The LeGarrette Blount watch…
It’s today or not until next week, right? Not sure there would be any point in reinstating him this week if it’s not done in time for him to get a week of practice in as an actual member of the team that’s going to play Saturday against Stanford.
I suspect the Pac-10 has spent 24 hours huddling with a public relations firm trying to decide best how to handle this announcement. They’ll want to handle it in a way in which they look like candidates for the Nobel Prize for doing humanitarian work by reinstating him. Rather than look like a bunch of wafflers who once suspended a guy for a season and now are letting him back early.
I’d be afraid of ruining team chemistry, if I were the Ducks. Look, there are only so many carries out there for running backs. I’m not sure how many I’d want to take away from those quick little backs right now. Blount better be in superior shape to what he was at Boise.
Let’s remember, the team is undefeated without him. It is 0-1 with him.
College football, Oregon Ducks | Dwight Jaynes | November 3, 2009
Blount had one bad game — AND ABOUT 10 MINUTES OF REALLY POOR JUDGEMENT — however:
I do think he’s the reason why the Ducks D has been so strong against the run — he’s been practicing with the scout team the whole time.
Also, having Blount around saves wear and tear on James, when the Ducks just need to smash it through the defensive line on 3 and short or certain red zone situations.
This also saves Masoli too, the Ducks don’t need him to get injured trying to pick up a first down, when they could use Blount’s ‘power game’.
Blount doesn’t necessarily deserve another shot, but I think he’s served a long enough sentence. He also can help guys like Masoli and James stay healthly.
Here’s the bottomline though, at the most if the clock would have been running or in between plays, the punch would have been a 15-yard penalty — and it may have been offset because the Boise player was taunting him.
It’s important to keep that prospective.
He’s not the first guy to get in a fight on the field, but is the first to get suspended for an entire season for it. It was a bad call when they made it, and they should reconsider it.
I posed this question yesterday, but I wonder if you really WANT Blount back. You can go both ways here. He seemed like an addition by subtraction. On paper, he’s a huge asset. However, chemistry DOES matter (think of the Blazers over the past 20 years, where the talent level didn’t always reflect the wins or losses, good and bad). Someone told me that Blount can be a backup, and I hope he can accept that role; beggars can’t be choosers. I was afraid that he’d take PT from somebody and cause resentment. But, if Oregon struggles in a game, even I’ll be saying, “we should have reinstated Blount.” I was at the Washington game (season ticket holder), road games are always tough, and sans Blount, the Ducks ran it right down our throats.
Come on, folks. It’s such a misrepresentation of what happened to simply say he “got in a fight on the field.” Did you see it? It was waaay worse than that. If it had just been that punch, it would have been one or two games. People, on national television, he punched the guy, then squared off against a teammate and took a swing at him. Then he fought cops, security and an assistant coach all the way off the field — who almost needed a straitjacket to contain him — to keep him from going into the stands.
Yes, it was a huge temper tantrum. But again, he wasn’t arrested, so I don’t know how relevant the cops are in the situation.
Here’s my point though, google “Brandon Wood dui”.
Last season, he was suspended for 1 game for being arrested for a DUI.
Believe me, I’m not a huge Blount fan or anything and what he did was not good in any respect. However, being suspended for an entire season is a relatively harsh punishment.
Didn’t Cliff Robinson technically get arrested for punching out the cop?
uncle cliffy knocked that copper goofy
Didn’t Clifford Robinson punch out a police officer one time?
It was more than punching someone – he freaked out. But a whole season? Come on – we’ve seen lots of brawls in sports. None of them result in season long suspensions.
Good luck with this one Dwight. I don’t think there is anything that can be said that will convince the majority of fans that Blount should not play or that his transgressions were serious. After all, the BSU player had it coming, right? I would like to see Blount assert the same defense in court for a bar fight and see how that goes…
Damon – His 10 minutes of being a complete d-bag were inexcusable.
However, at the most, under Idaho law, he’d be charged with a misdemeanor because the BSU player was not severely injured (and he didn’t press charges).
He could assert the same defense in a bar fight, but the police probably wouldn’t charge him for that either — because his victim wasn’t hurt (and he didn’t press charges).
