We Read These Stories About College Football Players Getting Drunk and Doing Illegal Drugs During the College Football Season Even and We Cannot Help But Wonder….”What the Hell Are These Idiots Thinking? Answer: They ARE NOT Thinking! – A Head Coach’s Rules A Long Time Ago On Illegal Drugs and Alcohol – Hey Charlie Weis! USE That Motivational Tool To Motivate Your Kansas Football Team – Coaches Hot Seat in the Peanut Gallery and REAL Journalism – The Importance of Recognizing How Precious OUR RIGHTS As American Citizens REALLY Are In the American Republic and How Different the Rest of the World REALLY Is – As For Saturday Night….Go Dawgs!
There are lots of news stories both in and out of intercollegiate sports each day that bother us a lot or hit us straight in the gut and in the last dozen or so years stories like these can only lead to head shaking and wonder just what in the Hell are these kids thinking?
TCU starting QB Casey Pachall suspended indefinitely, College Football Talk
AND
No. 1 recruit one of three Mizzou players arrested, suspended, College Football Talk
We are not going to comment on the Missouri football players that were allegedly smoking marijuana because one has to be an incredibly stupid person to be doing illegal drugs especially when on a sports scholarship in today’s world and that is certainly our opinion of these three Missouri football players that surely had something better to do with their time than what they were doing BUT what really bothers us is that the TCU starting quarterback was out on a Tuesday night during the college football season drinking and then driving which is so far over-the-top stupid and irresponsible that this indeed does deserve a comment or two.
Thirty-five plus years ago a few of us here at Coaches Hot Seat remember our freshman year in college and first meeting with our head coach who we were playing for on a scholarship and after that coach going over many of the things that were expected of as both students and athletes at that particular school he then began to speak about two different but closely related things:
Illegal Drugs which then was mainly marijuana, cocaine and various pills
AND
Alcohol which was a little different item the in American society then since the drinking age was 18 years old and in this spot we must say that if our young adults at 18 are old enough to vote for the President and serve in the US Military then they sure the Hell should be able to drink alcohol if they so choose and as many lives that have been saved by raising the drinking age in America to 21 we also at the same time have reset higher the age of becoming a full adult…..except of course if the “Leaders” of our country need those 18 – 21 year olds to fight a war for them because then they are adults…..but not before which is truly disgraceful.
Getting back to that coach of ours and his talk on Illegal Drugs and Alcohol he made it crystal clear that day that…
If you did Illegal Drugs you were off the team…..immediately. PERIOD.
The coach said he was not going to go into some long philosophical discussion on the issue if Illegal Drugs should be Illegal or not but only that he knew for a FACT that they were Illegal and if we were doing them we would be off the team immediately and we would lose our sports scholarship as well. PERIOD.
The coach then turned to Alcohol which many of us had been drinking for a few years at that point in an age in America when Alcohol use by people below the age of 21 wasn’t such a hot-button topic and as we remember it now our coach said something along the lines of….
“You are all adults and you can choose to drink alcohol or not during your time when you are not in class, at practice or playing in games but I am going to ask something of you and that is everyone in this room will be working together to win a championship and it is my opinion that the use of alcohol during the season is detrimental to that goal of winning a championship and thus I am going to ask you to abstain from drinking alcohol from the start of Fall camp until the regular season is completely over.”
A player asks a question: “Does that mean you are forbidding us to drink alcohol during the season?”
Coach: “No….I am leaving the decision on whether to drink alcohol during the season or not up to you.”
Needless to say that initial meeting with our coach left quite an impression on us and guess what?
We and the vast majority of our teammates chose NOT to drink alcohol while the season was going on and we put our focus on our classes, our studies, the practices and the games and to this day it is our FIRM opinion that during the college football season from Fall camp through the end of the regular season that college football players should NOT drink alcohol and should certainly the Hell not be doing illegal drugs.
Having seen the inside of a number of Major College Football programs over the past few years and the amount of time and effort that is put in by these young men to play the game of football and go to class we frankly cannot imagine they have much time to go out drinking in bars or even drink at home since there is ALWAYS film study on the next opponent that can be done once one’s studies for that day and week have been completed.
