Reggie Wayne Is Skeptical About Kerry Collins

Peyton Manning's status for the season opener is in question right now due to his neck problem. He could possibly miss even more games if the Indianapolis Colts decide to be extra careful with him. The Colts signed the recently retired Kerry Collins off the scrap heap to have an experienced backup on hand just in case Manning's condition gets worse.

I thought it was a pretty good signing, considering the state of quarterbacking in the NFL.Face it, some of it is flat out brutal. I know Collins isn't the end all be all of quarterbacking, but if the Colts are to remain among the elite, Collins' signing was a must.

Now if you ask Colts receiver Reggie Wayne, he would differ with me. He's not exactly in Collins' corner, but he didn't exactly call him a piece of crap either.

"We don't even know him, we ain't vanilla, man, we ain't no simple offense. [...] So for him to come in here and be the starter, I don't see it. I think that's a step back.



"Who says Kerry's going to be the starter? Just because we bring him in doesn't mean he's the starter. He's got to learn too, right? Unless they gave him a playbook months ago, he's got to learn too. […] He's going to have some studying to do. I'm not sure how he is with the books, not sure about Penn State's education, but he'll have to do some studying. [...]


"I don't care who you are, I mean I'm not going to let anyone just come in here and just push someone aside like you're that dog now, you know what I mean?"

"I don't want to make it seem like I'm not welcoming or having open arms to anybody that comes to our organization," Wayne said to the local media. "If they open the doors for Kerry Collins to come, then that's fine. I can't do (anything) about that anyways. But I'll be damned if we're going to open the doors for someone else, and just drop our heads on who we already have. The Colts are big on protecting their own, so I'm (going to) help protect our own."


Not exactly a vote of confidence for Collins. And I guess some encouraging words for Curtis Painter. Everyone knows Collins is no Manning, but to rip on his education, damn. I guess Reggie forgot where he went to. The U. I'm not knocking their alumni, but their football players aren't exactly known for their academic achievements.  

Luke Walton To Be An Assistant Coach At The University Of Memphis

During this NBA lockout some players are going overseas, some are playing in glorified pick up games to keep their skills sharp, and some (Delonte West) have considered jobs at Home Depot.

Los Angeles Lakers forward Luke Walton has gone into coaching. According to a report by Jason Smith of the Memphis Commercial Appeal, Walton will be named the third assistant under head coach Josh Pastner. Walton played at Arizona while Pastner was an assistant in Tucson. The Walton hiring will make him the third member of the Arizona connection, along with assistants Jack Murphy and Damon Stoudamire.

Walton will be charged with coaching the Tigers' post players. Pastner said Walton will also be involved in recruiting for as long as he's with the Tigers. Walton will remain with Memphis until the lockout is over.

Considering his diminshed role with the Lakers he might just stay there. Pastner does know there is a risk involved since the lockout could end at any time, but he seems very excited about the prospect of having an active NBA player on his staff.

"We're really excited about it," Pastner said. "You're talking about a guy who's played with the Lakers for eight years, has been a part of four NBA Finals, (has) two (championship) rings and has been in the huddle with Phil Jackson, who's arguably one of the greatest coaches in all of sports."


"It is a risk in the sense that the lockout could end at any time, but I felt the reward outweighs the risk," Pastner said. "(Walton) wants to coach. He wants to make a difference. He's really excited about this. He's going to be able to come in and help with the bigs. It's going to be great."

This could pay off big for Memphis in the recruiting department as the Walton name has some credibility in basketball circles. Walton will be in Memphis this week to help with the Tigers' individual workouts. Let's hope he's not a know it all like his father.


  

Tigers Bring Back Brandon Inge

At the conclusion of Detroit’s 4-1 victory over the Cleveland Indians on Friday night the club announced that they have purchased the contract of third baseman Brandon Inge and have sent outfielder Andy Dirks back down.


As expected, Tigers manager Jim Leyland indicated that Brandon Inge will come in and play primarily against lefties and be a late inning defensive replacement while Wilson Betemit will get the call against right-handed pitchers despite being a switch hitter. No word yet on tomorrow’s lineup but given what Leyland said you can make the assumption that Inge will start at third since the Indians will turn to left-hander David Huff.

