The following is a presentation of play Fly Sports properties. Welcome everybody, This
is Sparta. I'm your host Jason Strayhorn, along with my co hosts Otis
Wiley and Jayu to to culprit and everybody. You know what this is something
that we just had to do breaking news is the Hypocrisy edition of This is
Sparta because we just felt that it was something so agreeious that we could not
wait till next week to bringing the news and what we know and the updates
that we have thus far. Obviously we all know what happened at the Michigan
game and the tunnel incident, and you know, we had to literally drag
Otis Wiley on this call because he didn't want to do it. He wants
to turn the page and move on, but it's hard to move on when
hypocrisies happened. And hypocrisy has definitely occurred in ann Arbor, as we find
out yesterday that Mozzi Smith had been charged with felony weapons charge and this happened.
You know, we're going through a timeline of this. There is an
incident that happened on October seventh in the morning. Now, now if you
look at that date. Michigan played at Indiana on October eighth, So he
was arrested in the morning on a Friday morning, going like Thursday night,
going to Friday morning, and got was able to come out of jail and
get on the team playing go down to Indiana, and no one heard a
peek. Guys, what say about the news that has come out? Yeah,
I think the biggest thing, I think you hit it on the head
about the hypocrisy there. If that was something that happened to a player in
East Lanson, if it was a Michigan State player, that would have been
front page in center, it would have been on ESPN, some other stories
would have been tied into it. It would have been based on the culture
in East Lanson these you know. So I think it's absolutely ridiculous that this
kid was arrested and had the opportunity to play, you know, to fly
with the team that same day and play without anything being said. But when
we talked about the tunnel incident, you know, you have Ward Manual,
the ad at Michigan and Jim Harbaugh sitting there talking about how outrageous this is
and how you know these guys have to be charged to the furthest extent of
the law. An apology won't do it. You know, they have to
be suspended now and everything. You know, I get it. People will
say, you know, let it's innocent til proven guilty. Michigan State players
were not, you know, provided that same goodwill of innocent til proven guilty
even though but you know, I get there was video. But just like
this, you want the due process to play out. But you can't be
sitting there in a press conference, living in a glass house and throwing stones
at the same time, because you know, what you do in the dark
will come out in the light one hundred percent, said Otis. I had
a thought and I had a comment, But Jay, you just did it
so elegantly, like just verbal like he verbalized what I was obviously trying to
put together in my own my own head of like the gall the audacity to
put our guys up on the chopping block immediately. And this goes from internally
all the way to their entire fan base. And I'm not saying entire fan
base, because I have friends who are are fans there, and you know,
have talked to me about this, and we've had conversations about the tunnel
but when your house, your own house is not clean, but then you
go to somebody else's house and you condemn them because they're messy or they don't
they're not organized. This is just the absolutely positively disgrace on the situation of
keeping the same energy that you had for us internally for them. And this
also has to be discussed about, you know, the conference and the amount
of energy that they put forth to condemn us from how we manage this.
And you know, we were all working cohesively with them to discuss you know,
the parameters even without the investigation. But then this is happening and meaning
that these guys are winning at all costs, and Jim Harball and and the
athletic director are collectively saying, hey, we know the character of this guy
on our student athlete. He is he's a kind human being. It just
makes absolutely no sense. And I love that we're addressing it right now because
no one is fully coming out there discussing this public and this is what we're
about. Uh is discussing this right right head on? Yeah, absolutely otics
And you know, sticking to that theme there, and you talked about,
you know, you have a messy house and going to someone else's house.
And it's for the same things for those people that when we came here and
we talked about, you know, the tunnel incident, and we said,
you know, that should not have happened, but this, that and other,
and people were firing at us, sending us messages, sending messages to
the football department, Coach Tucker's you know place have to be under you know,
police security, all those things, putting families in jeopardy because of what
these fans are saying there, saying it's a cultural problem at East Lanson.
The head coach does not have the programming order. These guys are a bunch
of thugs attacking their families, attacking kids who were not even in Michigan State
yet but committed to Michigan State attacking their families. And then this is happening,
and everyone wants to keep quiet. Everyone wants to keep quiet from the
top down, from ward Manual, Jim Harball, the entire Michigan football program,
the deep, deep fan base that you know spew that hate. Shame
on you with our question. Oh hey, listen, but guys, you
don't understand like I understand the emotions that are coming from both of you guys,
and you guys are holding together pretty good because I know this really ticks
you off to the core. I mean when you look at the timeline of
events, we talked about Misi Smith. I don't really know Misi Smith.