I know everyone wants to be harsh and teach Blount a lesson, but this punishment is out of line with a lot of punishments that have been handed out lately at the college level.
What about that dude that was arrested and convicted of aggrevated assualt from Michigan State? That guy served 6 months in jail and then came back and rejoined the team w/o a suspension. (He was suspended while in jail).
GOOGLE GLENN WINSTON, so you can see my point. He was back on the team in August.
I don’t know about the player from Michigan State. I will just assume you are right about that. But as an attorney, I can tell you that if he did what he did at the game on the street he could be charged with and be convicted of assault and battery. That is a serious charge. Maybe, as you say, the cops would cut him a break. I wouldn’t count on it though. I don’t know what Blount’s problems in the past have been. Let’s just hope that there are no more incidents.
And here Kelly proves once again that he’s smarter than us all.
Oregon just whooped USC. They are in the drivers seat for the Rose Bowl, but they’ve got to be careful, because there’s still 4 games to play.
This is a dangerous game at Stanford, and a dangerous few weeks with Arizona on the horizon. It would be perfectly natural to have a let-down game, with the national media doing nothing but swelling your heads all week talking about how great you are.
Blount’s reinstatement takes some of that away, as some in the media start to talk, and harp about that this week instead. Instead of telling them how great they are, they are telling them that their coach is handling things all wrong and that Blount is going to destroy the team chemistry. Its not the love-fest that it normally would have been.
Kelly just put one over on the media, and they don’t even know it.
I love how so many writers, radio hosts, and fans think they know more about the actual situation than the coaches, players, and university that were actually involved. 95.5 spent hours over 2 shows talking about this, when there hasn’t even been an announcement yet.
Dwight – lets state the obvious right off the bat. Blount was NEVER OFF THE TEAM. Chemistry is not a concern.
All of your blubbering and moral indignation about the incident is truly pathetic. You have lost the argument and you simply can’t accept it and stfu.
Dwight,
I suspect that your suspicion that the Pac-10 is huddling with a PR firm is not true. Whatever PR work that needs doing has already been done, and by the university, not the Pac-10. I suspect that right now both the Pac-10 and the university are making decisions about what’s best for Blount and what’s best for setting precedence going forward.
But your need to take the most cynical path possible is duly noted.
Dwight,
Is this you huddling around your computer waiting to publish your next Duck/LGB hating post?? Did you not see Spikes only get suspended for one half for gauging another players eye.. A punch is less harmful to any human than eye gauging. In fact, when i played at a JC 2 players in a pile were going at it, in very similar ways as spikes was.. RESULT: loss of vision in both eyes for 2 months and permanent vision loss in one eye.
Talk about something more important Dwight….. Start talking about how the SEC favors FL in every way, on and off the field. Talk about how IOWA is not dropping BCS slots after nearly losing 3 straight weeks. Talk about why the ducks will pass BSU in the BCS….
Dude are you new here… Dwight is not a rah-rah fan. Go to E-Duck if you want that.
The whole “This is going to ruin team chemistry” argument is tired. The team loves LGB, and if you disagree Dwight, you aren’t listening to what the players and coaches are saying. They want LGB back on the field.
Also, just because he might be reinstated, does not mean that he will automatically take away carries from LMJ and Co. Barner and James will still get the majority of carries. Blount will have to earn his time.
If CK and the team are behind LGB being reinstated, why shouldn’t we stand behind them? Oh I get it, you have to get page hits somehow. Leave the shock talk to Canzano.
I am not so sure the Ducks want him back I think it is more of a legal issue with Blount strong arming the Ducks. It is sad that athletes get treated differently than regular students. If a student hit another student in class what do you think would happen. I hope Blount can wake up but this isn’t exactly a learning situation for him (more like learning that he gets special treatment). This is the same culture and mentality that led OJ to think he could get away with murder and armed robbery, although I hope someone steps up and teaches this kid before he goes all the way down that road.
ean,
Please explain how Blount strong-armed the Ducks with the legal angle? He never lost his scholarship. So what was the legal argument to be made? Could a court rule that Kelly must actually PLAY Blount? Can a court dictate playing time?
Bring something legit to the argument here. Enough of this made up Beaver stuff.
