This Ones for the Shula Haters (Alabama's Head Football Coach)

Shula's method puzzling

This entry was posted on 9/19/2006 7:41 AM and is filed under Finebaum Column.
I want to take back all the criticism about Mike Shula's handling of discipline in the Juwan Simpson affair. I was dead wrong in wanting Shula to be more forthright.

After the Louisiana-Monroe game Saturday night, Ala-

bama's head football coach finally explained the unexplainable, his utterly insane and incredibly infantile method for handing out punishment.

It reminded me of that tired but true Mark Twain quote: "It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt."

Shula's decision to spread out punishment of seven players over three games and implement discipline in the order of the violation is very possibly one of the dumbest things I've ever heard. Where did Shula come up something this ridiculous? A third-grade class?

Shula said the methodology was developed so it wouldn't hurt this team.

Hurt the team?

Forget the team.

What Shula has done is embarrass the entire university and its tradition in the process. That sound heard Saturday night in the aftermath of Shula's gibberish was Bear Bryant rolling over in his grave.

Why is it that four national championship coaches (Mack Brown, Larry Coker, Steve Spurrier and Bob Stoops) in the last few weeks have suspended star players on the spot? The answer is obvious.

I said a moment ago Shula's rationale sounded as if it came straight from a third-grade class. Scratch that. That's embarrassing to hard-working and industrious third-graders. This comes right out of nursery school.

And why did Shula suddenly break this double secret code of silence to lay this on the public? Did someone in the school's public relations department realize that now that Alabama's preseason exhibition games are over and with a big game looming, Shula could put this story to bed once and for all and nobody would notice this smokescreen because all of the focus would be on Arkansas this week?

The reason why it was handled this way, Shula said, was "because I didn't think it was fair to the football team to suspend all seven (players) for one game."

When pushed to explain why the decision was made public after the third game, Shula inexplicably responded, "So we can move on."

What is that supposed to mean?

Had Shula made this ridiculous utterance in July, some would have laughed at him but at least it would have been over. Instead, Shula has turned it into a three-ring circus.

I'll always remember the first time the White House press corps asked Richard Nixon's spokesman, Ron Ziegler, about the Watergate break-in in 1972. It was nothing more, he said, "than a third-rate burglary attempt."

Well, it brought down the twice-elected 37th president of the United States, who resigned in disgrace.

Ultimately, a coach's future is determined by what he does on the football field and Shula's record there is mottled. Until now, he had always had the reputation of being classy and a man of integrity.

Now, he appears to look totally moronic. This latest episode is not only unexplainable but completely indefensible.

Alabama took a chance by hiring an unproven coach so we all knew it would be scary once the training wheels came off. But could anyone have imagined this kind of train wreck?

Head of Class in Rankin County

Brandon takes down Northwest Rankin this week and Pearl 2 weeks ago to take back its title of Top Football Team in Rankin County. Sorry Purl and NWR kittens.

And yet another invader

Well, this one isn't dangerous at all, but some how it got into Aubrey's room. Julie made me shut the door until I got it. Well, I couldn't find that sum bitch anywhere.

We ended up leaving the house for a couple hours and when I came back I was walking past our bedroom when I saw something out of the corner of my eye. I thought it was a roach because of how fast it went under the bed. Nope, it was that damn skink. Once again, screaming at me this time, because I didn't find it the first time, Julie said get in there and get whatever that is. After that, she packed up Aubrey and left the house. She told me later that she was about to go get a hotel room for the night. I knew than I had to catch this critter or I would be spending the night in a hotel.

I called in the troops and got Julie's step dad to the house to help me catch this lizard. Believe me when I say this, I did try to catch the lizard by myself for about an hour. This is the fastest lizard I have ever seen. It was cat like. I kid you not. To make the story short, me and Mike finally caught the thing after about 20 minutes. The skink caught a softball bat to the head. Sorry PETA people, but it was in my house. Die skank...I mean skink. Hahahaha

Another guest at the Kalahar House

Here is our latest invader. I heard that even though this is a large and scary looking spider, it isn't a very dangerous spider. They are actually pretty helpful. They kill a lot of insects and bugs that you don't want around your yard.

It did scare the crap out of me when I was mowing my yard and came face to face with this beauty. Oh well, I guess I will wait to find out what else we have around the house.