This is nothing against Missie Smith. This is totally for the machine that is
Michigan, the blue wall that everybody talks about. They act like it doesn't
exist, but something it absolutely exists, and this is a prime example of
it. You going back to a couple of days before the Michigan Michigan State
game. God by the name of Donovan Edwards. I don't know if you
guys know who that is. You know he absolutely crushed it against Ohio State
this this past week. Great kid, love him. Noah's family been knowing
MC was yay, high kid. Okay, talk to his father yesterday for
over an hour. Great family. Nothing against him, but he has a
slip of the finger or whatever it was with Twitter and retweeted some Kanye West's
anti Semitism things that we've seen guys like Kyrie and Irvin get destroyed for absolutely
destroyed, and so did Kanye himself, rightfully so. And there wasn't even
a sense. There wasn't even a half, not a quarter, no,
not a thought that he would miss any time playing the game of football.
Okay, So if that's the way we're going to do it, then I
just say keep that same energy with everything else. Isn't that what we do
when we sign up to be coaches, when we sign up to be in
public institutions like the University of Michigan, like Warden Emmanuel, like a guy
like him, you know, a former athlete, a guy like you know,
Jim Harbaugh who played the game. He protects his players. But you
want to bury enough. I don't think that that's at all, right,
You can't this This stuff will define that program. These things are coming out
and they're gonna try to say, well, this was on video and that
wasn't The facts are the facts, guys, you know, and this is
something that you just cannot change. You cannot turn a blind eye to gun
possession and you know, anti semitism and all those things. And then because
the other the team, because the guys are wearing a different color than you,
then we bury them. But let's go to the news today. The
kids, a lot of a couple of players from Michigan say, were arraigned
today, and during the arraignment, the judge basically says that they're not allowed
to have any contact with the University of Michigan, no players, no coaches,
or they can't go to Ann Arbor. And you know, one of
the attorneys, Wade Think, did bring up the fact that he objected to
it and was allowed to talk on the record, and he basically pointed to
the fact that I didn't don't recall other coaches, you know, being able
to be being censored from going to Wisconsin. You know, he brought up
again the basketball coach from Michigan in the fight that had that happened last year,
that they can't ban him from going to an entire university from what happened
in an emotionally charged environment, right, And that's what they chose to do
with Michigan State players as it stands right now. You know, there was
also a push to get all the players that have been charged michign State drug
tested, not allowed to leave the state, things like that. But the
timing of this, when the charges were dropped was conveniently after Harball had his
press conference. Now you will not speak to Jim Harbaugh until after the Big
Ten Championship game. Guys, how do you think about that? How do
you feel about that? Like there's no consequence right now they're down in Indianapolis
preparing for the Big Ten Championship game with no consequence whatsoever. Oh my gosh,
man, is it is? It's frustrating. And you try to get
this, you try to have the same level of justice, right we will.
We want fair fair shot, fair chance, and how things get handled.
You mentioned it stray about you know, just the it all stemmed from
them. It all stinned from them down the road of understanding that if they
were just took responsibility, uh, and then obviously figured out a way to
protect everyone involved. I feel like the rivalry played so much bad blood into
this rivalty play so much into this, you know, gang war against us
on the criminal justice piece of it is, it's nonsense, man, like,
it's it is a I'm just I'm speechless when it comes to it,
because it is truly we're talking tampering. We're talking like, hey, hey,
we're gonna we'll bail you out and you play. You hop on this
plane right away, go play Indiana. Oh you know what, you're good
man, Just take that tweet down you play against us in in uh in
our rivalry with the battle of Paul Bunyan, Like truly, what is that?
What is that message into people that are are watching this and following and
more so with their their recruits and and families coming in, like, you
know, no matter what happens, We're gonna take care of you from all
all facets of your life. You know you get in trouble. No,
let's let's talk about focus on a mile across the street with Imani Bates,
same jurisdysic jurisdiction, same situation. We want to just knock this dude off
the planet and put him out of his his dream of playing basketball and without
even truly doing Like if he if he was in if he was a Michigan
overring, none of this would have happened. That's extremely the story and conclusion
on the same situation that happened with him. Imani Bates was suspended one day
after his arrest, suspended, no questions asked. You know, I've seen
people in the media absolutely killing the guy, saying and you know, he's
a thug, he's this, he's that, he's everything wrong with basketball and
turns out. It wasn't his. It wasn't it. He was part on
someone else's car, you know. And and I know, I know the
Michigan fan base is gonna say, oh, but this situation was different.
He didn't have serial numbers and this kid like had applied for his license.
