Joe Judge has his hands full this past week as he deals with a COVID outbreak as well as addressing the fallout from a tweet rookie wide receiver Kadarius Toney sent that appeared to sympathize with Henry Ruggs following a fatal DUI crash he was involved in.
The New York Giants head coach seemed to suggest to reporters ahead of Thursday’s practice that Toney’s remark was not meant to minimize the seriousness of the incident that left one person and a dog dead.
“I have spoken to Kadarius, I’ve spoken with the entire team on this issue,” Judge said, via ESNY. “The one thing that’s unique about this situation with Henry is the number of relationships he has throughout this league. Whether you’re from the state of Alabama and you know him from high school and from competing against him, or you were a teammate of his at Alabama — a significant number of those guys are playing in the NFL. When I talked to my team about the situation, I’m literally looking at guys’ eyes that it’s not a headline to them. That this is a friend of theirs, this is a teammate of theirs, this is something different.”
The 22-year-old Ruggs is facing several felony charges after crashing his Chevrolet Corvette into the back of a Toyota RAV4 early Tuesday morning. The wreck claimed the life of 23-year-old Tina Tintor.
Prosecutors allege that he was traveling 156 mph seconds before the crash with a blood alcohol level of nearly double the legal limit.
Toney took to Twitter and made the below statement.
“We young…..everybody make mistakes….y’all lookin at the situation like ‘this or that’ kuz it ain’t y’all…having so much too say….he know he messed up don’t drag em for it……that’s goofy to me….just pray for the families involved,” the tweet read.
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Judge reiterated Toney’s remark about thinking of all the families involved.
“The important thing is that we express that our prayers are with everyone involved with this…I’ve talked with Kadarius and it’s important that we understand how we articulate our words, how we put it out there. Ultimately our prayers are with everybody — this is a situation no one wants to see happen with anybody, no one wants to be in this situation. While no one is, in any way, shape, or form, dismissing consequences at all, it’s horrible on both sides. It’s absolutely horrible.”
