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The Miami Dolphins have been dealing with a scandal involving player misconduct and bullying for the past six weeks, ever since tackle Jonathan Martin left the franchise on October 28, then levied his allegations toward guard Richie Incognito on November 2. Over that time, the Dolphins have suspended Incognito, been visited by NFL investigator Ted Wells who interviewed every player and most of the coaches and executives, had reporters from all over the world invade the team's facilities, and had to answer questions about locker room leadership, hazing, and racism. Oh, and they have won five of seven games since everything started, putting themselves into position to control their own playoff destiny.
As the culture of the Dolphins' locker room came into question, team owner Stephen Ross asked several former Dolphins and NFL legends to come together to form a new code of conduct for the locker room and the organization, one that will prevent anything like the last six weeks, or the behavior that led to it, from happening again. That committee will meet once the Wells issues his final report to the league.
One of the members of that committee, Dolphins Ring of Honor member Jason Taylor spoke to the media about the situation briefly yesterday while hosting the annual table tennis benefiting his Jason Taylor Foundation. “I know everyone talks about the whole nonsense that went on,” Taylor said, via Miami Herald reporter Adam H. Beasley. “I think internally, you could tell it was very overblown outside of the building. Players didn't complain, and it’s great to see them bounce back. It’s no miracle that they’re playing well in spite of this quote-unquote controversy.”
Wells is not expected to file his report to the NFL until 2014, but it's clear Taylor thinks not a lot will come out of the "scandal." The report, which is expected to be made public, should recommend changes to the Dolphins' locker room, as well as the rest of the locker room's around the league, if any of Martin's allegations are substantiated. Then Taylor and the rest of the code of conduct committee will look to implement those recommendations in an effor to make the Dolphins the standard bearer for the league.
