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Jonathan Taylor Dismissed From Alabama: Why Nick Saban Went Too Far With Second Chances

By Caleb Calhoun

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Alabama Coach Nick Saban is right to preach second chances when it comes to players. But he took it too far with Jonathan Taylor, who was dismissed Sunday.

After his second domestic violence arrest in the past year and third arrest in the past 13 months, according to SI.com, Alabama Defensive Tackle Jonathan Taylor has been dismissed from a second prestigious school in the past year.

Taylor, who started his career at Georgia, was arrested last July on felony assault and domestic battery charges after allegedly “striking his girlfriend with a closed fist and choking her” during a dorm argument. Those charges are still pending.

In March of 2014, he was one of four Georgia players arrested on “theft by deception.”

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The July case got him dismissed from the school. Then Alabama picked him up, and Taylor has now been arrested again on domestic violence charges. Saban had no choice but to dismiss him.

But it’s time to stop letting Saban off the hook. First, let’s be clear. He is right for calling out people who get up on their high horse and judge coaches who keep players with legal issues. As Saban so famously said in a speech last December, when he defended his decision to give defensive lineman D.J. Pettway a second chance, where do you want them to be? The link to that story is here.

There’s one thing wrong with Saban’s analysis though in comparing Pettway’s situation to Taylor’s situation. Pettway was arrested on a robbery charge. Taylor had already been arrested for theft and was then arrested for domestic violence on top of that before Saban took him on.

This wasn’t a second chance. It was a third, and Taylor blew it.

And if he is guilty of either domestic violence charge, I’ll answer Saban’s question directly. Where do I want him to be?

I want him in prison. I don’t want him in football. I don’t want him in society.

This is not an issue about second chances or high horses. Any decent person should support second chances for 19 and 20-year old college kids. But there’s a difference between a second chance after a robbery or drug charge and a second chance after a domestic violence incident.

And it appears as if we’re lumping all incidents together at all levels of football. Even domestic violence cases have to be picked apart.

Take the NFL, for example.

We know with the Ray Rice incident and now the Greg Hardy incident, the issue of domestic violence has come to the forefront of the sport.

But let’s look at those two cases. Rice was caught on camera punching his then-fiance on an elevator, knocking her out. He was out of the league for the year due to that.

Hardy, meanwhile, got off on his charges because his accuser did not show up for an appeal in a case that appears as if she was paid off. But if you look at his initial charges, which can be seen here on the Charlotte Observer website, they are much more violent than Rice’s case.

See the difference? Rice was an issue of anger management, something that deserves punishment and requires treatment.

Hardy, if he’s guilty, is more along the lines of a sociopath who does not belong on the streets at all.

After being arrested for theft by deception and then arrested for a domestic violence charge, Taylor’s initial charges at least appear to be more in line with Hardy’s. This is not a temporary anger issue in which you lash out and make a huge mistake.

This is, based on the accusations, an issue of power and lack of compassion. Losing your temper and striking a woman is always, always, ALWAYS wrong. It warrants severe consequences and public backlash.

But, in the process of losing your temper, if you strike and then commit other violent acts on the woman, or man or child for that matter, that could lead to a person’s death, it goes far beyond an anger issue. Saban saw Taylor’s charges and should have known that immediately.

And given the fact that it was his second arrest, Saban was giving him a third chance. At this point, Coach Saban, your “Where do you want them to be?” speech went way too far.

You should have at least waited to see what would come of the pending domestic violence charges from last July.

Instead, you let him on the team anyway. You gave him a third chance. And he now is involved in a third incident, a second one related to domestic violence.

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