If you've read my blog for awhile, or perhaps if you're familiar with my twitter stream, you know that I'm often skeptical of Major League Soccer's "punishments." Let me say right off, I think they got this one absolutely right.
Last Friday night, in the early minutes of the Dynamo's match at Seattle, on-field microphones picked up Dynamo midfielder Colin Clark using some pretty offensive language toward a ball boy. I'm not going to repost it here, but let's suffice it to say both words start with an F, and included an anti-gay slur.
Oops.
For his part, Clark issued a fairly prompt apology via twitter at about 12 AM Pacific time, Saturday morning--
"I'd like to offer a sincere apology to everyone who watched the game,
especially the ball boy for whom I used awful language towards,"
His next tweet read--
"I didn't mean to disrespect anyone and am sorry for letting my emotions
get the best of me, It's not who I am
and it won't happen again."
Clark also released a more full statement later. However, today MLS handed down disciplinary action including a 3 game suspension, a fine of an undisclosed amount, and league mandated sensitivity/diversity training. I think they got it just about right. It's not overkill and it's not a slap on the wrist either.
My take on this whole thing: I don't think Colin Clark is a bad guy. His apologies seem sincere. He apologized personally to the ball boy. He says that this is not who he is, and I'll take him at face value on that. He apparently doesn't have a history of this type of behavior.
Anyone that's played competitive sports at any level knows that sometimes your emotions can get the best of you, though that's tempered by the fact that this happened very early in the match. It's not an excuse at all, but I'll take Clark's word that he just lost his head and shot his mouth off. Hopefully the punishment will keep him from doing that again, and in theory it will make other players or staff think twice about this behavior in future.
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