IT'S ALL BETTER NOW: Brett Myers's domestic assault charges were dropped last week.

Phoenix readers may recall reading last week about starting Charger safety Terrence Kiel, who was arrested for the thoroughly lame charge of shipping codeine-based cough syrup to a PO Box in Texas. Well, Kiel played last week against the Steelers, but another Charger defensive back was put out on the streets after being busted in a domestic-violence rap. The player was Markus Curry, another Charger defensive back, who was picked up following a routine traffic stop and charged with inflicting bodily injury to a spousal cohabitant. Apparently a complaint had been phoned in to San Diego police. Curry had been on the Chargers’ practice squad but was released in the wake of the arrest.

Curry, who was suspended for domestic-violence issues while a student at Michigan, was the fifth Charger to be arrested since April. Like Kiel, he was also shot once — although Curry was shot in college, while Kiel was shot after being drafted. Linebackers Steve Foley and Shaun Phillips were both arrested this summer following altercations with police officers. Foley was subsequently shot by police in highly ambiguous circumstances.

Propriety demands
This newspaper make a point of mentioning that Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Brett Myers, arrested this summer in a highly publicized domestic-violence incident here in Boston, had the charges dropped last week after his wife signed an “affidavit of accord and satisfaction” indicating she did not want to press charges.
The agreement officially makes it impossible and improper for sportswriters and radio personalities to bust Myers’s balls for being a wife-beating jackass. Facts such as Myers’s wife being found by police in tears and with a swollen face, and witnesses seeing the pitcher striking his wife and pulling her hair will no longer be the subject of smart-alecky commentary in the sports sections of America.
On a serious note, there is something unpleasant about this court decision. It’s true that athletes who are exonerated of crimes very often fail to receive even close to the same amount of attention after being pronounced innocent as they did following their arrests. But in this case, there were several eyewitnesses to the war of the Myerses, and Myers himself issued a public apology for his “improper” behavior. Moreover, reporters covering the latest court proceeding noted that court officers treated the pitcher like a celebrity. According to the Associated Press, one told him, “Good luck, it will be all right,” while another said, “Nice seeing you again.”

Illegal use of hands
In a week where Markus Curry joined the ranks of arrested NFL defensive backs, Sylvester Croom’s Mississippi State Bulldogs donated one of their cornerbacks to this summer’s shocking wave of college defensive-backfield arrests.

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MSU cornerback Adron Chambers, 20, was busted last week and charged with two misdemeanors, indecent exposure, and simple assault. Little has been made public about the incident; all that is known is that a student reported being “inappropriately touched” at 1:52 pm last Wednesday in the school’s Ruby Hall dormitory. Later that evening, Chambers was arrested.

MSU has had a tough year on and off the field. In the spring, six players were arrested for assaulting an off-duty police officer. In September, freshman Anthony Summers — also a defensive back — was arrested on a disorderly conduct rap.

This has been quite a summer for college defensive backs, from the MSU players to Tarrell Brown and Tyrell Gatewood (the Taser victims from University of Texas), and including such luminaries as Marvin Taylor of UConn (misused credit cards), Marsalous Johnson of Tennessee (aiming pop guns on the highway), and Aleem Harris of New Mexico (lady-beating). Pro defensive backs in trouble this summer have included Kiel, Curry, Adam “Pacman” Jones (nightclub disturbance), Ricky Manning Jr. (restaurant fight), and Minnesota Vikings road-rage veteran Dwight Smith.

When he’s not googling “defensive backs,” and “felony,” Matt Taibbi is writing for Rolling Stone. He can be reached at M_Taibbi@yahoo.com .