Boy, that escalated quickly.
In the last 24 hours, Dolphins guard Richie Incognito has gone from defending his honor on Twitter to being shielded by the team to being suspended for conduct detrimental for the team.
And now, his career as a Dolphin is apparently near its end.
A team source told Armando Salguero of the Miami Herald “He’s done” when asked about Incognito’s status.
“There are procedures in place and everyone wants to be fair,” the source said. “The NFL is involved. But from a club perspective he’ll never play another game here.”
While the reports that he bullied teammate Jonathan Martin may have made him hard to employ, there were pragmatic football considerations as well. He’s a 30-year-old who was going to be a free agent after this season anyway, and he plays one of the positions considered most fungible in the league.
He has value as a player, but he’s not worth the $4 million he’s making or the trouble he’s creating at the moment.
Either way, the Dolphins do not seem inclined to have him representing them again, though they’ll need to wait to see how the league’s due process shakes out before they can make any declarations.