MRP / Trib. AFL Round 20 charges - Steve Johnson cleared of misconduct for kneeing Scott Thompson

[Son_Of_God29]

thank Christ the GFC have common sense, if he gets off tonight there can be know repeat of the stupid headbutt from last time we played failmantle

 

[MC Extra Dollop]

WE ARE CHALLENGING!

Give it a good crack and if it fails, I'll accept that. If they challenge and put forward a crap argument, that will piss me off more than the incident itself.

 

[Hoffy95]

Appealing on the basis that he will get suspended against Freo anyway so they will still get their man.

 

[JUBJUB]

Brave call...or stupid? Hope we win

No,lose and Stupid gets two weeks.If so he only has himself to blame for getting himself in these shit for brain incidents,especially against a known stager like Spud Thompson [so glad we didn't draft that prat]

About time the club stood up against the corruption in the MRP

 

[catempire]

I don't have high hopes but there was no other option really.

 

[you pick one]

If he gets off justice will have been done,Johnson will have had the wind put up him for a couple of days and that's all the incident was worth.

 

[bigfarter]

I'm pretty sure it was on Footy Classified (one of last night's panel shows anyway), because the inference was that North's medical report must have put Johnson in, it was being said that North was denying that was an accurate version. And I could have this wrong, but the way I remember it, they were even saying North wasn't even asked to provide a report. We shall see.

I think it can also be appealed on the basis that Johnson had clearly tried to get away a couple of times and Thompson kept pulling him back. I think if he can convince the tribunal that Thompson made contact to his leg immediately before, causing him to lose balance, combined with the mystery surrounding North's medical report, that's not a bad case at all.

Would be very interesting (and a huge story) if the MRP claimed they had a medical report that they never had. I don't buy the excuse that Thompson kept pulling Steve back into the wrestle. If Steve wanted to extricate himself he could have. He was playing for a free.

 

[Generalissimo]

I'm not super confident, but I think given the ridiculousness of the charge, we'd be wimps to just sit there and take it.

 

[Parasite]

Surely he gets off. Let them play the game ffs, nothing in it.

 

[MC Extra Dollop]

Would be very interesting (and a huge story) if the MRP claimed they had a medical report that they never had. I don't buy the excuse that Thompson kept pulling Steve back into the wrestle. If Steve wanted to extricate himself he could have. He was playing for a free.

It's not the strongest argument, but I think it has some merit. I feel like most of the cases that have gone to the tribunal (and further, in Jack Viney's case) have ended up getting a pretty common sense decision and the result has tended to go something in line with the court of public opinion. Now, in this instance, the court of public opinion seems to be somewhere between 'It's a disgrace that was cited' and 'Johnson is a class-A ****wit, but wow...that's soft', so that is promising. People are behind us on this one. In the past, with incidents like Kelly and Selwood, I reckon the public has been - at best - 50/50. And if that's reasonably accurate, I reckon the tribunal will just be looking for a decent defence to give Johnson a pass. And, in my opinion, that's a decent defence.

And, yes, the North side of things is going to be very interesting. I'm not even sure what the fallout should be, if the MRP has been found to have so blatantly lied to bring about a charge. If that's true, or even if the MRP just embellished the North and/or Thompson responses, that calls into question every time we've just shrugged our shoulders at the 'impact' finding and said 'well, that must have been the medical report'. It would almost be 'position untenable' stuff.

 

[Art Vandelay_]

Sorry mate. That is garbage.

"Based on the video evidence available and a medical report from the North Melbourne Football Club, the incident was assessed as reckless conduct (two points), low impact (one point) and body contact (one point). This is a total of four activation points, resulting in a classification of a Level One Offence, drawing 125 demerit points and a one-match sanction."

If SJ was a cleanskin he could have got that down to 94.
If the MRP were to remove the loading, they'd need to remove the option of an early plea for balance.

