Gophers part ways with wide receiver Donovahn Jones

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Rescooter said:
My apologies regarding skepticism. We've had a few trolls come on here from bordering states (who shall remain nameless) that cause me to be this way. If it is fact, you just broke a huge story and good reason for his immediate dismissal. If this is 100% true; it's big and you deserve accolades. We usually find out the rest of the story weeks after and find out that Kill had every reason for what he did. His track record leads me to believe this was very serious. If true (which it's looking more and more so), D Jones is scum.
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It doesn't make him "scum". It means he has problems and needs help. Can we refrain from calling all "fallen" people "scum"? Can we just be grateful that our brains and life experiences have lead us down a path where stealing is not in our realm of reality? Can we just be a community of colleagues that has understanding and pity for those who fail? Can't we realize that when we call people "scum" and condemn them for bad behavior, it says so much more about us as human beings than it does about the person who committed the bad behavior? Let's adopt hearts of understanding, compassion and forgiveness. It will make the world a better place. I promise you that.
 

DoubleAlum said:
Can we just be a community of colleagues that has understanding and pity for those who fail? Can't we realize that when we call people "scum" and condemn them for bad behavior, it says so much more about us as human beings than it does about the person who committed the bad behavior? Let's adopt hearts of understanding, compassion and forgiveness. It will make the world a better place. I promise you that.
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I just threw up a little in my mouth.
 

If the reports of theft are true, wow! Every player on the team received a gift package worth $550, including a $447 gift card at Best Buy. No reason to steal anything when you're getting a gift like that handed to you.
 

DoubleAlum said:
It doesn't make him "scum". It means he has problems and needs help. Can we refrain from calling all "fallen" people "scum"? Can we just be grateful that our brains and life experiences have lead us down a path where stealing is not in our realm of reality? Can we just be a community of colleagues that has understanding and pity for those who fail? Can't we realize that when we call people "scum" and condemn them for bad behavior, it says so much more about us as human beings than it does about the person who committed the bad behavior? Let's adopt hearts of understanding, compassion and forgiveness. It will make the world a better place. I promise you that.
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You can argue that "scum" is a little harsh, but this isn't a reference to "all fallen people", this is a reference to someone who allegedly committed an intentional act of theft against his own teammates. Also, as to his "brain and life experiences", D. Jones is an adult who (if the accusations are true) made a conscious decision. Theft is not something that happens to you (unless you are the victim), it is a crime that you commit as a volitional adult.
 

DoubleAlum said:
It doesn't make him "scum". It means he has problems and needs help. Can we refrain from calling all "fallen" people "scum"? Can we just be grateful that our brains and life experiences have lead us down a path where stealing is not in our realm of reality? Can we just be a community of colleagues that has understanding and pity for those who fail? Can't we realize that when we call people "scum" and condemn them for bad behavior, it says so much more about us as human beings than it does about the person who committed the bad behavior? Let's adopt hearts of understanding, compassion and forgiveness. It will make the world a better place. I promise you that.
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So then what do you call someone that steals from his teammates and friends? Someone who turns a hard earned team trip into an opportunistic time to personally benefit at the expense of others? Someone who is an adult, who gets a free education, free trip, and stipend but still feels entitled to take things that don't belong to them? How about someone that has been given multiple chances to turn things around only to reward those who believed in them with thievery?

Not an upstanding citizen in my book. If scum is offensive, I apologize. But this whole thing is very unfortunate.
 


Rescooter said:
So then what do you call someone that steals from his teammates and friends? Someone who turns a hard earned team trip into an opportunistic time to personally benefit at the expense of others? Someone who is an adult, who gets a free education, free trip, and stipend but still feels entitled to take things that don't belong to them? How about someone that has been given multiple chances to turn things around only to reward those who believed in them with thievery?

Not an upstanding citizen in my book.
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I call him a guy who still has a long way to go to develop into the man he has the potential to become. He was wrong. He should be punished. He needs to repent. He needs to pay a price and learn a new way. So do the folks who think he is "scum". He is not "scum" in my opinion. He's flawed like most people. How many of us have stolen something, cheated on our girlfriends or wives, cheated on our expense reports, cheated on our taxes, called our loved ones mean names, failed to turn in something we found that didn't belong to us? I've been trying hard not to judge people. We all can be better. Maybe GH is filled with guys who have never done something bad. I for one am not one of them. I'm just grateful that there were people willing to forgive me and give me the chance to grow, mature and not write me off.
 

Sparlimb said:
I just threw up a little in my mouth.
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I'm concerned for you if that made you throw up a little. Perhaps you need to ask yourself why that is? It's a lot deeper than you might expect sir. Lovingkindness should not make a person throw up a little.
 

