Chansky's Notebook: The Boyer Case

The Jackson Boyer settlement trumped soccer.

This was going to be about the Copa America soccer match until two things happened. The short-handed U.S. got so outclassed by Lionel Messi and the Argentines that it looked like a UNC women’s game in Anson Dorrance’s early years. You know, when the ball stayed down on the opponent’s end most of the time. I was going to wonder how so many Argentina fans got into the stadium in Houston with Donald Trump doing border patrol. Blah, blah, blah.

Then the news broke about the Boyer family of Chapel Hill getting $795,000 from UNC for their son, Jackson, being allegedly hazed by some football teammates before the 2014 season. Are you kidding me – 800 grand for a concussion that was so bad Boyer never missed a practice and played in seven games that season? Here’s how I think it came down, if you remember the case.

Four Tar Heel players, three of whom are still on the team, were suspended for the 2014 opener against Liberty – how punitive – after they were identified as having pranked Boyer at the Aloft Hotel during pre-season training camp. If you recall further, the Boyer kid did not want to press charges and hoped the story would die, but his brother and parents were really pissed. So, over the last two years, they lawyered up and threatened to sue the university, which almost always settles nuisance cases like this to avoid more bad publicity.

My guess is that Jackson Boyer never favored the lawsuit, and when his family persisted he went as far away as he could in this country by transferring to Southern Cal, where he is the same walk-on wide receiver he was in Chapel Hill. The Boyers say the money will go into a trust for Jackson, who has two seasons left with the Trojans.

Questions loom, however. Like where does UNC come up with 795,000 as it awaits a likely multi-million-dollar fine from the NCAA? And with another football incident having occurred at a fraternity house last season, will this become known as the new Carolina Way?

Anyway, we lost to Argentina, 4-0, if you went to sleep at halftime like the rest of North America.