I don't agree with this one bit. Inge has been struggling all season and now that he's feasted on some minor league pitching and he's ready to go. The Tigers need to let go of 2006,  move forward.and stop trying to keep the band together.

They just traded for Delmon Young and elected to keep Magglio Ordonez on the roster. And now they trade for Betemit, platoon him with Don Kelly and Ryan Raburn, bring back Inge and send down a functional Andy Dirks. Just to keep Ordonez and Inge on the roster. At some point this team has to get younger, it might as well be now.

Former Miami Hurricane Highsmith Plans To Sue The NCAA

Alonzo Highsmith was one of the greatest Miami Hurricanes and one of the cornerstones of what made the University of Miami football team what it was in recent memory. His son A.J. is now on the team and that team might get hit with the hardest NCAA penalty since the SMU scandal that resulted in the death penalty.

The elder Highsmith is now threatning a lawsuit if the Hurricanes get hit with NCAA penalties coming from the Nevin Shapiro booster scandal. Highsmith's beef in this matter is that the current players shouldn't be penalized for sins of the past or the current 12 players that received extra benefits. I know a lot of former Hurricane greats are taking this hard but this might be borderline ridiculous.

“This lawsuit will be on behalf of all the kids who have done nothing wrong and would be being deprived of what they came to college for,” Highsmith said. “Look at the Reggie Bush situation. Look at what he did to the USC program. All those kids that went to USC for all the right reasons had to suffer the consequences.



“This has been going on for years and years. If someone at General Motors does something wrong, they don’t shut down the company. Nobody ever challenges the NCAA on this. Why? Why?”


“If you have a family and one child does something wrong then he can’t go to Disney World. But you don’t make all of the rest of the kids stay home too.”

“There are at least 70 kids on that team that have absolutely nothing to do with Nevin Shapiro, and you are going to tarnish their image over the actions of a few?



“You want to punish those kids that did something wrong, fine, I understand. But it’s a total travesty to punish the other kids who made good decisions. I’m going to sue if they try to ruin these kids’ college experience. I’m going to sue somebody.”

Well Alonzo, I understand what your getting at here, but if the NCAA let schools get away with illegal booster activity, this kind of stuff would be running rampant. School presidents and athletic directors would have a reason to turn a blind eye to players receiving gifts, money, cars, etc.

Of course Highsmith does have a dog in this fight with A.J. being a member on the team, so it's natural for him to want to see Miami get off light or receive no penalty at all. Sorry Alonzo, but the Canes are going down and they're going down hard.

Jimmy Johnson Takes His Shots At Shapiro

In the aftermath of Nevin Shapiro's damning interview to Yahoo! sports about former and current Miami Hurricanes players receiving improper benefits, it looks like the "old school Hurricanes" are circling the wagons, speaking out against Shapiro.

First former 2 Live Crew frontman, Luther Campbell, a well known Hurricane supporter came out to speak about Shapiro and his shortcomings as a person. Now former Hurricanes boss Jimmy Johnson has some words to say about Shapiro, boosters, and the state of the program.

Former University of Miami football coach Jimmy Johnson called into the "Paul & Young Ron Show" Wednesday morning to weigh in on the allegations of improper benefits involving former booster and convicted felon Nevin Shapiro.


On the "Paul & Young Ron Show",  Johnson called Shapiro a "jock-sniffer wannabe" and offered perspective on a number of the aspects of the story:


On Shapiro: "This little scumbag is in prison for bilking a billion dollars from a bunch of people and obviously he's going to embellish the truth a little bit, but I'm sure he took advantage of some of these kids and I hate it for the program."


On boosters with their own agenda: "These parasites hang around every program and the players have got to be smart enough to know that they want something, that they aren't giving out free drinks to them unless they get something in return."


On current UM football coach Al Golden: "He wants to do it the right way. He's very thorough, very detail-oriented. He's gonna be fine, but I hate that he inherits some of this mess."