And ean, are you actually saying students that aren’t athletes who hit other students get booted from school?
One last thing, if you want outrage today, how about the fact that Tim Clark is back practicing with the Beavers? He was physically helped off the field Saturday and was complaining about a headache on Sunday, and is back practicing on Tuesday. In this day and age, I would like some explanation how a program wouldn’t take more precautions here.
I got a good chuckle out of that concept: A court dictating to Nate Kelly that LaGarrette Blount would HAVE to get a certain amount of PT.
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4527376
Yes students should be booted from school for hitting people at school events.
I hear you on the Tim Clark thing I hope OSU is getting him checked out because a game is not worth risking your life over.
ean,
I am aware that there was that article about the attorney representation. However, a few things:
1. Don’t believe everything you read. My argument still stands. There is no legal argument to be made for not allowing an athlete to PLAY in a college game. If he still has his scholarship, can still get an education, and is able to practice with the team, please give me a valid legal argument as to why the university would reinstate Blount over a fear of a lawsuit?
2. The only mention in that entire article about a “fear of a lawsuit” was an “UNNAMED SOURCE” who had “DIRECT KNOWLEDGE OF THE SITUATION”…ummm, if he had such direct knowledge, why would he say Blount only met with Harry Edwards for 10 minutes?
Edwards has indicated that he sat down with Blount for SIX HOURS in a hotel room and had others on the phone with them in a conference call during that time, including Dungy and Kermit Washington.
My point is, don’t take an article like that, pull a single line out of it from some unnamed source that clearly either doesn’t know what they are talking about or has a personal agenda, and then reuse it like its some irrefutable smoking gun.
So, in short, you may not have STARTED the rumor, but its a classic rumor spreading move by a rival fan (much like the Herbstreit comparing UO to Paris Hilton rumor). If that article had been about an OSU player, you would have shot down that poor journalism just as fast I did.
rah-rah shish-koom rah
Yeah, I say keep him on the scout team even if they do put him back in games.
LaGarrette Blount was a 20/20 Man. He’d get 20 carries a game, and 20 touchdowns a season. Now, he’s going to be a different kind of 20/20 Man: He’ll get into the game when Oregon’s up 20 points!
I am reminded of some court cases that have become public – in that when a defendant has shown true remorse – as Mr. Blount has – the judge has lightened the possible sentence somewhat. In times where the defendant has shown no remorse the judge will often impose the maximum the law allows.
When Mr. Blount had time to reflect on his actions and the effect it had on his future family – his wife gave birth to a son shortly after the incident – contrition (“OMG – what did I just DO!!) came forth. (Keep in mind this was NOT a life-threatening situation akin to driving drunk.)
We all make mistakes – even more serious than going ballistic for 3 or 4 minutes – and most of us got second chances. Are we to be hypocritical in judgement here?
Mr. Blount has more than served ample time in punishment mode.
My only beef has to do with Coach K. in that he should have admitted he made a mistake in declaring a season-long suspension instead of an “indefinite” suspension.
Much ado about nothing.
Kelly won’t jeopardize winning. LMJ will continue to be the feature back, KBarner will back up up. I can see Blount getting Crenshaw’s carries.
They will work him in slowly and maybe feature him if the game is put away.
oh how i wish lgb was a ‘better person’ and only gouged out the eyes of an opponent lying on the ground –
then he would only miss 1/2 a game
or maybe if he just swung his helmet in an effort to break somebody’s face???
or if he was a really good guy, he would have dragged a woman down a flight of stairs by her hair…
but no, he threw a punch and that is only a 1 game suspension for any other player in the history of college football
They aren’t 0-1 with Blount, they are 10-4 with him. Try not to forget about his record setting season too soon.
Who among us–being contrite about a wrongdoing (and who among us should judge LeGarrette’s heart on this matter)–would want to be forgiven? I haven’t seen all news articles on this matter; I just hope that the offended Boise State football player was asked his views on reinstatement–and that he forgives LeGarrette. That way, we have 2 ‘winners.’
Most posters have seen or heard of punches thrown in a supposed non-physical parlor game (cards, etc.) While unfortunate and appalling, can one imagine the ‘exponential potential’ of this happening in a physical and emotional game like football?