Kansas City Chiefs star wide receiver, Rashee Rice, has had arguably the most eventful offseason in the entire NFL – and for all of the wrong reasons.
After emerging as one of Patrick Mahomes most talented and trusted weapons, the Chiefs went on to win their second-straight Super Bowl.
If they’re going to pull off a historic three-peat, they’re going to most likely have to do it without the valuable Rice at least for part of the season.
That of course is because of Rice’s legal troubles.
He helped caused a horrific car accident in Dallas back on March 30th after he was racing at speeds of up to 119 MPH.
The end result was a six-vehicle accident, resulting in injuries to four individuals, two of whom required hospitalization. (Everyone is lucky the damage wasn’t much worse than it was.)
Surveillance footage captured Rice and his friends inexplicably fleeing the scene.
Subsequently, on April 11, the 24-year-old turned himself in to authorities.
Besides the charges stemming from the incident, Rice is facing multiple lawsuits and is expected to be suspended by Commissioner Roger Goodell and the league.
If you thought that frightening incident was enough to make Rice “lay low” for a while, you were mistaken as he allegedly found himself involved in another ugly situation.
Rice was accused of assaulting a photographer at a Dallas nightclub in early May.
The multiple incidents come on the heels of all the trouble he reportedly caused while in college at SMU.
It should be noted that the photographer ended up refusing to press charges and that alleged situation has pretty much disappeared.
Rice has done his best to move on from his legal troubles.
While he is expected to be punished for the reckless car accident, Rice admitted that he has learned a lot from the situation and is growing as a person.
He’s trying to focus solely on football – and who could blame him? After all, he has a golden opportunity to emerge as a true elite receiver on the back-to-back Super Bowl champs. (Not a terrible situation to be in professionally!)
““I’ve learned so much from that. All I can do is mature and continue to grow from that. This is a step in a better direction for me,” he recently told ESPN.
“Accidents and stuff like that happen, but all you can do is move forward and walk around being the same person, try to be positive so that everybody can feel your love and your great energy.”
(While the majority of his message is respectable, the “accidents and stuff like that happen” line almost single-handily ruins the whole statement.)
The bottom line is we all hope Rice truly does learn from his mistakes and becomes a better person because of it.
He clearly has a bright future ahead of him and it would be a shame to see him ruin his enormous opportunity.
Having said all of that, Rice knows he’s going to have to deal with a whole lot of criticism going forward due to his actions.
When you make a reckless mistake at the level he did, that just comes with the territory.
This is precisely why Rice was blasted on social media following a comment he left on Caitlin Clark’s Instagram page.
The ironic thing about the situation was, unlike many jealous people out there, Rice was actually being fully supportive of Clark.
Clark posted a photo from her childhood along with one from her recent Indiana Fever game with the caption “Time Flies.”
Rice admirably responded with crossed-fingers and a fire emoji.
Of course, the responses came flowing in from people who referenced Rice’s off-field troubles.
“Cover your charges and law trouble first then comment,” one user stated.
“Aren’t you in jail?” another asked.
And so on, and so forth…
Interestingly, Clark is a die-hard Chiefs fan.
She attended Kansas City’s Christmas Day game against the Las Vegas Raiders last December.
Ironically, that was the last time the Chiefs actually lost a game – so maybe it’s best she stays away from Arrowhead going forward.
Incredibly, Clark has become one of the biggest stars in all of sports.
The WNBA has always struggled mightily to attract widespread interest ever since their inception.
Finally, the league has a superstar in Clark who could single-handily take them to the level where they’ve always wanted to go.
However, for that to actually happen, the jealousy and bitterness over Clark needs to end … Unfortunately, the clear self-sabotage doesn’t show any signs of slowing down to this point.
Not sure how many of you predicted we’d ever have a Rashee Rice – Caitlin Clark story on our hands, yet here we are…
We all make mistakes and hopefully Rice has learned from his and takes full advantage going forward. (Mahomes and the Chiefs are certainly hoping so.)
What are your thoughts on both Rice and Clark???