Our recommendation to the young men that play Major College Football:
Forget the alcohol during the college football regular season and certainly the Hell don’t be stupid and be doing illegal drugs which is the sure sign of a Very Damn Stupid Person that evidently has all the time in the world to waste his life away and disgracefully in our opinion while on a sports scholarship which millions of young people in our country and around the world would desperately love to have as an opportunity for themselves.
Relative to drinking alcohol NOT during the season we must in this spot say that over the past few years while watching the Great movie Animal House with our 16 plus year old sons and with all of us laughing hysterically no matter how many times we see the movie our sons have often asked if we did the same kinds of things that went on in Animal House when we were in college.
Our answer to that question is always the same:
YES, but we are not telling you which things we did do….and which we didn’t do beyond of course that we did NOT do illegal drugs and if you know what is good for your health and well being not to mention what your Mom might do to you….you will NOT do illegal drugs either. PERIOD.
College students including student-athletes SHOULD have a Helluva time while in college and there is plenty of time during the offseason to have that Helluva time BUT during the season the student side of that equation should be focused on his classes and the athlete side should be on helping his team win a championship and if you are doing those two things to the best of your ability we don’t believe there is enough time in the day to be getting drunk or doing illegal drugs so….
STOP IT
…and put your focus and energies where they should be which is on….
YOUR Studies
AND
YOUR Team
PERIOD.
Charlie Weis is given a GIFT to motivate his football team and drops the ball
Another story that caught our eyes on Thursday was out of Kansas…
Charlie Weis unhappy with student newspaper, College Football Talk
…which had the Kansas student newspaper pointing out the FACT that Kansas football was about to go on the road and get its ass handed to them by cross-state rival Kansas State…
….and to Charlie Weis we can only say:
The way that Kansas football has played in recent years winning….
6 total games
…over the past three seasons if Coaches Hot Seat was the head coach at Kansas right now we would….
Plaster this student newspaper cover
….ALL OVER the Kansas locker room and use it as a motivational tool and this story so happens to be the MOST POWERFUL motivation in the history of Man and Woman on Planet Earth and that very basic and primal human motivation is…
“I or We as a Team will show you that you are WRONG.”
Huge companies have been built, massive fortunes have been made and legendary playing and coaching careers have been created….
….by people that were motivated by one thing and one thing only:
“I or We as a Team will show you that you are WRONG.”
Use the GIFT that the Kansas student newspaper gave to you Charlie Weis and you might just find that you will have a motivated football team on your hands that will want to show the….
Students at the KU student newspaper
…what can be done when the Kansas football team is properly motivated.
Coaches Hot Seat in the Peanut Gallery and REAL Journalism
One of the first rules that intelligent people come to understand early in life hopefully is that the first rule of life is…
“You are smart enough to know that you aren’t really that smart.”
…and if one goes about his or her life understanding that one can learn a Helluva lot from the people around oneself and that the Very Worst Damn kind of Human Being is a…
Pompous Arrogant Ass that believes he or she is God’s Gift to Planet Earth
…with Bad Tippers coming in a close second they will come to the same kind of conclusions that we have here at CHS because we are smart enough to realize a couple of things when it comes to our website:
No. 1 – We are in the opinion business and are throwing our opinions down from the peanut gallery which people can do whatever the Hell they please with them and if folks get a chuckle or two from our opinions then all the better.
No. 2 – We are American Citizens with opinions and we most certainly are NOT REAL Journalists
Cases in point:
Bob Welch of the Register-Guard in Eugene, Oregon did a great piece last week about the internal pressures and struggles within the Oregon athletic department which is just great reading and very insightful about what goes on inside a very successful athletic department at Oregon and the difficult decisions and choices that must be made by athletic directors to keep things moving forward:
Oregon Ducks’ success carries a price, Bob Welch, Register-Guard
Just some great reading Bob and some REAL Journalism as well.
The second Case in Point is from Jon Wilner of the San Jose Mercury News who also details the pressure inside a college athletic department with this profile being on University of California athletics and the current status of California football head coach Jeff Tedford:
Again just some great research, reporting and analysis by Jon Wilner on Cal athletics and the above story is the exact kind of quality reporting that we really don’t have the time to do here at Coaches Hot Seat and frankly don’t have the writing ability or research skills to pull off either.
