ESPN Ombudsman on Mike Leach

Much stronger effort than his last. He actually takes the WWL to task a bit for fudging Craig James' role in the controversy:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=ohlmeyer_don&id=4844048

 

I am interested in the issue but could not read that whole tome.

 

And yet now that Craig James' behavior well before the concussion incident is a central subject of the lawsuit, ESPN lets him get away with the "I'm not here to talk about the past" B.S. They could compel him, as an employee, to answer the questions about whether he called Leach and the assistants all season and told them Adam was the best receiver on the team. But they won't because they have no balls.

So that's how much the ombudsman column means. In case anyone didn't already know.

 

Y'know . . . the WWL could function quite well without Craig James.

 

He's trying to position himself as the uberconservative in the Texas Senate race. He probably believes Leach is a liberal.

 

My bet is that Craig James will slowly fade away from Bristol.

 

ESPN can't necessarily compel him to do this as an employee. But Mike Leach's lawyer can.

 

Agreed. Very critical eye and not serving as a yes man or blind defender of all things four-letters.

 

Interesting note also at the end on GMAC bowl. It was a joke the way game was broadcast. I am not surprised that ESPN got complaints.

 

You know, I wish somebody would really dig back into the SMU football scandals of the 1980s and see just how much Craig James, as well as his Pony Express teammate Eric Dickerson, were likely sliming their way through NCAA violations.

The SMU crap didn't really hit the fan until 1985-86, after those guys had left. I can assure you that as much as SMU got penalized, the likes of James and Dickerson got off pretty much scot-free. They had skated away 2-3 years earlier before things got really bad.

I just don't think James has ever been fully scrutinized and held personally accountable, and it would be interesting to see what the likes of TMZ could dig up---James et al got away before the posse caught up with the Ponies. Then-AD Bob Hitch and Gov. (and SMU board member) Clements were among the main evildoers, but there were a number of SMU players blatantly flaunting their ill-gotten gains, and I"d be interested to see how deep James's hand was into the till.

What do you say, Craig? Let's hear you come clean, and I don't mean Mark McGwire "clean."