Boys Acting Badly

Well it is that time of the year again. No, not the opening of camps although that is coming soon for college football. It is the time for summer arrests and suspensions and we are getting word of more each day. While I am not condoning the bad behavior and feel that scholarship athletes--or scholarship band members--should be held at a higher standard and if they commit serious crimes then they should be punished swiftly, I do feel that we should put the seemingly large number of recent arrests in context. There are a lot of college football players. And while not every arrest makes the paper, nor even every crime leads to an arrest, the reality is that a very small number of college football players break the law. Punish them but do not point fingers at the sport. One of the most recent star players to be accused of a crime is TCU defensive end Devonte Fields, who has been suspended from the Horned Frogs after his ex-girlfriend accused him of punching her in the face and pointing a gun at her. That is serious and comes seven months after fields was involved in an altercation with armed men. There is something wrong here and TCU must do the right thing. This program has made great strides over the past decade and a half but has stumbled of late with a number of players arrested for their involvement in a drug selling operation and other players getting in trouble. And with the team trying to rebound from a 4-8 season we have this situation. But despite the pressure to not do so, coach Gary Patterson must punish his best player if he is indeed guilty. There is no way to get around that as the country needs to see that TCU players are held accountable for their actions.

TCU Blues

It is hard to feel bad for a 4-1 club but TCU is in a tough spot during what has been a brutal calendar year.  It was supposed to be a glorious year for the Horned Frogs as they returned to the big boy conferences with their inclusion into the Big 12 after a string of dominant seasons while bouncing around in search of a home that would allow them better access to the BCS.  But perhaps that single-minded pursuit of acceptance by the powers that be cost them in the karma department as they have left behind a string of spurned partners (seemingly all of the non BCS teams west of the Mississippi) and suitors (the Big East).  And while none of those teams wants to see anyone hurt or unable to handle personal demons, they must be smiling about the struggles of TCU.
TCU's travail's began in February when four football players, including former All American LB Tanner Brock, were among 17 TCU students arrested in a drug selling sting.  Brock's roommate QB Casey Pachall admitted to police officers that he had just failed a drug test for marijuana use and that he had tried cocaine and other drugs.  He was not arrested and remained active on the team, somewhat controversially, although the four players who were arrested were thrown off a squad that had already lost key players to graduation.  Then in May senior RB Ed Wesley, who rushed for 2,442y and 21 TDs in his career, declared for the NFL supplemental draft.  In August three starters or co-starters were lost to injury and then in September the leading returning RB, Waymon James, was knocked out for the season with a knee injury.  Now with Pachall in rehab and done for the season the Horned Frogs will be fighting just to stay afloat.  The development of RS FR QB Travone Boykin will be crucial as the Horned Frogs tackle a brutal second half schedule.  Their next two opponents, Baylor and Texas Tech, are as good as the better teams TCU has played in the recent past.  After those two, TCU plays at Oklahoma State, at West Virginia, home against Kansas State, at Texas and then home against Oklahoma.  Good luck to the team and to Pachall as he works at turning his life around.

Big East Update

The announcement that TCU will join the Big East conference for all sports is the big news of the day for the beleaguered conference. With four-loss Connecticut one win from a BCS spot, the rest of the country would prefer that the Horned Frogs join the Big East immediately. But the future, if not the present, is not so bleak for the continuously disrespected group.
For one thing, the improvement this year of Louisville and Syracuse made the conference more competitive from top to bottom. Of course, that is bad for the overall impression of the group as the conference lacks a couple of pushovers to help pad the record of the top boys. But for the conference's future, the return of Syracuse and Louisville to the living will be a boon to a conference needing publicity. The Cardinals, and Cincinnati, need to earn the Big East respect in the Midwest while establishing a football rivalry on par with the one they have in basketball, and Syracuse needs to be good to garner media attention for the conference as a whole in New York City, which feeds the huge number of Orange fans living in the metropolitan area information when the team is good. West Virginia, which is ranked and still alive for the BCS berth, and Pittsburgh are close to be ready for higher rankings but may need coaching changes to achieve that level of success. South Florida (which added the Miami pelt to the one they earned over FSU last year), Rutgers and UConn just have to continue doing what they are doing.
The conference is not as bad off as people think. We will find out in two years when TCU begins play. If they struggle they could prove that the level of play was good. But of they succeed the conference can enjoy a program worthy of the BCS title game. It is a win-win for all.

TCU An Outsider?

The Horned Frogs are good--just in case anyone still wondered. They whipped Utah every which way, chasing the Utes from the BCS discussion while making a strong case for themselves as worthy of a title shot. Are they better than Boise State? Who knows. The two programs appear to be pretty even. Do they have a better shot than Alabama of reaching the BCS title game? They do now.
One thing I find funny is the "outsider" status of TCU, which is based solely on their current status as a member of a non-BCS conference. But the Horned Frogs are a traditional power having won national championships under coach Dutch Meyer in the 1930s and Southwest Conference championships under Abe Martin in the 1950s. The program fell on hard times and had some pretty pathetic seasons in the 1970s and '80s, but you cannot hang an outsider tag on them because they had to be rebuilt. The reality is that some teams have been considered "haves" because of the conference they play in and others "have nots" because of the conference they play in but the reality is sometimes different than the accepted truth. TCU is proud of their history and proud of their recent dominance. They recruit Texas hard and pay their coaches well. Like Boise, they play football to win games--many schools do not--and they are very successful at it. Unlike Boise, they should not be considered an outsider.