Brandon Marshall Accused of Punching Woman

In our last post, we wrote about what to expect now that Brandon Marshall is a Chicago Bear.  That post focused on the football side of things.  What it omitted, were the maturity issues and off-the-field question marks about Marshall's character.  Less than a full day after the Bears announced they had acquired the talented receiver, these issues have come to the forefront.

A woman has accused Marshall of punching her in the face outside a New York City nightclub around 4am on Sunday.  Marshall has not been charged and his attorney paints a different picture of the scene.  While more details will surely come out in the coming weeks, it's the simple fact that Marshall has once again found himself in this type of situation that should concern Bears fans.

Instead of talking about his legal history, we'd rather focus on the football aspect of it all.  So let's break these issues down into two categories:  issues that could keep Marshall off the field and issues that occur on the field.  These current allegations would fall under the first category.  As many coaches have said, "Nothing good happens after midnight."  Whether guilty or not, the fact that Marshall has again put himself in a situation that could end badly is a concern.  We can hope that the strong Bears locker room will help keep Marshall in line.  It's also very likely that being reunited with Cutler will help Marshall in this area.  Cutler will surely let him know that he can't be of any help to the QB if he's not on the field.  To the on-field issues, I noticed something in the clip that was posted yesterday.  After Marshall scores the go-ahead TD, he takes something out from behind his belt that he plans on celebrating with.  This would result in a penalty on the kickoff, setting up the Browns with excellent field position late in the game.  This was only prevented by Broncos WR Brandon Stokley who sprinted up to Marshall and grabbed his hands stopping him from using whatever prop he was holding (click here for video).  These types of things are always a risk with Marshall.  He is certainly worth that risk, however, given that he is allowed on the field in the first place.