I mean, like save it like that that right there, Like, it's
not about the difference in cases. It's about the difference in energy that you
put out there. That is what the issue is. And then let's talk
about the Washington County Prosecutor Eli Sovia. We were talking about a University of
Michigan grad law school. Now, you know, this is a guy who
went to Anabra Pioneer. You know, he was an eighth grade teacher.
Started his career as an eighth grade teacher. I would think that this guy
has a heart. It's special education teacher. Like, this is a guy
in the public school system coming out of it looks like Kalamazoo College. You
know, this is a guy that you would think is going to have a
heart for what's right and what's good. That he wouldn't look at colors,
you know, That's what I'm saying, Like blue versus green, like that
right there. That's a prejudice for what why is it different? He knew
that this kid was arrested in charge when he came with the Chargers on the
seven out of eight players from Michigan State, all those players missed. Seven
out of eight players missed four games. Mozzie has missed zero. One of
the Michigan State players will be out for twelve games in total as he continues
to go through his legal process. There is no real legal process, there's
no there is no punishment, there's no consequence for the others. That's he
didn't you know? This is the Seeli Sabac goes on to law school at
the University of Michigan. He currently is a lecturer for the Law School of
the University of Michigan. And I know that there's been reporters that have reached
out to the University of Michigan regents for comment. There's been no comment.
No one knows when they knew anything about this. But guys, I find
it very coincidental that as soon as the charges were dropped, statements were already
teed up and ready to hand out to the media from both Ward Manuel and
Jim Harbaugh. How about that written statements were already cooked up ready to go
as they got on the plane to go to Indy. Yeah, you know,
Jason, that's that's a good point. You know, if the whole
thing with that is just like you talked about it at the beginning, it's
just hypocrisy, hypocrisy, hypocrisy, that's all it is. And you can't
have this. You know, Michigan State players. Once that happened, it
was automatically guilty until proven innocent. And now with this everyone's trying to be
like innocent or proven guilty, let the due process play out. You know,
those same people are saying that, and you talked about it otis you
know about keeping that same energy. And you can't sit here and tell me
that that prosecutor is sitting there and he can look himself in the mirror and
say, I'm doing everything by the book, I'm doing everything fair because at
the end of the day, I'm not stupid. You're not stupid. So
don't piss in my boot and tell me it's raining outside because it's a grandpapy
that that that's definitely you know, we had a comment just here like he
this is you cannot be a part of something any investigations. Yes, like
that that's basically water, that's blood in the water. You already have a
positive, I say, your majority of on the wrong side already, like
you're already leaning towards UH, a prejudice or something of bias with this coming.
You know this deal, right, So he gets paid from the institution.
Yeah, man's he works there, He went there, he works there,
And I just give us, hey, give us a little doubt,
give us our hundred thousand dollars back from the penalty that we got from the
from the network or the conference. And you need to go and and go
get that from them too, because like this is even in that whole situation,
we get a public repormand and then we got to pay one hundred thousand
dollars Like that don't even sound completely because it should have been all like the
incident of the tunnel should never happen. Why aren't they paying dollars? You
know, it's even that as a difference in the issues of our ore,
you know, our issues with the conference. And so there's no one publicly
out here discussing it uh and being outlanders, because I think people are like,
you know what we've already did what we had to do and now we're
focused on the future. But this stuff is gonna keep coming up, and
there's gonna be future issues with this playing us and you know for next season
and then we still got to play in basketball. So there's gonna be some
thanks right here, man, of like, how is this gonna fold?
How is it gonna unfold? As we continuous to do this, and then
I better see some press or some timelines on Saturday tomorrow or there's big championship
game talking about these these players and the issues that's going on on that team
down the road. I get it guaranteed the media is going to try to
clean that up too, and and it up like you know, this is
the Purdue versus Michigan on and we need to focus on some of this stuff
too. Yeah. National media isn't even really talking about it, guys.
National media isn't picking it up. Just you know who controls the national media.
They're not bringing anything up about this. And as you said, something
needs to be done at the big ten level. Oh that's you said that
perfectly. I mean there has to be a common you know, Commissioner Warren
has to weigh in on this. He's got a weigh in on this because
he was there at the Michigan Michigan State game. He was there at present
and he saw the post fight stuff. He was in the tunnel, he
was assessing the damages and he did the best he could and to come out
with a decision that he thought levy a level decision from up top. But
this right here, with this information, to turn the blind eye to it,
to not censor them or find them or what that that would be a
huge black eye to the to the conference, be a huge black guy to
Michigan State. Because I'm gonna tell you what. You know, we've been
covering. We're going into recruiting season, We're going into transfer portal season right
with How is this fair? How can you have competitive balance? You know
obviously we have nil and all these things going on where this guy can pay
for this. But we're talking on basis hey is the society that the two
schools traffic in, that they are, that they that they exist in.
