Go Bucks, Part II

As my son and I were walking our dog the night before he left for college, he said, “So…uh….are you going to write a blog about me this week?”

“I’ve already devoted two posts to you going to college,” I reminded him. “Don’t you think you’ve gotten enough airtime?”

Which is funny, because I have a child who doesn’t believe that there is enough airtime for him in the world. Nonetheless, I haven’t much left to say about leaving him on the doorstep of his tiny new home except that he needs to brush his damn teeth and go to class. If he can manage those two things, I am cool.

Now, on to sunnier subjects. Specifically, Terrelle Pryor and The Ohio State Buckeyes.

This week, the NFL ruled that Pryor would be eligible for this year’s supplemental draft, with the caveat that Pryor must sit out the first 5 games of the season. When I heard of his eligibility, I threw my arms up in the air and ran from room to room, yelling, “Wooooooooo!” Here’s why:

Terrelle Pryor is a young man with lovely poise, incredible skill, who is extremely coachable, physically gifted, and he stood up to two years of Buckeye Nation Assholery with grace and humility. As an athlete and a football player, he deserves to play in the NFL if he can make it work. I hope he kicks ass.

As mentioned above, Ohio State Buckeye fans really were unbearable during this whole tattoo-gate piece of BS. These kids did not get tattoos to specifically mess your life up; they made a mistake, one that involved tattoos, not drugs, not alcohol, and not, ahem, strippers. Ohio State fans seem to have an awfully short memory – Cris Carter, beloved ESPN analyst, was ruled ineligible his senior season after secretly signing with a sports agent. His loss contributed to a disappointing final season for the now-beloved Earle Bruce, who was then fired. But Carter is cheered as hard as any Buckeye alumni, despite his PERSONAL FAILURE IN FULL AWARENESS OF THE RULES. Furthermore, Art Schlichter, former Buckeye great, was often spotted at Scioto Downs, gambling, while in COLLEGE (yes, college, at OSU), but the Ohio State athletic department did not “feel” that they had “enough evidence” to go to the NCAA about it. Right. That was in 1979. This crap isn’t new.

I’m not going to lie. I will always be on Pryor’s side, because I am not on the side of Jim Tressel, and somehow, Buckeye Nation has turned this issue into a Team Edward or Team Jacob thing, where, I guess Edward is a right-wing , religious white guy who preached morals and values while ignoring his own lapses, and Jacob is a young, talented black guy who’s also really good at basketball (sound familiar, anyone?) Jim Tressel, as the coach of the football team, should be hanging his head in shame over the fact that he asked those young men to sit at a press conference and admit what they had done, while continuing to hide his own culpability in the whole mess. Gross behavior on the side of the coach, respectable behavior on the part of the students, who continued, and continue to apologize for their actions. I don’t understand why you would buy a ridiculous “JT” bracelet to support Tressel, but want to tar and feather a kid who seemed like a decent sort, aside from liking tattoos.

Buckeye fans, I get as teary-eyed as you do when I see the band march onto the field pre-game, and see the drum major run up the middle of the field, his legs kicking high in the air. I love my Bucks with the passion of ten thousand suns, but seriously, you guys have got to lay off of the pressure on these poor kids. They are not politicians, they are not community leaders, and they are not on your fucking payroll. They are at the University to get an education and play on the football team, not make you feel like you’re a winner. If and when they fail, on or off the field, it affects them far worse than it affects you. Can you imagine Joe Bauserman calling your work every time you made a mistake and screaming about how “we” have to do a better job proofreading and “we” were really looking weak on our expense reports? This team is going to be a little raw this year, and I feel certain that a number of excellent kids are going to be disappointed in what they had hoped would be a National Championship senior season. But the players and the coaches are showing up every day, and they are going on, despite something that I feel certain rocked their world. The very least you can do is go on with them and show them that you love your Bucks, win or lose. And while you’re at it, throw a little love TP’s way, too.


PS, you can read last year’s advice to Buckeye fans here, and you can read my two previous posts about my son going to college here and here. That should keep you from calling radio talk shows for a little while.