Welcome, Husker Nation, to a Tuesday edition of the Carriker Chronicles.

Now, I’m fully aware this is the biggest college football week of the season if you are a Husker football fan playing Wisconsin. But for one day, I want to talk about something that is bigger than the game of football itself and that is the whole Josh Brown situation.

Now, a lot of you know the details so I’m going to speed through these real quickly for the people who don’t. He was suspended one game for the abuse of his ex-wife at the beginning of this football season. Since then, Brown has admitted to verbally, emotionally and physically abusing his ex-wife over 20 times. It is publicly known now that he also admitted to being molested as a young boy. He is currently on the Commissioner’s Exempt List, which means he will be paid, but he cannot practice or play with the team, and it’s pretty much a given he will never play for the Giants again. Which I find interesting, ’cuz the Giants knew about the abuse when they re-signed him, but now all of a sudden they are concerned about it. Very interesting.

The NFL is currently going through a 165-page document of new evidence, and I’m sure at the end of that they will finally do what is absolutely best for their PR machine.

Now, my personal take is that he will either be suspended for the rest of the year or stay on the Commissioner’s Exempt List, and most likely his career is over. He is a 37-year-old kicker and the media hoopla that is going to follow him going forward – teams aren’t going to want to sign him next year when he is 38. He probably won’t get a second chance like Adrian Petersen or Richie Incognito.

But the real reason I wanted to make this video, and the reason this video is bigger than football, bigger than Wisconsin, bigger than Ohio State, is because I know Josh. I know his wife, Molly. I know his kids, his two stepsons (her two sons before they got married), and their daughter they have together who is about the same age as my son Jacob. I’ve been to his house; he’s been to my house. We’ve played pingpong. I knew Josh at Nebraska. I knew he had some issues, and he’d tend to get in trouble, but when we got to St. Louis and I played with him there at the Rams, he was hosting Bible study and he seemed to have turned a corner. And I was mildly surprised, but in all honesty, who am I to judge? Anybody can turn around. I have more holes than Swiss cheese myself. So, I was proud of him.

But now all this comes out, and I look back and I wonder what I could have done personally. I didn’t know Josh was molested as a child. Could I have said something to Josh, “how you doin’, man, are you really back on track? I see you’re hosting Bible study.” None of this excuses his actions; I just wonder what I could have done. Maybe Molly, you know, somebody could have reached out to her. She’s such a nice woman, their kids are so great, and they had to endure a lot of this themselves.

So my point is, you never know what’s really going on. And if you think there is anything you can do, any hint whatsoever, even if they give you nothing at the moment, they might remember that later on when they need someone later on in a moment of stress or dire situation. I want to read you this quote my wife sent – “People can be so quiet about their pain that you forget they are hurting. That is why it is so important to be kind” – by Nikita Gill.

Don’t worry, I’ll get to Wisconsin tomorrow and the day after, but I wanted to address this today.

So Go Big Red, and always remember to Throw the Bones!