Woody Johnson: Edwards' DWI arrest unacceptable, disappointing

Woody Johnson's message during his initial conversation with Braylon Edwards Tuesday was rather simple.  

"I told him exactly what I'm telling you," the Jets owner said this afternoon. "'This is not acceptable, Braylon. I'm disappointed. You let yourself down. You let the team down.' "

Edwards, of course, was arrested for DWI early Tuesday morning in Manhattan after blowing a .16 -- twice the legal limit -- on a Breathalyzer. He also had teammates D'Brickashaw Ferguson and Vernon Gholston with him, though neither was charged.

"I was disappointed that it happened," Johnson said. "This is a serious thing to be accused of so I’m sorry that it happened to one of our guys, particularly when we’ve done a lot to address this particular issue because it does occur in professional sports as it does in real life. People do get these tickets, but we have Player Protect, which we’ve encouraged.

"It’s a great system where a player can call up anytime, and listen, if they tell me who the name is, I’m firing the service. I don’t want to know who this car takes or goes to get. But if you have one drink, you should not be driving. A half a drink, do not drive. Any liquor, don’t drive. We’re set up to do that. That’s a point of emphasis. I’m disappointed, I wish this hadn’t occurred."

Edwards won't start in Sunday night's AFC East tilt with the Dolphins in South Florida, but he's expected to play at some point. Exactly when and how much he'll precisely play, the Jets say, hasn't been determined. They want to gather all the facts and conduct their investigation into what transpired that early morning.

Johnson took issue with the idea the punishment isn't stern enough. Some have strongly said that simply not starting him isn't sending much of a message, that Edwards isn't losing much by sitting on the bench at the game's outset.

"He's losing more than that," Johnson said. "First of all, we don’t know if he’s losing it but he’s got a serious ticket in front of him, and if proven guilty he’s got a serious taint on his record. He’s going to be a free agent at some point. I would guess if he’s convicted of this, this is not going to be helpful. So I think he’s got a heavy load in front of him."

But is the immediate punishment too soft?

"He’s not going to start," Johnson said, "and I think it’s about as a significant thing as you can do to a starter, a guy that considers himself in that respect."

More significant than taking a stand?

"We’re going by the precedent," Johnson said. "We’ve looked at every one of these issues in the last year and there’s no precedent and nobody has even done that (not starting him) as far as I can tell. But that’s about as severe an action as I’ve seen. Most teams have let the legal process take place. This has happened before, we hope it doesn’t happen again here or elsewhere for that matter."

Johnson doesn't think the Jets' image and the way they are being perceived across the country has taken a negative hit with these recent off-the-field incidents. 

"One of the things you get with a team is every incident is fully reported," Johnson said. "I don’t know if this mirrors life, but we try to do the best job we can. One of the things that I’m proud of and I think fully reflects where we want to go is Rex and his openness. And I said right from the beginning, the openness comes with the fact that you are going to see everything that we’ve got, good and bad. We not going to be perfect. We don’t claim we are perfect, but if we are imperfect, we are going to try to get closer to perfect than closer to imperfect."

That starts with taking advantage of the Player Protect program, which offers confidential rides to players who've been drinking. The Jets fully fund the program and the players don't pay a dime for the service. They aren't even allowed to tip the driver.

So with that in mind, Johnson is making sure he's delivering the message to the players loud and clear. 

"If you drink, do not drive," he said. "You are not entitled to drive. It’s illegal and we don’t want you on the road for yourself and for the people in society that may be in front of you at that point."

"We're going to push this as hard as we can push it," he added. "There's no tolerance for point-anything alcohol level if you're driving. Zero. I don't want any drinking and driving. That's my personal goal and that's what I'm going to tell them. We've got a program that costs you nothing and I don't know about, the coaches don't know about, so there's no stigma attached to it."

But there may be one attached to Edwards at the moment, even though Johnson considers this Edwards' first true brush with trouble since coming here via trade from the Browns nearly a year ago.

"When people come to the New York Jets, it’s clean slate time," Johnson said. "I’m a great believer in second chances. But when he came here, this is the first time that Braylon has done anything. He’s going to have to deal with what’s occurred here and deal with the legal process, and try to do something with that ticket and address his personal reputation."