Before there was Blake Griffin there was Shawn Kemp.
“I freakin’ hate this guy.”
Penn State is close to announcing that Patriots’ assistant coach Bill O’Brien will be their next head football coach, and, according to Boston.com, a lot of Penn State alums are not happy about the decision. Former Penn State LB LaVar Arrington went so far as to say he’s “done with Penn State”, and will put all memorabilia from his alma mater in storage.
First off, THIS is what is getting the Penn State alumnus in a fuss, f’realz? But, more to the point, all this former-player hissy-fitting is because O’Brien didn’t spend an eternity at PSU before getting the job, thus making him “clueless” about what it means to be a Penn State footballer. This is so ridiculous that I’m putting a up a list of successful and/or beloved college coaches that didn’t do it the “Jo Pa”-way by assisting for 15 years before taking the head coaching gig.
Bobby Bowden: Bounced around for 22 years before leaving his 9-year tenure at West Virginia for Florida State.
Urban Meyer: Three times he was the successful toast of the town for his non-alma mater (Bowling Green, Utah State, Florida) before eventually getting a gig at Ohio State.
Nick Saban: He has been the head coach for 3 FBS schools, including both teams in the BSC championship this year. From 2000-2004 Saban coached LSU, capturing the 2003 National Championship, then took a Dolphin break before returning to the college ranks to lead LSU-rival Alabama to the 2009 National Championship.
Bo Schembechler: He is the worst offender. Before his successful head-coaching career at Michigan Schembechler was an assistant coach for the arch-rival Buckeyes for 4 seasons.
Not to rain on the Pats’ top-seeded parade or anything, but foes threw for 4,703 yards on New England this year. That’s so bad it’s almost scandalous…
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Peter King, Sports Illustrated. I am so sick of hearing about how many yards the Patriots have given up on defense, and how it means they aren’t a strong #1 seed in the playoffs. Don’t get me wrong; the Pats are not a strong team. If they cannot get it going on offense and score 30 points, they aren’t going to win. However, why are the Patriots the only ones being lambasted for having a historically porous defense? Let’s take a look at the other #1 seed, Green Bay: Passing Yards Allowed: 4,796, worst in the league Passing Yards Per Game: 300, worst in the league Granted, the Patriots are right behind the Packers in both those categories. But the Patriots are doing it with DBs practically coming off the street, while the Packers’ defense is continually hyped for having Woodson, Matthews, and Hawk. The Patriots defense is horrible, but let’s admit that the Packers are even worse… |
I have heard some low things about college coaches. Mike Krzyzewski going to players houses let them know just how much they are ruining his program. Jerry Tarkanian turning a blind eye to drug abuse, gambling abuse, sex abuse…all the abuses, really. But Phil Martelli might just take the cake.
A former St. Joe’s player, Todd O’Brien, wrote a piece detailing how Coach Martelli is actively preventing Todd from playing ball elsewhere. Why is he doing this? Well, probably because his first plan – getting the kid kicked out of classes so that he couldn’t graduate – didn’t work.
If O’Brien were some academically and mentally unstable, social miscreant maybe there would be less rage boiling inside me. But, alas, he seems to be an upstanding student-athlete that a) realized he wasn’t going to the NBA, b) wanted to continue his education in graduate school, c) figured why not use up that last year of eligibility playing at a small-time basketball program.
That bastard.
The source for Sports Illustrated? Otis Smith, the Orlando GM. The sources for ESPN? Unnamed; for all I know it’s the ghost of Red Auerbach just screwing with us all. This NBA transaction fever has left me with the ever-growing feeling that ESPN is actually the sports brand for TMZ. Most of their stories are hearsay and trade rumors from tweets at this point.
ESPN is the FOXNews to Sports Illustrated’s CNN.
