We’ll see how Jarboe ends up faring. In the meantime, any blockhead who brings a handgun to a track meet gets at least 40 points on our scale.
Handful of trouble
We’re seeing a little more of this lately, too — the “sports star wantonly grabs unguarded vagina in public place” arrest. Pioneered by oft-traded Jason Kidd, there has been a small handful, so to speak, of these incidents in recent years. Sometimes a groping arrest will be reported in such a way that it is unclear which part of the female body the offending player seized — the case of LSU football player Chase Pittman comes to mind — but in other cases, it’s pretty obvious.
This past week, we saw the latest development on that front, as Nebraska offensive lineman Andy Christensen was suspended from the team after being arrested for first-degree sexual assault, with resisting and failure to comply charges tacked on for good measure. A 23-year-old woman at a bar in Lincoln called the Brass Rail reported that Christensen came up to her “from behind” and “reached under her clothing.” No word yet on exactly how much Andy was drinking that night, if at all, but Huskers coach Bo Pelini seemed unamused by the incident.
“The charges against Andy are serious in nature and these types of actions will not be tolerated,” he said.
It’s unusual to see an offensive lineman pick up this kind of charge — this is much more a cornerback/power-forward type of offense. The offensive lineman is much better known for your brute force/belligerent public-drunkenness type of charge, i.e., getting loaded at a bar, peeing in a sink, hurling a stool in the direction of a dartboard, putting a fist through some civilian’s eye orbit, kicking out the rear windshield of a police cruiser, etc. In fact, the OL is often more inclined to punch a woman in the stomach than he is to grab her genitals — see the Jets’ Jumbo Elliott at the famed Bogart’s bar fracas some years back.
Offensive linemen also seem to specialize in arrests involving pellet guns: ex–USC Trojan/current Philadelphia Eagle Winston Justice comes to mind (he pulled a pullet gun on a fellow student in a USC “parking structure”), as does Alabama tackle Jeremy Elder (who used one in a robbery), or Oklahoma State lineman Adam Gourley, who was brought in after being caught pegging civilians with a pellet gun from his dorm-room window. These are your standard offensive line–type arrests. But vagina-grabbing? Strange, to say the least. And disturbing. Let’s give Christensen a good 55 points for the sex-assault and move on.
Lubed Trojan
Speaking of USC, old friend Pete Carroll has to be even less pumped and jacked this week after seeing yet another player of his pop up on the blotter. Remember that just a few weeks ago, prized linebacker recruit Maurice Simmons got arrested for an armed street robbery in Compton. Now it comes out that starting defensive tackle Fili Moala has been arrested in connection with a bar brawl incident in Newport Beach at a saloon called Hogue Barmichaels.
