Dark side: S.F. took a stand against domestic violence; K.C. still hasn’t
MIAMI — The Super Bowl is a time when teams celebrate all that is good and special. Not the elements that are dark and disturbing.
But both the 49ers and the Chiefs have had plenty of challenging times in their past. Both teams have faced, in multiple instances, issues of domestic violence.
Teams have to weigh talent versus tolerance. What behavior will they tolerate? Where is the line drawn? The teams — at least the current regimes — have taken different approaches in grappling with one of the NFL’s darkest issues.
On Monday night and again on Tuesday, Kansas City wide receiver Tyreek Hill sat at a podium and answered questions. It marks one of the first times he has been available in a nonpostgame situation all season. A season that, at one point, looked like it might have
been in jeopardy.
Last spring, Hill was investigated for two domestic incidents and suspended from all team activities. In March, he was accused of breaking his 3yearold son’s arm. A month later, audio surfaced of him threatening his fiancee, saying, “You need to be terrified of me, too, bitch.” He was investigated but was not charged with any crime. Hill denies the allegations of child abuse.
The woman involved is the same one whom Hill punched and choked while she was pregnant with his son, when Hill was in college. In 2014, he was kicked off the Oklahoma State football team and eventually pleaded guilty to domestic assault and battery. He was sentenced to three years’ probation, and to angermanagement and batterer counseling.
In April 2016, the Chiefs made him a fifthround draft choice. Last September, after the league announced he would not be suspended, Kansas City signed Hill to a threeyear $54 million extension.
“Each and every day that I get up and get a chance to be around my kids, I feel like I’m truly blessed,” Hill said Monday. “God gives you the opportunity to wake up and be a better human. I’m still working on myself, trying to be a better man.”
Did he worry he might not be able to play this season? That he may not be with the Chiefs right now?
“I knew I was going to play,” he said. “I had a rough patch, or whatever, but I was going to bounce through because of my faith and the people around me, my supporting cast. And I still got to see my son. My son knows what’s going on. Having him around me was a real big thing. I tell him, ‘I’ll always be your father, I love you.’ He tells me, ‘Daddy, you’re my best friend.’ ”
This wasn’t the first time the Chiefs had confronted domestic violence. Far from it. In May, USA Today wrote a story detailing the extensive domesticviolence history surrounding the team.
Linebacker Jovan Belcher killed his partner in 2012, then drove to the Chiefs’ facility and shot himself.
Last season, running back Kareem Hunt was caught on video kicking a woman in the head in a hotel. The Chiefs released him, saying they did it because he was untruthful with them. Hunt was signed by the Cleveland Browns, was suspended by the league without pay for eight games and played five games this season.
This offseason, the Chiefs traded for defensive end Frank Clark. Clark, who was drafted by the Seahawks in 2015, was kicked out of Michigan after he was arrested and charged with assault for allegedly hitting his girlfriend. He pleaded no contest to a lesser charge.
The 49ers, of course, have had their own issues. At one point, they led the league in arrests. Their previous playoff teams employed Ray McDonald, Bruce Miller, Ahmad Brooks and Tramaine Brock, all of whom had domesticviolence allegations against them. The arrests and accusations tore at the fabric of the team’s image and the credibility of its claims to value high character.
And then came the case of Reuben Foster, which was a litmus test for the new regime. The linebacker dropped to the 49ers in the draft because of a failed drug test and altercation at the combine. The team was thrilled, but Foster was a highrisk pick.
In February 2018, he was arrested on suspicion of domestic assault. Three months later, he was charged by the Santa Clara district attorney. His girlfriend recanted the allegations and testified under oath that she had fabricated the story. The 49ers took him back in but made it clear that there could be no more trouble. Six months later, Foster was arrested again, this time at the team hotel in Tampa, Fla. He was released the following day. Prosecutors ultimately would decline to file charges.
“There wasn’t a decision to be made,” head coach Kyle Shanahan said Monday night. “We knew what happened, we knew the information that we had, we felt very good with the decisions we were making based off of that information. We were also very clear that if this stuff came up again, there wouldn’t be a decision. We wouldn’t look into whether it was true or whether it was not true. You have to quit associating with this. And if you didn’t, it would be the end of the story.
“Once I was told about it, I knew what I had told Reuben. And a decision was made very fast.”
It was a low point for the team, but it was also a significant moment for the regime of general manager John Lynch and Shanahan.
“To me, that is one of the defining moments of John and Kyle,” 49ers CEO Jed York said recently. “To be able to say, ‘This is a firstround pick in our first year and we moved on from it.’ It was hard. And we could have justified not moving on. But we knew where we had to be.
“I think that’s a defining moment for the culture of this team. We are team first.”
I believe it was a defining moment for the team. It was a difficult decision, but the type that makes a team grow. It sent a clear message that talent is not the only thing the team values. That a player has to be accountable and dependable. That he must put his team first.
Foster was particularly talented. He quickly was picked up by Washington.
Hill is particularly talented. He could be a difference maker in this Super Bowl.
If so, the Chiefs would like you to believe it is a feelgood story.