When the contempt list comes out on Friday, I’ll probably have to give myself the top spot. I was lazy last week reporting and opining on the OJ Mayo Referee-Gate situation. I allowed my research to end with AP wire reports, instead of doing due diligence in digging in to what really happened in Charleston, West Virginia on January 26. This video, taken at the game, seems to raise questions about whether or not Mayo really ‘pushed’ referee Mike Lazo. It is difficult to tell from the angle of the video I watched, but it seems unlikely that Mayo was guilty of any sort of malicious contact against the referee, and it has raised strong doubt as to the veracity of Lazo’s account of the events.
If you read the post from last week (Hold the Mayo), you know that I spent most of my time criticizing the adults involved in allowing Mayo to avoid immediate suspension. And it would seem that some of that criticism was misplaced, at least in this particular circumstance. It is difficult for me to maintain that anyone involved in the case, from the head coach to the judge whose injunction allowed Mayo to play in Huntington’s next two contests was wrong. Perhaps Mayo should have been disciplined for taunting and making incidental contact with the official, but there is enough evidence from that fateful night to suggest that the referee was just as culpable in the incident as Mayo.
On a local level, I have always believed that there is a lack of accountability for high school officials, and this saga may shed a more intense light on that fact. The job of a high school official is one that few people want, and with very good reason. But they are paid for their work (unappreciated as they may be), and they should be held accountable for egregious errors. Most high school officials are fair men and women working with the best interests of all the kids involved; as such, they should be applauded for their efforts, and their efforts should not be tarnished by officials who have malicious agendas. If it is true, as some suggested, that Lazo had it ‘in’ for Mayo throughout that night, then it is Lazo, and not Mayo (who may be looking at as much as a four-game suspension in the aftermath) who deserves a lengthy suspension.
As a guy who was always thirty seconds from an ejection, I should have known better to sit in judgment on the case without having all the facts. Getting it right, or at least providing a different perspective, has always been the mission here, and I simply dropped the ball on this one. It doesn’t make OJ Mayo a saint, but I knew better than to make him the devil without a closer examination of what really happened. OJ, you have my apologies.
For more on the Mayo saga, you can read Yahoo! Sports’ Adrian Wojnarowski and our buddy Pat Forde…and a special thanks to my old buddy, The Powdered Wig, for sending me on a deeper fact-finding mission.
Chief,
This reminds me of the time that your foot was on the line on that 3pointer during our afternoon pickup game……..most people wouldn’t expect there to be players willing to call your toe nail on the line during a pick up game from 45 ft away….. sometimes its a thankless job making the right call!!!
I think we were both thrown out of that one……
Darth