On the temptation to student-athletes to accept extra benefits: "A lot of these kids come from the inner-city without a penny to their name and some booster wants to buy them dinner. It's hard for them to say 'no'."


First of all I hate to see this go on anywhere, especially one of the true heavywieghts in college football (I know some will disagree with that). There are some saying that Miami should get the death penalty. That's not gonna happen. I have plenty of reasons why, but not all night to discuss them. I don't see how they shouldn't since there were coaches and administrators that knew what was going on. They might get a bowl ban and loss of scholarships but that's it. I still don't see how the Canes escape with a light penalty. They better hope that Al Golden has the nuts to stick around, because I'm sure he didn't see this coming when he signed up for this job. He was sold a bad bill of goods.

Also, Ohio State might want to start kissing up to Terrelle Pryor, especially if he doesn't get admitted into the NFL supplemental draft. It's always the disgruntled athlete/booster that was promised something and didn't get it or never went pro.

Another thing is with the NCAA. Their rules about improper benefits are outdated. I know college athletes are "special". But I'll use this as an example. If I'm a well off individual helping a kid out because his home life isn't that great and I become influential in his decision on where he goes to college, then I'm giving improper benefits. Just because I let him use my expensive car or take him and his family out to dinner or loan him a few dollars to get by, those are improper benefits. Not everyone wants something in return, they just want to see a kid succeed. 

Don't get it twisted, I don't feel sorry for Miami. They did this to themselves. I know it goes on damn near everywhere, but to be honest it's almost what you have to do to win big in college football. But you know what happens in the end. Miami or some other big name school gets caught and Fresno State goes on probation.

I wonder how many ex-players will speak out against Shapiro.








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Kimbo Slice Wins By KO In His First Boxing Match

Kimbo Slice has gone from a YouTube backyard brawling sensation to a MMA washout to boxer. For Slice's sake (Kevin Ferguson) he better hope this foray into a legitimate sport goes a lot better than his last one.

Well Slice/Ferguson has gotten off to a good start with a win over James Wade by knockout. Wade was not an impressive opponent, he came in at 0-1 with a loss by KO. But remember, Slice's first MMA fight was against a so-called tomato can and he was taken to the limit in his first bout.  



Just knowing that Slice is in the boxing game might get some of the diehards to watch. I doubt it, but stranger things have happened. As you can see he has a long way to go to be legitimized as a contender.

Warren Moon Wants Newton To Start In Carolina

When you draft a "franchise" quarterback there usually is some pressure from fans to start the rookie right away, even if he might not be ready to handle the rigors of the NFL. I'm sure the Carolina Panthers felt that way, especially since their only quarterback with any kind of experience is Jimmy Clausen. They probably didn't need Hall of Famer and Cam Newton's mentor, Warren Moon, popping off about Newton being the starter in Carolina.

“Cam has a chance to start day one just because of where they are right now at the quarterback position,” Moon told Burns and Gambo of 620 KTAR in Phoenix. “No really strong incumbent starter there, and then the fact that they have a new coach, new scheme, might as well start with a new quarterback.”


I can see his point since Clausen is only a second year player with limited experience. But it is a new scheme that neither one of them knows very well due to the lockout, which puts both of them behind the eight ball. Also I wouldn't sell Clausen short. He could give Newton a run but I feel the Panthers will bow to the pressure and have Newton as the starter.

“There is a good chance that could happen,” Moon said. “I just don’t know what the organization’s thinking is right now. Do they want to throw him out there game one of the season or do they want to wait a few games into the season? That’s just a decision that they’re going to have to make, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he was the day one starter because he was drafted number one overall to be their guy for the future and why not make the future now?”


I know Moon probably knows what he's talking about and has more football knowledge in his big toe than I ever will. I just would like to see the Newton era last more than a few games. Put him in with the first teamers in the preseason and see how things shake out. If he beats Clausen with a superior perfromance, put him in. If the Panthers start Newton just because Moon and the fans think he should be the starter from day one, they'll be in for another long season.