Tyreek Hill celebrated his touchdown at the Sept. 8 kickoff game by mimicking being handcuffed with wide receiver Jaylen Waddle. Photo courtesy of Miami Herald.
DOROTHY LAKSHMANAMURTHY | STAFF REPORTER | dlakshmanamurthy@butler.edu
Overtime, or “OT”, is an opinion column series where the Collegian takes national sports headlines or polarizing topics and gives them a Butler-centric angle.
What happened?
Hours before the Miami Dolphins season opener on Sept. 8, Miami-Dade Police Station (MDPD) clocked wide receiver Tyreek Hill driving 60 miles per hour in a 40-mile-per-hour zone. He was pulled over for speeding a block away from Hard Rock Stadium.
Released body-camera footage of Hill’s encounter with MDPD shows that Hill was outwardly irritated from the get-go and officers demanded the athlete to step out of his vehicle.
When MDPD opened Hill’s car door, he seemed to be compliant with the officers and took the initiative to get out of the car on his own. However, MDPD subsequently escalated the situation to an egregious extent by dragging Hill out of the car and onto the pavement face-first.
Hill’s teammates, Jonnu Smith and Calais Campbell, pulled over to help de-escalate the situation. This resulted in Campbell — named the 2024 Alan Page Community Award recipient in recognition of his extraordinary community service — being handcuffed by MDPD as well.
After the temporary detainment, Hill and the rest of the team arrived at the stadium to secure their first 20-17 win against the Jacksonville Jaguars.
Who is at fault?
MDPD stated that Hill was “uncooperative,” but also placed the initiating officer in the altercation, Danny Torres, on administrative leave. According to the Miami Herald, Torres’ employee profile also shows that this is not the first time he has been reprimanded. The officer has served at least 50 days of suspension in six other past incidents.
With information continuously coming out, senior sports media major Matthew Sherwin finds the details of Hill’s detainment not to be in favor of MDPD.
“I saw it right after the news broke, so I didn’t know exactly what was going on at first,” Sherwin said. “As more details started to flow in, you start to see that it’s not a great look for the police pulling over and doing what they did to one of the star players on the Miami Dolphins.”
Hill admitted to reporters at a press conference on Sept. 11 that he “could have done better” during the altercation.
Graham Landt, sophomore marketing major, expresses it is evident, per the footage, that Hill was not immediately compliant to take orders from MDPD.
“Tyreek wasn’t being very helpful at the start,” Landt said. “He was closing his window and not talking to the officers. It could have been handled more maturely, and Tyreek could have been a better role model with the kind of light and stature he is in.”
Both parties, Hill and MDPD, had room to improve their actions to avoid the escalation of this altercation. Hill could have been more apt to listen to the officers from the start by rolling down his window when told to do so. MDPD should have acted professionally in dealing with the situation by not resorting to force almost immediately.
However, it is clear that MDPD’s brutal actions are the prime issue of this aggressive altercation. Justin Dungy, first-year defensive back on the Butler football team, notes that Hill’s errors do not excuse the officers to use such force.
“I feel like the police escalated it a little more than they had to,” Dungy said. “Putting him in handcuffs and having him on the ground is a little much. It was harsher than it had to be, and I found it a little racially motivated.”
Police brutality, specifically toward African Americans, has been a pervasive issue for over a century. Many suggested that Hill’s race most likely played a role in the officers’ harsh actions, which, unfortunately, would not be surprising.
Similarly to Hill, NBA player Thabo Sefolosha was a target of police brutality in 2015.
Playing for the Hawks at the time, Sefolosha went to a nightclub where a violent argument outside the building caused police to shut the club down. Hundreds of people, including Sefolosha, piled out onto the streets where police forced Sefolosha to the ground. Sefolosha also broke his leg during the confrontation with police, ending his season even though he was not affiliated with the initial dispute.
With Hill and Sefolosha’s popularity, professor of anthropology Elise Edwards explained how most discussions surrounding police brutality are only becoming prevalent because of the players’ popularity in these news stories — not for the root issue.
“I think it’s unfortunate that these situations are news stories because this happens every day to Black men in America,” Edwards said. “I must admit that it’s a bit disturbing to see the NFL cover the story as if it was another ‘day in the life’ of an NFL player. This kind of stuff is acting like it’s simply objective reporting.”
The NFL has branded themselves to be an anti-racist organization, and has even painted stadiums’ end zones to say ‘END RACISM,’ but Edwards questions how far the organization’s loyalty stands when it comes to speaking out against the police.
“I think the NFL should be more openly critical of the police department, but they are not going to be,” Edwards said. “In addition to having many conservative team owners, the NFL is fearful of upsetting its fan base. Although they’ve been performatively anti-racist in moments where they saw some benefit to doing so, they won’t formally call out the police for fear it would endanger what sells for them.”
