corner by telling them how it's gonna be. They should just keep quiet, as should you.
>GFY
GFY, classy response.
@oldcolumbustown
You basically read my mind. Its not really the incident itself that upsets me. I've done it many times myself. Its the fact that stoney and mewhort are supposed to be team leaders. It basically forces urban to take a hard line on this. Especially seeing as how urban has had nothing but good things to say about both of these guys. They really let their coaches and teammates down in this whole situation. And I'm sure that is a point that urban will make very clear to them.
Tom Brady didn't play for Meyer...you lost me on that one.
4-6 seconds from point A to point B and when you get to point B, be pissed off
example of a high profile athlete, adding that no matter your status, the coach is the authority....
Agreed, but when said player is the example of how Meyer has a zero tollerance policy, one would think the logical support for that argument would be someone Meyer coached. I.E. Tim Tebow. Now grant it, Timmy never found himself on this side of a story but I'd have liked it more. I guess I'm picking nits....
4-6 seconds from point A to point B and when you get to point B, be pissed off
Could it be that Meyer is sending a message by suspending them and that he's waiting for the legal side of things to play out? if charges are dropped, then good. But my guess is that these guys will have to 'earn' their way back from suspension.
Per Tim May from the Dispatch : "OSU coach Urban Meyer confirms by terse email that Jake Stoneburner and Jack Mewhort suspended pending resolution of their case."
I don't think Meyer will let Ohio State end up like Florida when he was there. He loves Ohio State otherwise he wouldn't have coached again. He's going to do everything he can to keep this job and if it means suspended your star players, so be it. They could be punished, there's no excuse for having run ins with the law unless you did something wrong. They did something wrong, they are being reprimanded, so on and so forth. It shouldn't be overlooked. If charges get dropped, which I'm hoping, both of them need to own up to their mistakes and prove Meyer they are going to be leaders for this team this season. Lead by example I always say and that's not a good message I would send to my fellow peers.
Our football team is under NCAA probation. Coach Meyer doesn't have much of a choice -- he has to take a hard line first -- otherwise there will be questions about whether we have addressed our issues with institutional control and player oversight.
He will probably ease up on Mewhort and Stoneburner later, but we should expect a "zero tolerance" policy for the next two years at least.
"We get paid to score touchdowns, not kick field goals"
-- Urban Meyer
^ Definitely
Irricoir: you didn't make any strawmen arguments, that I saw. A strawman is when you misrepresent your opponent's argument - usually by turning it into an extreme position that's easy to knock down.
For example, if you had accused another commenter of suggesting that "the cops always overreact." Then, you give 2-3 examples of when cops either reacted appropriately or under-reacted. Thus, you've easily knocked down your own strawman.
On the other hand, it would be more difficult to knock down the position, "Shawnee Hills police are more likely to overreact to relatively minor situations compared to officers of big city police departments." Possibly true, possibly false; but the argument appears solid enough to hold its own, pending a serious debate.
Alex, et al,
Tell EVERYBODY at OSU to stay the hell away from the bars in Delaware. They have local-yokles that hank out just looking for college students, eagor to cause trouble. My son was a starter on Oh. Wesleyan baseball ranked # 1 in Div 3 at the time,(1998) in a bar there celebrating a teammate 21st birthday.(We actually beat the Bucks at their place that year) One of the locals picked on the wrong guy, our first baseman, @ 6'0',and 220, and went outside, and broke his jaw. All my son did was to try and break up the fracus, and then the cops showed. Seven players arrested and spent the nite in jail, suspended for 7 games. The Attorney told us later he personally had handled over 200 students who got in trouble because of the locals.(record got exponged) I believe this incident with Stone aand Meghorn occured in Delaware co, correct? Just some friendly advice.
Furgy and Tommy Myers(QB to Northwestern) were in the backfield together at Troy High,and my bro. took me to the Troy vs Chaminade game, when he was a Sr at CHS and played Troy the first game of the 1956 season. CHS had a great team tha
Seriously, why is this a big deal? They were peeing in an alley, so what? Drop the charges or give them a small fine and community service to show you don't let football players off easy and move on.
Regardless of the outcome, you know Coach Meyer is not happy that this happened.
What was Coach Meyer's first statement at his introductory team meeting??
It seems Urban is being pretty tough, but it's easy to be tough during the summer. I'm wondering what he does if something happens during the season. Too many coaches today leave it to the B1G to hand down the suspensions.
BTW Did anybody get their 40 yard time? No attempt at a "Bo Duke?"
shawnee hills police were on edge from the golf tourney to many hours dealing with all the drunks.
came across 3 guys pissing where they take a piss @ when they have to go and no place is open.
like two dogs one puts his scent there its his when he see's someone else doing it he gets pissed, thats all to this story.
"Give me Liberty, or Give me Death!"
Peeing behind a bar is suddenly grounds for panic under NCAA probation? Come on guys, let's stop overracting here.
did some research on shawnee hills police they had them in custody for 7 hrs before they were charged booked at 9am released at 10:45 per texas paper
http://blutarsky.wordpress.com/2012/06/04/theres-no-peeing-in-football/
http://recordspedia.com/Ohio/Shawnee-Hills/Crime-Statistics
http://interceder.net/latest_news/Shawnee-Hills-police
http://www.elpasotimes.com/sports/ci_20768678/osu-football-player-charge...
"Give me Liberty, or Give me Death!"
How much trouble would they really be in if they jut stood there when confronted? seriously, they are in trouble for running from police. Everyone knows you don't run from cops, thats where you get into serious trouble. My guess is if they just stood there and said " yep, you caught me pissing" they aren't in any real trouble.
Dustin Fox was our leading tackler as a corner.... because his guy always caught the ball.
@Lavelli My sentiments exactly.
thats lame cops saying they shouted police ,shawnee hills is the most corupt police depart. in america.
this be my last post you guy are some of the most negative sports buffs i have ever come across in my 50 years on this planet.
"Give me Liberty, or Give me Death!"
@DEAD cool story. In your free time, maybe learn how the space bar works.
Personally, I'd love to see everyone's responses if it were Denard Robinson that ran from the cops...
Hodge - If it was Denard he would've outrun the cops at first only to trip over his shoelaces...
@Hodge - Would Denard be running from the police while doing the "Keep Feeding Me" motion from last years game? That's what's important here
If Denard Robinson isn't careful with spooning all that food into his mouth, he's going to end up lookin' like Whoopi Goldberg
Buckeyeski,
That image is burning my brain right now. Thanks....I hope you burn your lip on some really hot coffee today for doing this.
I jest of course-but seriously. I hope Denard Robinson gets fed to John Simon and Big Hank one piece at a time.
4-6 seconds from point A to point B and when you get to point B, be pissed off
I have a hard time caring about this.
I think this is the most encouraging story I've heard in a long time. Now, hear me out. It says Mewhort RAN from police- as in the past tense of RUN. That's when your feet start going faster than a jog. So, what I take from this story is blah blah blah douche bag cop who was bullied in eighth grade by football players blah blah blah MICKEY MAROTTI IS A @#$%ING GOD!
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