Earlier this afternoon KVAL television released the unedited footage of Cliff Harris’ traffic stop from the State Trooper’s dashboard camera. The audio from the footage reveals that Darron Thomas was in the car, and the policeman strongly suspected marijuana use by the passengers.
Asked about the incident after practice, Coach Chip Kelly indicated there would be no punishment for Thomas. He told George Schroeder of the Register-Guard, “It’s not new information for us… I know exactly what the situation was.”
The names of the other players and former players in the car should have been released the morning of the incident. The details, all the details, should have been made public. While it’s not likely to result in any NCAA trouble, this really was a coverup on the part of the Athletic Department. Thomas’ involvement was news, and relevant to the severity of the incident. It points to a fundamental hypocrisy on the part of the coach, who’s been touting his junior quarterback as a leader all summer. Oregon fans were duped.
You can’t build a high enough fence, or a distant enough construction zone to keep problems like this out of view of Oregon fans and the media. All summer the coach has been talking about character and intelligence, knowing full well the leader of his program has been lawless and foolish. This marks the third time Thomas has ridden shotgun to trouble in his Oregon career. He was a passenger when Eddie Pleasant was arrested for a street-racing incident that caused an accident and injured a small child. He was in the passenger seat the night Jeremiah Masoli was stopped for an illegal turn with marijuana in the glovebox. And he and Tyrell Irvin, a former Oregon defensive end, were with Cliff Harris the morning of his 118 mile per hour joyride in a rented car with no license and no insurance. Harris passed a field sobriety test. None of the players involved pass the accountability test, the maturity test, or the priority test. The players tell the cameras, “We’re focused on winning a national championship.” Their actions tell a different story.
I’m ashamed of the Oregon program today. I don’t expect the players to be choir boys, and I wasn’t one. The isolated incidents have become a pattern of behavior. It’s clear they want to live in a world of no consequences, where being an Oregon football player makes every problem go away. They failed their families, their fans, and themselves. Yet if Thomas throws three touchdowns in Dallas, we’ll all act like this dangerous, senseless act never happened.
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