Alabama wins the BCS Title
National Football League
Draft King Analysis
January 8, 2010
Lou Pickney, DraftKing.com
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Congratulations are in order for the University of Alabama for beating Texas last night in the BCS Title game. It had to be rough for the east coast fans watching the finish well past midnight on a work night, but so it goes. Colt McCoy looked great early in the game, playing well enough where he perhaps was positioning himself as the third quarterback to go in the 2010 Draft... and then a clean hit by Alabama DE Marcell Dareus (6'3" 280 pounds) on McCoy knocked him out of the game.
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Marcell Dareus knocked Colt McCoy out of the game and had a pick-six last night. (Icon SMI)
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After the game, a choked-up McCoy admitted on live television that he couldn't feel his arm. That is not good at all. They're saying today that a pinched nerve caused the numbness, and my hope for McCoy's sake is that he will be able to overcome that and have a strong off-season. But my heart went out to McCoy, watching helplessly from the sidelines as a true freshman tried his best to fill in for McCoy against Alabama's great defense.
My buddy Lance Wilkerson, who is the lead sports anchor at the TV station I worked with in the late '90s in Evansville, IN, contacted me today asking about Mark Ingram and any potential for him going pro in 2010. Ingram *could* go pro... but not to the NFL. Maurice Clarett took the NFL to court in 2004 challenging the rule that requires players to be three years removed from their high school graduation before being eligible to enter the league, but he lost in court and the rule remains in effect to this day. I suppose that if the UFL offered enough money, Ingram could potentially jump there, but that seems highly unlikely, if not laughable as a concept, at this point.
It saddened me to read about South Florida firing Jim Leavitt today, doing so because of Leavitt allegedly striking one of his own players in November 2009. Leavitt literally built that school's program from nothing, starting from scratch in December 1995 and leading it to the point where USF reached #2 in the AP poll in 2007. Think about that for a second -- if you were to do that with a made-up school in EA Sports' NCAA Football 10, it would seem unrealistic. Leavitt did it in real life. He managed to push USF from competing as a I-AA squad to being a member of a BCS automatic qualifying conference. Being in Tampa helped on that end, but overall what that program has done in less than 15 years is nothing short of amazing.
This is not to justify what Leavitt is accused of doing, but I hate to see his tenure at USF end in controversy. His was a remarkable accomplishment that might not be replicated again, particularly with the way big conferences have battled (to a fault) to maintain the status quo with the present system. Here's hoping that USF continues its success with whoever replaces Leavitt as South Florida's next head coach.
One lesson from the 2009 season is that schools are drawing a line on how players are treated. It's not just Leavitt -- Mike Leach and Mark Mangino, two other coaches who enjoyed success in recent years, found themselves out of jobs in part because of allegations about how they treated their players. And while most football coaches will continue to be hardasses (just the nature of the beast), perhaps some head coaches will think twice before doing something severe that could end up costing them their job.
Perhaps the most compelling storyline of the day centered around the Seattle Seahawks abruptly firing head coach Jim Mora, Jr. just as rumors of the team courting USC head coach Pete Carroll began to surface. As of this writing there is nothing official in place between the Seahawks and Carroll, though the money and personnel power that Seattle is reportedly offering Carroll is staggering. If USC loses Carroll, it will be hard-pressed to find a replacement who can maintain the level of success that the Trojans have had during Carroll's time with the team.
