Jameis Winston’s Uber Investigation a Non-Story?

Article By: Jameis1of1

Many Tampa Bay Buccaneer fans and even various media personalities that cover the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have recently been stressing over the NFL’s “investigation” into Jameis Winston, after he was accused by an Uber driver of sexual harassment.

However, the main stream media and even the vast majority of sports news outlets nation-wide seem to consider said “investigation” a non-issue, which is strange considering nearly anytime Jameis Winston does anything news worthy, it turns into front page news with a click-bait title.
For example, when Winston uttered a few words that many considered politically incorrect while spending his off-day doing charity work and trying to inspire local school children, he was hammered mercilessly by a plethora of talking heads in the media.

Another example would be when he tried to inspire his teammates with his infamous “eating W’s” speech before a game, after the team lost, he was ridiculed by media nation-wide.

Obviously, the media’s narrative could have been entirely different than what it was in both cases. Article titles could have read, “Jameis Winston misspeaks while selflessly inspiring school children on his off-day” and “Teammates let Jameis Winston down after his sincere pre-game speech”.

However, negative articles sell better than positive articles and incendiary headlines generate more views that favourable headlines do. Therefore, the fact that the NFL’s investigation seems to be a non-story outside of the Tampa Bay market, is rather strange, unless, it actually is a non-story.

The reality is, it is indeed a non-story, a non-issue and that it’s actually quite possible that the so-called “investigation” was more a case of the NFL simply waiting to reveal that Winston was cleared of all wrong-doing (so that the optics appear good to the public), than it was that there was a serious investigation at all.

The simple facts of the matter are that the accusation leveled against Jameis and his statement that such an accusation was false is not even a difficult to decipher he-said/she-said situation. In fact it is a he-said/she-said situation where the one and only eye witness on record has corroborated the statements of the “he” and refuted the statements of the “she” in this unfortunate situation.

Eagles starting CB and recent Super Bowl champion Ronald Darby went on the record to both refute the Uber driver’s accusation and corroborate Jameis’ statement of innocence. And, while some media ran with articles written with anti-Winston slant and claimed that Darby may not be a credible witness, do to him previously being a witness for Jameis in the past, the fact is that Darby is an A+ legal witness.

He is a professional athlete with a clean record, on a different team than Winston, and one that also has the possibility of earning a massive contract in the very near future.

No one using common sense would believe that such a person would risk losing such a future massive contract by lying to the NFL and covering for a player on another team.

In short, Ronald Darby has no reason to lie for Jameis Winston and every reason to be truthful with the NFL, so when he corroborated Winston’s statement of innocence and refuted the Uber driver’s accusation, he did so as an A+ legal witness.

On top of the fact that the one and only eye witness has corroborated Jameis’ statement of innocence, there is the simple fact that the Uber driver never filed a police report, and that the civil attorney she hired, never even filed a civil claim against Winston within the two year statute of limitations in Arizona where the supposed event is said to have occurred.

In short, it seems clear that the Uber driver (a) knew that she did not have a valid incident to report to the Police, and (b) that even her high-powered civil attorney knew that his client didn’t even have a solid civil case against Winston.

Finally, some believe that Jameis Winston should reveal the name of the passenger both he and Ronald Darby claimed was in the front-seat and therefore the only person that possibly could have harassed the accuser. However, the obvious truth is that Jameis does not need to reveal such a person’s name, nor does he need such a person to come forward and corroborate his statement of innocence.

It is the driver that needs this third passenger to come forward to corroborate her accusation, in order for her to have her first and only piece of evidence against Jameis. However, if this third passenger was indeed in the front seat, even the accuser probably hopes he or she does not come forward whatsoever as the mere fact that he or she was in the front seat would be additional proof positive that the accuser lied and that Winston himself was innocent of any wrong-doing.

With the above said, this case involving Jameis Winston is nothing at all like the NFL investigation into Ezekiel Elliott which resulted in Elliott being suspended for 6 games by the NFL.

In that case, there was physical evidence, multiple witnesses interviewed, and of course, actual video evidence against Elliott. In this case, there is no evidence against Winston, no witness that corroborates the accuser’s tale of events, and no proof that Winston did anything wrong at all, while at the same time there is the one and only eye witness corroborating Winston’s statement of innocence.

In short, this is a non-issue and a non-story and Tampa Bay Buccaneer fans have nothing to fear but fear itself, and perhaps Roger Goodell’s ego and the NFL’s penchant for doing things to please the public whether they are just or not.

If the Goodell is of the mind that he will suspend Winston even if all the evidence (and the only credible “evidence” is the one and only eye witness, who of course, corroborates Winston’s statement of innocence) shows him to be innocent of any wrong-doing, simply in order to appease the public, well, there is nothing any Bucs fan can do about that.