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In an interview with Fox Sports' Jay Glazer, Miami Dolphins guard Richie Incognito shed light onto his side of the allegations from tackle Jonathan Martin of misconduct, bullying, and harassment. Incognito defended himself as having done everything he did out of love for Martin, and without realizing Martin was having any problems.
Incognito told Glazer, that Martin never showed signs that football or the locker room were getting to him. When asked about the specific voicemail transcript that has been everywhere, with Incognito calling Martin a "half-n*****" and threatening him, Incognito admitted that he was wrong to use that kind of language, but pointed to text message he has from Martin, saying that was the way they two joked with each other.
Incognito provided 1,142 text messages to Glazer to back up his claim that this was a joking, back and forth type of relationship between the two, including the earlier teased text from Martin saying he would murder Incognito's entire family. Also in those texts were some from after Martin left the team, when Incognito texted Martin to see how he was doing. Fox Sports tweeted a screen shot of that exchange:
RT @NFLONFOX: Jonathan Martin's text to Richie Incognito: pic.twitter.com/KHCr8GLDDZ >> AFTER Martin left. AFTER Thursday night game.
— Kevin Nogle (@thephinsider) November 10, 2013
Prior to Martin's representation filing a complaint of player misconduct with the Dolphins, Martin told Incognito that the allegations of bullying and harassment were not coming from him. He, according to Incognito, wrote in a text that he had not talked to anyone about these things, and didn't know how they were coming out.
Incognito also told Glazer that he was miffed that he had not realized Martin was hurting, but that the tackle never showed any signs. He said, if Martin were sitting in the room with them, he would hug Martin and ask him what was going on.
Everything, according to Incognito, was done out of love, and, while looking back he admits the words used were inappropriate, he did see his relationship with Martin as a friendship.
You can watch the entire interview here:
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