And he'd still be on 125 !

that's it for me VC.... the last two are easy... it is low impact and it is body contact, so it comes down to the conduct and I would argue it is reckless, but even if it was negligent the carry over points and his loading would still see him suspended... when you're in the situation SJ is in you have to be very careful... you can't afford even the slightest slip up.

It will be interesting to see what argument they use in the challenge, you would think it would be to have the charge thrown out?? as downgrading to negligent will probably still be a week without the plea, as reckless was with a plea.... Personally I don't like his chances I don't see what solid argument they have

 

[dazbroncos]

The Ballantyne incident has seen similar incidents with no case to answer. Mitchell twice, Hannerbury (I think) and other players who've escaped my memory. My 6 year old daughter has thrown harder punches. Let's not forget Ballantyne keeled over like he'd been shot. The bump on Hanley never made contact with his head, it was a disgraceful suspension.

Care to explain how Goodes got off then?

The phrase insufficient force seems to magically disappear from the MRP vernacular whenever SJ is involved. His feet are on the ground as he is on the Nrth players chest. WAs he rolling back and forth - yes - but dropping his knees… Nathan Jones he dropped the knees but from what I saw in this he didn't. And the NM player pulled him down as well. There may be more vision but thats what i saw

Its a bad position for SJ to be in and he should just lay there hand get niggled and punched and then run away but of course he plays back and gets rolled for it.

Its BS but as CS said, its a load of petty shit that has accumulated in to a pile of bigger shit that gets him done every time.

And while his actions are subject to a subjective criteria he will keep getting done - warranted or not.

GO Catters

 

[SJ]

I reckon he'll be found guilty. I think one of his 'knees' actually gets Thompson with some decent force, and considering the rib cage is pretty fragile it is a dangerous action (disregarding the outcome). Ribs can break pretty easily, you can't really have people going around doing what he did.

 

[vinum coupe]

Lets get one thing strait this system of carry over points was adopted from the NRL back in the day when in that code the minimum charge was manslaughter,now we are using the same points to suspend players for clowning around,I'm happy for thugs to carry some sort of extra penalty as a deterrent,but that tag doesn't fit SJ,Fyth and so many other great footballers.No club and no supporters are happy with this part of the system time to f--k the points off for good.

That's what I said earlier.

Maybe loading should only apply to striking charges.
punch, elbow, kick.

 

[MC Extra Dollop]

I'm not super confident, but I think given the ridiculousness of the charge, we'd be wimps to just sit there and take it.

And that's the other part of it. Ideally would like to risk it with a player that isn't as important as Johnson, but Chris Scott can only say 'Just because we accept the verdict, doesn't mean we agree with it' so many times, before it goes from sounding pretty impressive to pissweak. Johnson's an idiot, but I think he has a case and I'm glad he's challenging it.

 

[catempire]

I reckon he'll be found guilty. I think one of his 'knees' actually gets Thompson with some decent force, and considering the rib cage is pretty fragile it is a dangerous action (disregarding the outcome). Ribs can break pretty easily, you can't really have people going around doing what he did.

One of my (many) gripes with the system is that if you are going to use outcomes (i.e. the extent of injury) as a proxy for force - which they do - you have to apply that when there is no injury to conclude that there is insufficient force. It has to go both ways to be a fair system.

 

[SJ]

Let's just hope this case lasts longer than the five minutes that most of our other challenges have reached.

 

[SJ]

One of my (many) gripes with the system is that if you are going to use outcomes (i.e. the extent of injury) as a proxy for force - which they do - you have to apply that when there is no injury to conclude that there is insufficient force. It has to go both ways to be a fair system.

Good point.

 

[MC Extra Dollop]

I reckon he'll be found guilty. I think one of his 'knees' actually gets Thompson with some decent force, and considering the rib cage is pretty fragile it is a dangerous action (disregarding the outcome). Ribs can break pretty easily, you can't really have people going around doing what he did.

Agreed...that is a risk, if we assume that the MRP's finding on the impact was in fact based on a North/Thompson medical report. Which is why I think we would also want to argue that Thompson at the very least contributed to the end result, if not that he caused the entire thing.