Is the government entity for you or against you? Are they like Lady justice
supposed to have a blind eye and and the scales of justice is blind?
Is that what it's really about? Or if I'm a recruits mom or father
dad looking at this saying hey, if I'm ana recruit myself, I'm like,
whoa man like I'm afraid to go to East landsing right now? Like
think about that, guys, This ways, this is much bigger than Mindzi
Smith. This is bigger than this. This is an overreaching situation that has
to be stopped because it will have a ripple effect that will go decades into
this society. I'm telling for what goes on in these Lancing versus ann Arbor
if somebody doesn't do something about it, Yeah, you're right, you know,
something has to be done about it. You know, there has to
be a balance. There has to be you know, the same thing for
each school all through the conference, not even just each Lands and ann Arbor.
It has to be what happens at this school is going to happen at
that school and the other school. It can't be you know, different circumstances
for different schools. So you know, those guys down the road, they
feel, like I always say, they feel they invented the game of football.
They have that sense of arrogance to them that they can get away with
whatever, and you know it will just be swept under the rug and it's
going to be you know, okay after that. But you know it's starting
to come out and more and more people need to be able to, you
know, speak up on it. And uh, you know, I think
I'm just carring. You know, it's this guy gonna play tomorrow. No,
there's no question he's gonna play. I think he does. I don't.
I don't see you after all this, now, after all this,
now you know it's coming out, do you say, hey, you're still
playing or are you gonna say you're suspended? Tell you know things smooth over?
Like what why he's gonna play? You know why he's gonna play?
Like this is I like this tweet here from a peach James at the peach
of the President, when he asked, I want you to imagine if the
takes if mel Tucker and Allen Howard said anything close to the two statements that
came from the athletic director Ward Manuel or head football coach Jim Harbaugh. If
you read these, I mean, it's it's pretty egregious. You know,
I don't know I have respect for judicial process. Of course you do.
You have confidence because it's on your side, you push, you do.
Mozzie's character right, like saying that the eight players that he tried to burn
at the State from Michigan State didn't have good character. Those guys are great
character kids. There's no hope prior history of violence. Okay, we have
of course they've played tomorrow. They're hypocrites. Johnny Costanza says, right there,
he's gonna play. You know why he's gonna play, guys, You
know why? Not only is he a team captain, now only is her
first team? All Big Ten coaches and media. Did you see him perform
in in Columbus? He he was flushing c. J. Stroud out of
the pocket, the thing he got to him a couple of times, and
the and the money that's involved with that game that comes up tomorrow is way
too big for them to pass up. Brother, I'm gonna tell you right
now, he's playing. They don't have the guts to not play them.
They don't have the guts to not play because he's too good on the field
for them. And that's all they really care about, really know, as
you know who cares about it too, is uh his commissioned warringt coming out
there talking like, hey, you know, Ohio State should be Ohio State
should be in the college football playoffs. You know, even if that loss
happened, right like, that was the immediate response to you know, getting
too big ten teams in there. I mean, yeah, Harbo got exactly
what he wanted to tate our program because you know, Tuck was coming.
You know, we had our we had our average year, but we we
mount holding up baby Warreant regulators mounting up, and he's trying to put it
down and trying to push our program down. This is one way to do
it. It's sad. Let us go back, and I'm not wanting us
to join the big ten back in the older days. Man, this is
real and it still carries on, it still exists today. Yeah, and
uh, you know if this is you know, just this whole thing here,
when if we said it, when the tunnel incidents happened, Harbos's up
there just fanning the fire, making that flame bigger and bigger. And then
this happens, and Coach d said it best. I don't care what anyone
says. You know, hey, let's move on from this, let's do
that. This rivalry it's never gonna be over, you know, coach d
said it best. It's just getting started. And especially with all these things
that's coming up now, the difference, the way that the programs are treated
differently. It's not over, it's never gonna be over. It's just getting
started. Hey did you did you did you read Harball's response to uh,
you know, disciplining his players with playing the flag in the horseshoe. Yeah,
he says he I'm gonna take that flag and frame it and put in
our museum. And who's who's in the middle of that flag? Square?
Square? Of course I wish oh, good, look, this is not
a good look at all. This is I read this too. I had
a great article. It was the Free Press. Mitch is a great writer.
Obviously everyone knows this, but he talked about the hypocrisy here. It's
not a good look, admit that much. Even if you're amazing blue maniac,
you're a star football co captain. Being arrested on gun possession, felling
me in early October, being allowed to play for Michigan the very next day,
not being charged for seven weeks, and continues to play Saturday after Saturday,
and his school says nothing, and after the Oh House, they game
oh now, let's talk about it right before the Big ten championship game.
