As fall practice began this week, much of the focus was on Justin Feagin being dismissed by Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez because of legal woes, and Glenn Winston being reinstated by Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio after serving a jail sentence.
Most college football programs, if you examine it, have had off-field trouble like this.
Michigan has had problems in the past with players. Michigan State even more. The list is long at both schools the last 25 years. They are not alone on college football’s landscape.
People tend to blame coaches. Rich Rodriguez did coach Pac Mac Jones and Chris Henry, two of the NFL’s most notorious bad boys, at West Virginia. So I guess there will be skepticism about his recruiting. Is it up to Michigan’s standards? Then again, honestly, Michigan’s off-field character and academic standards haven’t been that high when it comes to football. Generally, if you can play, you can get in, unless the case is extreme. And in fairness to Michigan, it never seems to bother anyone on signing day, and their class is annually ranked in the Top 10.
I was surprised Winston has not been suspended for a game or two. He did sit out some last season, but it does like there is a bottom line here.
Coaches and administrators always seem to talk about the need to support the athlete at times like this, and perhaps there is genuine sincerity behind MSU’s actions regarding Winston.
But it’s difficult not to cast a cynical eye toward MSU on this, and not think about the Spartans need for a kick returner, and that Winston is a really good returnman.
And I have trouble believing Rodriguez didn’t have an inkling about Feagin’s troubled past. Seemed more like it was late in the recruiting process last year, the Wolverines weren’t going to land Terrelle Pryor, and Rodriguez needed a multi-dimensional QB.

Random Thoughts

- I didn’t think the Tigers loss to the Red Sox Monday was a moral victory. Just the opposite. The Red Sox are ripe for the picking. When it was 5-5, after that kind of rally, the Tigers should have won the game. They didn’t show much of a killer instinct and they blew a golden opportunity to separate themselves from the White Sox.

- While hindsight is always 20-20, managing a baseball team is a bottom line proposition. So, yes, the criticism being leveled at Tigers manager Jim Leyland for not pinch hitting for Adam Everett during the eighth inning Monday is justified.