DoubleAlum said:
I call him a guy who still has a long way to go to develop into the man he has the potential to become. He was wrong. He should be punished. He needs to repent. He needs to pay a price and learn a new way. So do the folks who think he is "scum". He is not "scum" in my opinion. He's flawed like most people. How many of us have stolen something, cheated on our girlfriends or wives, cheated on our expense reports, cheated on our taxes, called our loved ones mean names, failed to turn in something we found that didn't belong to us? I've been trying hard not to judge people. We all can be better. Maybe GH is filled with guys who have never done something bad. I for one am not one of them. I'm just grateful that there were people willing to forgive me and give me the chance to grow, mature and not write me off.
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Not to turn this into a dialogue between us; I apologize for the harshness of my post. You are choosing to take the high road which I respect. You should however use the same grace on those who speak harshly as you do on those that steal. I hope D Jones turns things around and becomes an honest productive citizen.

P.S. The career I've chosen requires that I don't do any of the above. It's a high bar and I have to live under that. Unfortunately, it make me harsh about others at times. The categorization of "scum" was out of line.
 

DoubleAlum said:
This is an honest and friendly response to your post. It is not being written with anger, sarcasm or disdain.
I watch all the games as everyone else does on GH. I'm always at a loss how people say that "this guy didn't run sharp routes or gain separation", "that guy was getting beat by his man all game", "this guy wasn't opening up holes today", "that guy wasn't filling the right gaps today". How in the world is someone able to see all these things and have any clue what's going on in the game? Even if you're watching the game 9 times on replay, the cameras don't even come close to showing what all these different guys are doing. Even if you were at the game, and focused in on one different player on each play, the most you would be able to honestly comment on is about two plays for each of the 11 players on both sides of the ball. Even then, you would have missed most of the game and wouldn't be able to "follow" the ball. Would someone please honestly explain this to me?
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its not really that difficult honestly. First off there is an unknown aspect to any observer as you don't know the play calls. That said if you know football on an X and O level (and this isn't meant to be condescending, just an honest assessment as some people are more interested in the strategic minutia of the game than others. Personally I love that part of the game and love the coaching aspect), you can usually tell who is supposed to do what to some extent. Yea its hard sometimes to tell if a receiver was running a called curl or an option route, or if an OG was supposed to mesh and work up to an LB, but usually you can see the basic outline of the play. Then once you have seen the play you can go back and see why it worked or why it didn't. You can see where a WR got open but didn't get the ball thrown his way or when an LB didn't take on a block at the right angle and had a hole opened up. If you're interested in those things its not really rocket science, more a semi obsession that has guys like me re-watching games I don't get paid for and have no influence over.
 




Hope me posting this does not break any loving-kindness rules.
 

none of this would have happened if we would just pay the players. hehehehe
 

Quote Originally Posted by sonnygarcia View Post

Will be interesting when the coaches will be able to put together a competent passing game. Since Leidner is terrible, at best, and we don't have any quarterbacks on the roster or currently committed who are good passers, we're looking at 2018 at the earliest
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die hard gopher said:
One of the more ridiculous posts of the year.
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+1 - I second your comment. True but sad.
 

He might be scUM. Is Harbaugh trying to pick him up as a transfer? Time to lighten this thread up a hair.
 



DoubleAlum said:
It doesn't make him "scum". It means he has problems and needs help. Can we refrain from calling all "fallen" people "scum"? Can we just be grateful that our brains and life experiences have lead us down a path where stealing is not in our realm of reality? Can we just be a community of colleagues that has understanding and pity for those who fail? Can't we realize that when we call people "scum" and condemn them for bad behavior, it says so much more about us as human beings than it does about the person who committed the bad behavior? Let's adopt hearts of understanding, compassion and forgiveness. It will make the world a better place. I promise you that.
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I think this is pretty much the basic life beliefs I was raised with. I'm not sure why someone would disagree. Except, we are on a message board acting all badass anonymously...including me too often.
 



60's Guy said:
It'd be nice if Jones had bought in and had a great attitude. When it is obvious just watching a game that someone has a bad attitude...that's not good. Jones is a great athlete but to play wide receiver you need to be able to "always" catch the ball. More important, to be great you need a tenacious, aggressive, mindset that any pass thrown your way you will fight for and somehow, someway make the catch, no matter the circumstances. Jones, completely lacked all of those qualities except speed and athleticism to be a wide receiver.

One aspect, catching poorly thrown balls: Maxx is excellent at this and hopes to be rewarded in the NFL for it.
I do recall Jones catching one low pass without traffic...so not never but rarely. But I recall several drops for Jones
on on target passes.

Doesn't address the lack of disciple in route running. Doesn't address timing. Doesn't address blocking.