And they just dismiss everything like it's a big deal. It's unremarkable. That's
crazy in of itself. I mean they want us to, you know,
just there's a lot of things you want to say here that you just have
to hold your tongue a little bit, right, guys. I mean there's
things that I know you say off there that you just can't say right now
because it does chat areas that we don't want to unmentionables. Unmentionables. Yeah,
pray to the Big Man himself man for just please teach me Lord in
the conviction that I go through daily on this understanding what we have to deal
with day to day weekly with this type of stuff. With one I wish,
I mean seeing them think about what's going through our guys head, who
had to go through what they just went through. Just to see someone legitimately
skim through the process continuously playing like we've probably been about eligible far some of
our guys would playing Jakobe winning. We would think about the the think about
the production that you took away from these kids put film on paper for their
future careers of the next level if they, you know, have aspirations for
that. This is a lot of stuff they robbed from these kids that no
one's coming out and publicly saying, hey, my apologies for sorry, none
of that. This is this is on them for for forever. And I
just my heart goes out to them, because these guys are looking down the
road and it's like, man, we only forty five forty five fifty minutes
away, and I need to go living in Arbory so I can get I
got the protection for law enforcement behind me. That's that's really the message is
being said. These guys missed four games of their career. They'll never get
that back. And meanwhile, you know, Michigan players missed zero time.
So I question, so question for this, Okay, your NFL scouts.
So these guys, the Michigan State players missed four games. They couldn't put
that body of work on film, all right, they couldn't you know,
show off for the scouts. And you go to the combine, NFL scout
will talk about, you know, hey, what happened in that fight,
everything like that, and all this tiff. I've been through the Combine process.
I've been through you know, the questioning from GMS, different questionables and
everything like that. What do you think a guy will will be You're talking
about character? Okay, Hey, after a rivory game, you got in
a fight in a tunnel, okay, Or hey, the night before a
game you were arrested with a gun. Character issues like which one if you're
a GM of a team, would you lean towards saying, Okay, this
guy has better character than this guy, the guy who got in a fight
in the tunnel while being taunted by his opponent after a rivory game, or
a guy in the early morning of the you know, day of the morning
karen a gun. I'm just saying, well, if the NFL looks at
it, they would take the fighter over the gun charge because charge you can't
do anything about exactly. So that's that's all I'm saying to all these people
that are out there saying Michigan State players are thugs, it's a bad culture
and everything like that. These guys got in a fight after a rivaly game.
This other guy's carrying a gun. Yeah, I mean, we've seen
players in the NFL. We talked about it at nauseam. What are you
carrying a gun for a Broa, Why are you carrying a gun around driving?
Ryan? Arbor City is Yo city? Are you like? You like?
What do you what? Are you scared that he's only six three seven
Yeah, one of the most Don't get me wrong. The only time I've
been to ann Arbor is for to play there or when we broadcasting for games.
But I thought ann Arbor was peace, love, tranquility, eating grass
and yogurts and stuff like that. And what kind of grass you're talking about,
don't know, whatever kind of grass you know? You know, John
Lennon, imagine all the people you know. But speaking of eating, you
know, let's let's take time out for a message from our partners. At
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guys, I think that'll be enough for our breaking news special to day,
you know, with what happened in ann Arbor, this was a lot.
We're going to see what happens tomorrow. We're going to see if the
Big ten or Michigan themselves have the guts to actually sit Minsie Smith. We
doubt that's gonna happen. We know it's not going to happen, but we
will definitely be back with you guys on Tuesday nine at eight o'clock to discuss
what happened over the weekend, just a little bit of Michigan State basketball and
other things. Ms U. Don't forget to follow us on our social media.
Click on the Lincoln the Bio anywhere, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube,
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all right, guys, it'll put a boat on everything for the day.
You know, thanks for joining us for this live, special, breaking news
episode. We just have to get on and bring you the news and things
that we know from our side of things. Guys, thank you for joining
Oldis. I know it's tough for you. You don't like talking about this
stuff and rehashing it, but hey, I never said that. I just
feel like it just he's getting brought up. I feel that. I feel
that way. I don't like talking about I don't like talking about those guys.
Hey, but we have to gotta do it, and I appreciate you.
Thanks to you, to Choo as well everybody in my production behind the
scenes, Pete Minez, Tony Costella, at Last stray On, everyone that's
involved. Hey, for everybody, guys, We'll see you guys on Tuesday.
Have a good night, God blessing, Go Breen, go a