WHY I DIDN’T KICK BROWN TO CURB
Big Blue chief explains why he re-signed kicker despite abuse allegations
John Mara strongly defended the Giants’ decision to re-sign Josh Brown — in the owner’s first public comments since the kicker’s alleged domestic violence history surfaced — saying the team felt “comfortable” bringing him back despite being aware of Brown’s arrest for domestic violence last year, along with the more than 20 other physical incidents his ex-wife alleges occurred.
Brown, who is suspended for the season opener for violating the league’s personal conduct policy, was charged with fourthdegree domestic violence in May 2015, but the charges in King County, Wash., were dropped five days later.
Based on the facts available to the Giants — and more importantly, the information unknown — Mara said he felt he needed to be “fair” to Brown, who signed a two-year, $4 million contract in the offseason.
“A lot of times there is a tendency to try to make these cases black and white. They are very rarely black and white. You very rarely have a Ray Rice video,” Mara said during Wednesday’s practice at the team’s facility. “There are allegations made, you try to sort through the facts and you try to make an informed decision. That is what we did here.
“Based on the facts and circumstances we were aware of at that time, we were comfortable with our decision to re-sign him. Nothing has happened in the meantime to make us question that decision.”
In that time, Mara has heard the complaints from fans for standing by Brown, but the owner asserted the team was “trying to do the right thing,” regardless of how retaining the 37-year-old kicker appeared to the public.
During the Ray Rice investigation, Mara said “there is no place in the game for domestic violence.”
“I have four daughters and seven sisters, and I know I have to face each one of them,” Mara said. “These are not easy decisions. It is very easy to say, ‘The guy has been accused, get rid of him, terminate him.’ But when you are sitting at the top of an organization and you are responsible for a lot of people, you better make more informed decisions than that.
“This is an issue, domestic violence, that we take very seriously here. Everybody in this building, players and employees alike, go through a training program on issues like domestic violence and sexual abuse. … We have worked very, very closely for many years, long before this became a hot-button topic, with an organization called My Sister’s Place, and this is an issue that is very personal to a lot of us. In this particular case, as an employer, it’s a complicated and emotional issue, and you have to make decisions based on the facts and circumstances.”
One of the reasons Mara didn’t speak about the issue before Wednesday was due to his reluctance to comment on the veracity of Molly Brown’s accusations.
According to the incident report, Brown’s ex-wife claims the alleged pattern dates back to her pregnancy in 2009 and that she had been granted a protection order against him.
“I’m not going to get into whether they were valid or invalid,’’ Mara said. “We did do some due diligence on this. We had a number of conversations with a number of different people.”
Molly Brown also alleged their landlord in Hoboken had blackmailed the couple by threatening to reveal the alleged incidents, but they reported the threat to Giants attorneys, who “basically did what they needed to do to make the guy go away.”
Mara called the claim “completely ridiculous,” though the team later clarified they advised Brown during a dispute over his lease with his landlord, in which the kicker said he felt threatened.
Though the NFL has implemented a new “baseline” six-game suspension for first-time domestic abuse offenders, Brown — who is entering his fourth season with the Giants — received just one game because of “insufficient information,” stemming from the lack of cooperation by the police and Brown’s ex- wife with the league’s investigation.
Mara said he supports the suspension, also noting Brown has been in counseling for a couple of years and is “confident that he has been very diligent about that.”
Though the Gi an t s signed kicker Randy Bullock on Mo n d a y, Ma r a said Brown ’s roster spot wo ul d be determined solely by his play on the field.
“I’m trying to be fair to Josh, also,’’ Mara said. “Yes, it’s a distraction. The easiest thing in the world for us to have done was for us to say: ‘Let’s find another kicker.’ I think he’s trying to do the right thing. He deserves an opportunity to show he can do that.
“We will live with the results of that decision and we move forward.”
“Based on the facts and circumstances we were aware of at that time, we were comfortable with our decision to re-sign him. Nothing has happened in the meantime to make us question that decision.” — Giants co-owner John Mara, on re-signing kicker Josh Brown