In his zeal to smear the NYPD, ESPN writer JA Adande made an analogy on Twitter, the stupidity of which burned with the undying strength of a thousand suns. Adande posted this gem comparing the football players in San Antonio who assaulted a referee on the field to a case of mistaken identity involving the NYPD, and a former tennis star named James Blake:
Really? Because those are the same things?
The kids in San Antonio targeted an official who was just doing his job, allegedly at the urging of their idiot coach, because they perceived that he had done some injustice against them.
The police in New York acted on information from witnesses. Bad information to be sure. But tips nonetheless, saying that Blake was the guy they were looking for. It’s not like they just “selected” Blake at random and decided to rough him up.
The two cases are in no way similar.
As for the amount of force used, with no video of the incident it’s impossible to say. However, do you really expect the police to nonchalantly just saunter up to every potential criminal they come across? ESPN does an excellent job of reporting half the story here. We know the criminal the police thought was Blake was involved in identity theft, yet what if he also had a history of violence?
Do the police use five plain-clothed cops and aggressive apprehension tactics on every criminal they meet?
I dearly hope that ESPN violently apprehends the next non-sports related tweet from JA Adande before he hits “send,” lest he melt the retinas of the masses with blinding silliness.