This is clearly addition by subtraction. Hopefully, Jones changes his attitude, finds a better fit for his abilities. I believe his high school coach that he's a good kid. I wish him well. It wasn't working here.
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Not singling you out here as I've now seen a few people on various boards mention his blocking. I don't necessarily agree with this one point. I didn't watch his blocking that much this year, because he wasn't on the field that much this year, but I never heard a thing about his blocking until now. In fact, he was a ferocious blocker his Freshman year. Even when he couldn't get open, he was killing it in run blocking. For a guy that was still pretty thin, he was a beast and helped spring Cobb quite a few times. It's possible he didn't get after it as hard this year, but still, I never once heard anyone question his blocking until after he was released from the team.
 

die hard gopher said:
Burns did say he not only didn't get along with the coaches but even his own teammates as well so that definitely fits the narrative.
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Burns said Jones walked into Kill's office and demanded more playing time, complained about his role with the team, etc and that the coaches didn't like the way he handled it. It'd been going on all year and yes, there were guys on the team who were sick of him as well. The coaches decided that was enough. Not saying this accusation of stealing didn't happen, but the version coming from Gopher camp in Orlando does not match.
 

It's hard to judge our WR on blocking.

We never ran outside. Jet sweep aside.
 


Some guys simply have problems adapting to their role after being some of the best players on their high school teams. Jones had an opportunity to work on his game and improve. However.....it looks as though he regressed. Too bad.....as his athleticism was certainly impressive. I had high hopes for him. Stories like this make you really appreciate players like Marqueis Gray. Highly recruited player that came in and did whatever he could to help the team win. Had hopes of playing QB.......had his opportunities.......but when he was called on to play WR.......he trusted the coaches without any complaints.
 



Costa Rican Gopher said:
Burns said Jones walked into Kill's office and demanded more playing time, complained about his role with the team, etc and that the coaches didn't like the way he handled it. It'd been going on all year and yes, there were guys on the team who were sick of him as well. The coaches decided that was enough. Not saying this accusation of stealing didn't happen, but the version coming from Gopher camp in Orlando does not match.
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I'm with you CRG. Other than some dude who created an account on GH today, posted twice, than disappeared, I haven't heard a thing about stealing. Until proven otherwise I'm going with other theories.
 

Spoofin said:
I'm with you CRG. Other than some dude who created an account on GH today, posted twice, than disappeared, I haven't heard a thing about stealing. Until proven otherwise I'm going with other theories.
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I'm not sure if it is a good idea to encourage GH's to come up with other theories. ;-)
 


stocker08 said:
Some guys simply have problems adapting to their role after being some of the best players on their high school teams. Jones had an opportunity to work on his game and improve. However.....it looks as though he regressed. Too bad.....as his athleticism was certainly impressive. I had high hopes for him. Stories like this make you really appreciate players like Marqueis Gray. Highly recruited player that came in and did whatever he could to help the team win. Had hopes of playing QB.......had his opportunities.......but when he was called on to play WR.......he trusted the coaches without any complaints.
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AND got rewarded for it - wouldn't have had a snowball's chance in hel! of playing QB in the NFL, but he's making six figures catching passes for a living
 

DoubleAlum said:
This is an honest and friendly response to your post. It is not being written with anger, sarcasm or disdain.
I watch all the games as everyone else does on GH. I'm always at a loss how people say that "this guy didn't run sharp routes or gain separation", "that guy was getting beat by his man all game", "this guy wasn't opening up holes today", "that guy wasn't filling the right gaps today". How in the world is someone able to see all these things and have any clue what's going on in the game? ... edit ... Would someone please honestly explain this to me?
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There are many people on this board who have played football at various levels and even some coaches. It is natural for those former players, as they watch, to pay attention to the position they once played. In the case of a wide receiver, former receivers as they watch the game, might note how much separation the player is able to get and how well he runs routes. In the case of a linebacker, former linebackers might make very shrewd guesses as to what gap the player is supposed to fill.

In my own case, I watch each game several times, once in person and then on my DVR after the game and during the off season. I pay attention to the linebackers and the linemen. I have no clue as to whether or not DJ was running crisp routes or not but I trust that others on here do.
 

Spoofin said:
I'm with you CRG. Other than some dude who created an account on GH today, posted twice, than disappeared, I haven't heard a thing about stealing. Until proven otherwise I'm going with other theories.
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Obviously something happened to warrant him getting kicked off the team 4 days prior to the Bowl game. This wasn't simply a parting of ways...
 

John Galt said:
Obviously something happened to warrant him getting kicked off the team 4 days prior to the Bowl game. This wasn't simply a parting of ways...
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My sources (i.e., the guy that posted twice here) tell me Kill was insisting on SPF 55 and Donny would only use the 30.
 

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