The above two quality and in-depth news stories and millions of others that are written by the US news media each year point directly to something that we believe many Americans take for granted and that is….
The American News Media
….which is enabled by something that is very precious and is certainly not the standard in most places in the world today…
The First Amendment to the US Constitution
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
….which was part of the Bill of Rights to the US Constitution which went into effect on December 15, 1791 when the state of Virginia ratified the Bill of Rights otherwise known as the First Ten Amendments to the US Constitution.
It is the First Amendment to the US Constitution that gives the RIGHT to Americans to state their personal opinions on whatever the Hell they please and for the RIGHT for anyone in our country to write about powerful institutions like Bob Welch and Jon Wilner recently did about the University of Oregon and University of California athletic departments in very clear and direct ways and if you as an American Citizen believe that Americans either in and out of the news media being able to Speak Truth To Power is the way the rest of the world operates you are sadly mistaken.
One of the things that always pisses us here at Coaches Hot Seat off is when people in positions of power in America try to use their influence to muzzle or shut-down other Americans who hold and promulgate opinions that the person in power does not agree with….
Think Steve Spurrier who basically said on his radio show a week or so ago that he and the University of South Carolina Administration were going to get a columnist (Ron Morris) fired because of things he had said and written about Spurrier
…..and if there is ONE THING we wish that those people in power could experience is just what the Hell countries are like that do NOT have something like the First Amendment to the US Constitution in place for their citizens BUT DO HAVE people in positions of power that muzzle and shut-down opinions they don’t agree with all of the Damn time and that kind of country would rightly be called a country that was run by….
FASCISTS
…..with China, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran and Syria coming immediately to mind and more and more Russia moving that way and back towards to the days when the Soviet Union was dominated by FASCIST PIGS and which current Russian President Vladimir Putin seems to be striking for.
There are literally dozens of things we read EVERY DAY of the year here at Coaches Hot Seat that we do not agree with or sometimes vehemently disagree with but unlike Steve Spurrier and others in positions of power in America that believe they actually have the right to muzzle and shut-down the opinions of people they do not agree with we not only believe that it is every Americans RIGHT to give his opinion but we have ALREADY put our lives where our writing is and….
Defended this country in the US Military during both a Cold War (that was pretty Damn Hot) with the Soviet Union and during Operation Desert Storm in 1991
….and thus we might see all kinds of things we disagree with ALL of the Damn time BUT we as Americans will fight and even sacrifice our lives if necessary to guarantee that ALL Americans have the right to their opinion as an American Citizen.
Maybe what would be instructive for Steve Spurrier and others that seem to not believe in the fundamental…
Principles of the American Republic
…as found in the Declaration of Independence…
…the US Constitution….
…and the Bill of Rights…
…would be for Steve Spurrier to serve a year or more of his life in another country on the frontlines in a war zone where the people just across the way or just around the corner not only want to kill you but they also DO NOT believe in….
Freedom
Liberty
Self-Determination
AND
Free Speech
…and often HATE America and Americans BECAUSE OF the fundamentals that the American Republic was founded upon.
Maybe if Steve Spurrier who was 22 in 1967 and somehow missed out on the Vietnam War where 58,000 Americans died serving their country in what we consider to be a Bogus War that was waged by some really Sorry Ass Presidents of the Unites States (Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon) had spent some period of his life serving in the US Military in a country where there is NO Freedom and Free Speech then Steve Spurrier would now realize that not only does Ron Morris or any other American have…
EVERY DAMN RIGHT
…to say whatever the Hell they please about His Majesty Steve Spurrier but maybe Spurrier would also understand that if Ron Morris and other Americans did NOT have that fundamental RIGHT then the American Republic would not exist as we know it today.
YES, we would even today fight and die for Steve Spurrier to have the right to criticize someone’s opinion of him but we will be Damned if we will sit quietly and allow Steve Spurrier to openly talk about having another American fired because that AMERICAN expressed an opinion that Steve Spurrier’s Precious Ass did not agree with which is easily one of the most Un-American things we have read about in years in OUR country.
Not that it matters…BUT…since we are Americans that believe in the Principles that the American Republic was founded upon….
We are pulling for Georgia on Saturday night.
Go Dawgs!
