When is it NOT good to lose 300 pounds? Well, yesterday for one, as the d-line has shed some weight in the form of Andy Roof. Coach Wulff wasn’t thrilled with the decision, and per Vince at SR.com, one can understand why.
“From where he was a year ago, he has changed his life around 180 degrees,” Wulff said in the statement, “and as a coaching staff we have seen the positive impact he made on this program.”
When asked to elaborate, Wulff didn’t hesitate.
“For any … person on our team, we’re always looking for people to better themselves,” Wulff said during the conference. “To continue to make smarter and more wiser decisions. When people are doing that, and are clearly showing those signs, we want to continue to reward those people in our program.
“That’s what we’re here to do. They’re going to make mistakes, we’re here to help them along the way.”
There are some decent arguments on both sides of the fence on this one. Do you abandon a troubled kid who has suddenly turned things around? Wulff is right, kids are going to make mistakes and they want to have the support system in place. But he’s also right, in that good behavior needs to be rewarded, but bad behavior? Not so much.
The timing, for one, stinks. As “Kaddy” pointed out in comments yesterday, we’re less than a week from school starting. Roof was on campus, not only practicing with the team but also enrolled in school and had an apartment. Now that Roof has been expelled, well, who buys out his lease? Should the student conduct board pass the hat to buy it out?
Then again, as “Michelle” pointed out, let’s get real. It’s not like this was a one-time offense. Roof was on his fourth strike, and normally it’s a three-and-you-are-out system. He has to be held to the same standards as the other students on campus, and if he’s given a free pass, well, isn’t he just being enabled? Behavior like his cannot simply go unpunished. Regardless of how well he had been doing in the most recent of times, he had his chances, and the entire body of work is taken into account.
It’s a shame though, any way you slice it. And we certainly don’t know all the details of the latest offense, as there is a lot of talk out there as to what happened. But in the end, everyone loses – Roof, the coaches, the fans. The trickle-down to what it could mean to the defense is a big concern. On the surface, one might shrug at the thought of a backup tackle leaving the program. But this team? Where the tackles were thin to begin with? The young, thin defensive interior just got younger and thinner. And in this case, young and thin isn’t what you want on the inside….
Moving on, lost in the shuffle was Dan Rowlands stepping away from football while he still can. Bum shoulders have ruined his last season of football, so the o-line will continue it’s shuffle. Micah Hannam will now slide outside to replace Rowlands, and young sophomore guard Brian Danaher gets his chance. Danaher, well, we don’t know a whole lot. He did play in one game as a backup last year. I guess we’ll all find out on Saturday.
Next, is time running out for Mkristo Bruce and Michael Bumpus? Mkristo got off to a hot start for the Jacksonville Jags, recording 2.5 sacks in the first pre-season game. But then he had a couple of tackles the second week, and now after the third game, he didn’t record a single tackle. Meanwhile, the only first-round holdout still left in the NFL, Jacksonville DE Derrick Harvey, finally agreed to a contract last night after missing the first 33 days of camp. Hopefully old MKB can stick with the team, but, well, you can more or less read the writing on the wall.
Bumpus was making waves early on in Seahawks camp, routinely singled out by WR coach Keith Gilbertson and even the big show himself, Mike Holmgren. But after three catches in week one, then two catches in week two, Bump didn’t get a ball on Monday night in San Diego. Now Seattle did make a few roster cuts last night, including WR Joel Filani, so it still isn’t over for Michael. But Bump didn’t get much PT on Monday, and with just one game left on Friday night, this is it. Bump has been a long shot, at best, to make the final 53, but let’s hope he made enough of an impression to be on the practice squad. That’s not exactly the end of the world, and hey, Jordan Kent from Oregon was on the practice squad last year, and now clearly will not only make the club this year, but could even start in the 3-WR sets. Hang in there Bump!
Have you seen the new Martin Stadium sign?
It’s, well, it’s “alright” from the pics at the official site, which you can see here. A little different than I think we thought it was going to be, at least from the artist renditions.
It’s not the super-terrific Taj Mahal grand entrance that folks were dreaming of, but it is certainly better than what we used to have, which was, uh, nothing. Remember??
Yeesh.
Finally, we thought it would be a good idea to see what the Okie State blogs had to say about grand old WSU. I couldn’t find a whole lot, but there is some stuff floating around.
- There’s the Oklahoman newspaper, but, no, we won’t link there (for many reasons, but, the wound is still far too fresh for their giddiness in stealing the you-know-what out of Seattle).
- There is the Tulsa World, and it’s got a pretty strong OSU blog. They have a “know the enemy” piece up today, but it’s pretty brief.
- There was something called the Cowboy Communicator, a blog run by the school, here. It’s pretty thorough.
- And I found this, at WordPress.
- And of course, there’s the scout.com “Go Pokes” site, which is probably where a lot of their fans hang out. But I couldn’t track down a good Okie State Football blog. If you know of one, please chime in with a link??
That’s about it for a busy Wednesday. Look for our first official “Football Friday…Only on Thursday” tomorrow. Enjoy your day, and as always, GO COUGS!
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