Imagine a quiet romantic evening with your girlfriend at a restaurant,\u00a0 followed by a walk into a crowded town square.\u00a0 \u00a0As you approach the waterfall during engaging conversation about the future,\u00a0 you drop down to one knee and profess your love to her in front of dozens of strangers.\u00a0 Fortunately she says yes and with glee you hug and kiss.\u00a0 A bigger part of your future is now secured or so it seemed.<\/p>\n
Months of planning would ensue after such an event and after all is said and done,\u00a0 the date is planned.\u00a0 You anxiously await the coming day but suddenly you receive a phone call a couple of weeks out.\u00a0 Your fiance’s mothers is on the line.\u00a0 She has informed you that “Kelly” is not going to be able to get married on that day but great news,\u00a0 her cousin Anna is going to be your interim bride to be until the family finds you a new love of your life.\u00a0 No worries though,\u00a0 the family has secured a top notch search team to make sure the right one is found.\u00a0 Ah yes,\u00a0 what is love?<\/p>\n
What I just described was not a Saturday Night Live script but the current state of our popular Saturday sport.\u00a0 If you have been following me for any amount of time,\u00a0 you have seen me lament the way we throw out coaches like dry erase markers.\u00a0 Gone are the days of Haden Frye,\u00a0 LaVell Edwards,\u00a0 Don Nehlan,\u00a0 Tom Osborne and the like.\u00a0 You know guys who could keep their jobs even if they did not win “the big one”.\u00a0 I have sounded the alarm like the haggard old man outside the stadium pleading with drunken fans to repent for their sins before Jesus Christ returns to claim his followers.<\/p>\n
I carry a young face but the truth is that I have been around for half of a century.\u00a0 It has allowed me enough time to see the way the river flows and predict the body of water it will end up in.\u00a0 In this case,\u00a0 college football is up to it’s neck in murky fluids.\u00a0 I saw this day coming but like most things nowadays,\u00a0 it has arrived even faster than I expected.<\/p>\n
Don’t get me wrong,\u00a0 I am not overcome with sorrow for the college football coaches.\u00a0 How could I entirely be when I see how much they are given to skip town.\u00a0 The numbers I am reading means their departure won’t be on a Greyhound.\u00a0 However,\u00a0 a part of me is sad for the coaches who are not given an authentic opportunity to make an impact in the lives of the young men they have been chosen to lead.\u00a0 Instead,\u00a0 they have been bastardized into coaching strictly for a check as the only point of view that matters is that of the rabid fanbase exploding on a social media account near you.<\/p>\n
Precious little consideration is given to the young men who are trying their best to make a life decision and to those who have already walked down the aisle.\u00a0 I know what the common masses will think.\u00a0 What’s the problem,\u00a0 you can just change your commitment or jump in the transfer portal.\u00a0 I guess I can’t blame you for this line of thinking if you have never thrown your line into these waters.\u00a0 Behind all of the offers, trips, social media posts, recruiting website hype and glorification are actual young men coming into their own.\u00a0 Behind them are their families and a whole lot of emotion going into a decision.\u00a0 For many,\u00a0 this is the first real decision they are making in their lives and what are they learning?<\/p>\n
For lack of a better term,\u00a0 college football has turned into a real “pimp and hoe” situation.\u00a0 Where there has once been a “Black Monday” where coaches who didn’t perform up to the often unrealistic expectations would be terminated by season’s end has given way to “Black Any Damn Day” where you could be fired at any moment,\u00a0 at anytime in any place.\u00a0 Yes sir,\u00a0 you could get kicked out of that Buick with no clothes on.\u00a0 \u00a0Ask Scott Frost,\u00a0 Herman Edwards, Geof Collins, Karl Dorrell and Paul Chryst who are all tasting the blood in their mouth from the pimp slap.\u00a0 \u00a0We don’t even let coaches make it to Halloween anymore.\u00a0 The boogeyman comes in September now.<\/p>\n
Left in the wake of all this “pimpitry” are the 17-21 year olds who now have their lives tossed Into chaos.\u00a0 Whether you,\u00a0 the fan,\u00a0 like it or not,\u00a0 people make decisions about places based on people.\u00a0 The majority of the players on a college football team are there because a person convinced them that they should be there with them but them is often gone by the time they get settled.<\/p>\n
At this point,\u00a0 what is a college football prospect committing to?\u00a0 Are they committing to a building,\u00a0 a city,\u00a0 a student union or perhaps a major that they may not be able to take because the classes conflict with the business at hand.\u00a0 You know,\u00a0 if you keep missing practice to take that afternoon class and the team loses to their rival,\u00a0 somebody’s gonna be pounding a Coldwell Banker sign into their front lawn.<\/p>\n
In this multi-faceted collision of entities in college football,\u00a0 the ones least considered in virtually all decisions are the youngest,\u00a0 most impressionable and hardest working,\u00a0 the players.\u00a0 The conduct of the “adults” have forced the youth to adopt a selfish mindset.\u00a0 The recruit must think of himself and himself only as this will be the only one interested in his best interests.\u00a0 When a coach sits on your couch during an official visit and stares into your eyes to tell you he’s not going anywhere it has to sound like the wayward father telling his son “I’m going to the store to get some cigarettes,\u00a0 I’ll be right back.”\u00a0 Come on college football,\u00a0 we’ve got to do better.<\/p>\n
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