A current public relations crisis that is currently going on is the whole Miami Dolphins bullying fiasco. It was originally centered on two offensive lineman Jonathan Martin, and Richie Incognito. However the issues have gone much deeper than that and Investigator Ted Wells researched and released a report on the improper conduct in the workplace, and it goes beyond just Martin and Incognito.
The whole story came to the view of the public when Martin up and left the team about 8 weeks into the season. As more details came out it was thought to be because a teammate (Incognito) had been bullying Martin and finally he lost it and left. The report Ted Wells turned into the Dolphins and the National Football League showed that it went deeper. The report also lists other players, lineman Mike Pouncey and John Jerry as culprits to the workplace wrongdoing. In addition to the 2 players it was mentioned that the offensive line coach Jim Turner not only knew this was happening but also from time to time joined in the unfair treatment. It was exposed that Martin and other young players had been receiving harsh treatment for the past 2 or 3 seasons. Not only did it include players but it also mentioned that an assistant athletic trainer had received many instance of racist treatment from Incognito, Pouncey and Jerry.
During the season, Martin had left and never returned to the team, after phone records and text messages were turned into the proper people Incognito was suspended for the rest of the year without pay, which cost him over 1 million dollars in salary. With the report coming out only 4 days ago there has been no more action taken yet by the NFL or the Miami Dolphins organization.
This all begs the question of what will happen with the decisions from the Dolphins and the NFL with the people involved in the “Bullying” incident. The Dolphins have to make a statement that this cannot be tolerated and the situation escalated so quickly that they are already to the point where they need to repair their image. I feel like what will come of this is that Incognito and Coach Turner will no longer be with the team. I would also expect that Jerry and Pouncey would get a small suspension from the team. On the NFL front I expect that they will produce a anti-bullying conduct policy that will go into effect immediately.
The NFL is a popular enough league that they will be able to recover their image quickly, but they will make sure nothing like this happens again.
Sources-
Coaches. (n.d.). News RSS. Retrieved February 17, 2014, from http://www.miamidolphins.com/team/coaches.html
Wells, T. (2014, February 14). REPORT TO THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE CONCERNING ISSUES OF WORKPLACE CONDUCT AT THE MIAMI DOLPHINS . NFL.com. Retrieved February 17, 2014, from http://63bba9dfdf9675bf3f10-68be460ce43dd2a60dd64ca5eca4ae1d.r37.cf1.rackcdn.com/PaulWeissReport.pdf
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