Who truly wants to douse football’s fires?
Editor’s note: News staff writer Jon Solomon fills in for Kevin Scarbinsky today.
Summer is so predictable. There are always three fires to put out: barbecues, wildfires and college football arrests.
The first two require only water. The third needs a lifejacket as well because you have to spray so much water that you might drown.
The truth is there are many more players in college football staying out of trouble than being arrested. To say the arrest rate is higher than in the past would require a comprehensive study and ignore the fact that the media reports on the sport’s arrests more often than in the past.
Nonetheless, this is the world we live in. It’s foolish for a school not to establish consistent behavior standards and try to determine why its players are being arrested.
Because ultimately, big-time college athletics is the front porch to the university, warts included.
Which brings me to a bigger inconvenient truth: No one in college athletics truly wants to crack the whip, unless the public cries for it and championships are not in sight. And such public outcry is rare.
al.com
7/7/08
Magnolia Tribune
