Marcus Smart Named In Lawsuit

A troubling story made its ways to social media about Marcus Smart being named in a lawsuit. This is not what the Boston Celtics wanted to hear and could possibly have the sophomore guard face a penalty from Commissioner Adam Silver down the road. Head coach Brad Stevens and general manager Danny Ainge will now have to deal with this distraction from basketball, with what the future may hold for one of the potential building blocks on the team.

It was MassLive.com’s Jay King who first reported about the lawsuit at 11:30 a.m. yesterday on Twitter. In the lawsuit, former Oklahoma State University teammate Stevie Clark claimed he faced hazing and disrespect from Smart during their time on the school’s basketball team. Hazing is not the best word to hear with all the stories people hear about Greek Life on college campuses. Sports teams can be just as bad on certain individuals, when it comes to getting a large group of people to get along. To me there isn’t much of a difference between a fraternity/sorority and a sports team, but that’s a debate for another day.

You can find the entire complaint here, where it looks like Clark’s main target of this lawsuit is OSU (Oklahoma State University) and coach Travis Ford. We do not see Smart’s name in the lawsuit until we reach the allegations part, where Clark felt disrespected by Smart and all coach Ford allegedly did was give him psychotropic drugs. Whoa…

This lawsuit took a much darker tone when I came to that allegation in the lawsuit. Anytime drugs are involved without consent can be very unsettling. Clark is right now claiming that a person he trusted gave him a drug without his consent, to go along with breaking promises Coach Ford made back when he was being recruited. This could end up being an ugly battle in court. Not to mention that going to OSU seemed to have affected the young man in ways that would cause anyone to make sure he was OK. “Stevie began to experience side effects from the medication almost immediately, manifesting in suicidal and homicidal thoughts as well as erratic behavior.” That’s a very serious picture that is being painted by Clark.

Marcus Smart was named in a weird lawsuit that claims he hazed and disrespected a former Oklahoma State teammate: http://t.co/Q9gnTP97Nh
— Jay King (@ByJayKing) September 5, 2015

In any case it just looks like Smart was mentioned because he was the BMOC (big man on campus) at the time he was playing at OSU. I have a feeling that many other players might have given Clark trouble, but people will know who Smart is by his name. I am also not a lawyer and I can’t tell anyone if Clark has a strong or weak case, especially since this just came up. However, I think Coach Ford and OSU better get a grade “A” lawyer. This lawsuit could end up being a huge deal. For Boston, hopefully Marcus Smart stays out of court.

C.J Maffris is a writer for Hardwoodhoudini.com. He believes he can pass law school since he kept up to date on deflategate. Feel free to stump him about law on Twitter @SeaJayMaffris

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