Saturday, we were comfortable in confirming that Florida cornerback Janoris Jenkins really, really enjoys his marijuana. Allegedly.
Sunday, on Easter, we can apparently confirm that Jenkins ain’t the only Gator who has his come-to-Jesus moment one toke at a time. Allegedly.
According to some outstanding holiday work by Jason Lieser of the Palm Beach Post, two other current members of the Florida Gators football program have been cited for pot since Will Muschamp -- he of the “Florida way” -- was officially hired as UF’s new head coach. Specifically, Lieser writes the following:Red-shirt freshman Chris Martin and red-shirt sophomore Kedric Johnson were charged with misdemeanor possession of marijuana under 20 grams in separate incidents earlier this year.
The Gainesville Police Department arrested Martin, who is expected to compete for a starting job at defensive end or linebacker this summer, on Jan. 29 after officers detected the scent of the drug coming from a vehicle. Martin was in the car and revealed approximately two grams of cannabis when the police confronted him, the report said.
Johnson, a back-up linebacker, was arrested on Jan. 9 after an officer pulled him over for speeding and smelled marijuana. He produced two grams of it from his glove compartment, the police report said.
And before y’all start, let me stress again that I get it. I get the fact that some people (wink wink, nudge nudge) believe that marijuana should be legalized, and that there’s money being thrown away via both pot prosecution and the lack of taxes on something that’s more benign than alcohol.
That doesn’t change the fact that it’s currently illegal. And the fact that this latest revelation puts the first-year UF coach square in the crosshairs of public perception.
“There’s a certain thing that I’m going to refer to as the Florida way, and that’s the way they need to act, and that’s the way they need to represent our university,” Muschamp said when he was hired in December. “I’m going to demand that, and I think that you’ll understand in time that that’s something that’s very important to me.”
What’ll be interesting is how “very important to me” it’ll be when it comes time to put those first-day words into action; how important “they need to act... need to represent our university” is to Muschamp’s new culture, and how much, and to what degree, “I’m going to demand that.”
