Jaxson De Ville
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- Mar 19, 2019
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Jaguars cornerback Jalen Ramsey has plenty of reasons to be miffed at the team, and the team currently has plenty of reasons to be miffed at him. Against that backdrop of dysfunction, the Jaguars have come to Ramsey’s defense in one specific way.
On Wednesday, Gene Frenette of the Florida Times-Union questioned the legitimacy of Ramsey’s departure from the team for the birth of a child: “How much more of a fiasco can this Jaguars vs. Ramsey become? I’m all for anybody getting time off for the birth of their child, but is Jalen’s girlfriend actually in labor? Or is this just a convenient excuse for Ramsey to be out of the team’s crosshairs for a week or more?”
Tony Khan, the son of Jaguars owner Shad Khan, fired back at Frenette.
“That is an appalling tweet, Gene,” Tony Khan said. “That is way out of line. You have no business questioning someone’s family.”
Frenette definitely entered a minefield when discussing the topic of a player leaving the team to attend the birth of a child, but given recent events is it wrong to pose publicly a question that many privately are asking? While players have an absolute right, if they choose to use it, to exit the team for the birth of a child, most players who exercise this privilege are gone for a minimal period of time. Against the background of Ramsey wanting out of Jacksonville, and in light of his illness from Monday and his back injury from Wednesday, it’s hardly appalling to wonder whether Ramsey will turn the justifiable departure associated with the birth of a child into an absence of unjustifiable duration.
Of course, it may have been smarter for Frenette to hold that thought until Ramsey stays away from the team for a week or longer. Regardless, Frenette wasn’t questioning Ramsey’s family. Frennette was questioning whether Ramsey would use the cover of a family situation to continue to pursue his obvious agenda of getting the Jaguars to relent on their refusal to trade him. Given the stakes involved, including the promise of a new contract from a new team at a time when the Jaguars aren’t inclined to pay Ramsey, it’s not unfair to wonder whether that may be happening.
Still, kudos to Tony Khan for defending his player, even if Khan twisted the facts a bit. If the goal was to mend fences with Ramsey, however, anything other than a giant bag of cash at this point amounts to a waste of time.