 

[dazbroncos]

I will preface this by saying that I have never defended Steve Johnson. He is the most infuriating player on our list by a long way. For every match winning performance he has given us over his career, he's given us an undisciplined act or poor game because he's played the man not the ball.

He has several times the natural ability of Joel Selwood, but Joel's leadership, work ethic, discipline and consistency makes him a far, far more valuable footballer.

BUT - in this case I cannot fathom that was considered a reportable offence. Headbutting Crowley - however soft the contact - was. Kneeing Nathan Jones last year was a poor act and he deserved his suspension.

But this one was not a 'kneeing offence' - to do that, don't you have to drop your knees into someone instead of basically lean on them as you're being prevented from standing up?

It certainly wasn't a 'reckless' act either. Brett Deledio ran past Mathew Stokes and deliberately elbowed him in the back of the head and his suspension was downgraded to a reprimand.

We simply must appeal this shocking decision.

Great post and i agree totally.
SJ has done some dumb shit before but this is just a joke.

GO Catters

 

[vinum coupe]

that's it for me VC.... the last two are easy... it is low impact and it is body contact, so it comes down to the conduct and I would argue it is reckless, but even if it was negligent the carry over points and his loading would still see him suspended... when you're in the situation SJ is in you have to be very careful... you can't afford even the slightest slip up.

It will be interesting to see what argument they use in the challenge, you would think it would be to have the charge thrown out?? as downgrading to negligent will probably still be a week without the plea, as reckless was with a plea.... Personally I don't like his chances I don't see what solid argument they have

Insufficient force I guess.
When I watched it I was hoping he had been pulled down.

And maybe he is. But I reckon he dropped his knee in.
So I don't think he'll get out of the reckless charge.

 

[Freo Blood]

Surely he gets off. Let them play the game ffs, nothing in it.

Bull - Ballas or Crowley would get pinged for that so let him miss. I hope he gets the 2, they lose both and we stay a game clear on the ladder. Peace and love Cats fans.

 

[goyoucatters]

The meltdown on here will be just about beyond belief when this (probably) fails.

The only possible argument for me (that could actually work with the panel) would be 'insufficient force'. Which I think the MRP will suggest they have already considered and adjudicated upon. I don't accept that the MRP haven't covered off with some sort of statement from the Kangas doctor about Thompson's condition after the incident.

Even if the panel accept that Thompson forced SJ to overbalance, I think they will probably suggest that he could have fallen onto Thompson without leading with his knees.

And as soon as they establish that he had a reasonable alternative, I think our case collapses.

Will be delighted to be proven wrong, of course. Because the MRP (and appeals process) is Chooklotto at its finest.

So I would imagine the only thing of which we can be certain is this...

SJ will most probably learn absolutely nothing about how he needs to measure his behaviour on the field as a result of this latest incident.

Which is actually the most infuriating part of all of this for me.

 

[Strangled Cat]

We had just been discussing the advantages of the system.

Why is it poor? What is wrong with serving the 'left over' parts of your previous charge next time? If anything, it's lenient.

Oh, right. As I hadn't read the previous 15 pages, I was lacking context.

To answer your question, I believe that you should be either guilty, or not guilty of something and you should only serve time on the infringement which you're guilty of. If you do something which doesn't warrant a week off, then just move on. Activation points etc. just make it messy, whilst serving penalties in a non-linear fashion.

I'd just prefer to see a common sense approach to tribunal hearings. Determining guilt via a point system does have some merit, but IMO the point system should only be used as a guide to obtaining the correct outcome, not an absolute. It's not an exact science after all.

 

[Art Vandelay_]

Bull - Ballas or Crowley would get pinged for that so let him miss. I hope he gets the 2, they lose both and we stay a game clear on the ladder. Peace and love Cats fans.

Both the freo players you have mentioned are the biggest campaigners and literally the skid marks on this great game.

Lose to Carlton 3 weeks from finals.... pfft give me a break they've just lost Henderson too


Oh and peace and love Freo fans