Coaches are not babysitters and should not be held as such.
The recent off-field actions of the LSU football team have posed the question of whether any backlash should fall on the coaching staff, most notably head coach Les Miles, for not preventing such an occurrence.
The answer is a resounding ‘no.’
The players are all legal adults who are old enough to smoke, vote and in some cases drink and gamble. They do not need constant surveillance. Any mistakes they made reflect poorly on them, and them alone.
LSU has found itself as a hot discussion topic on sports shows, yet not once has it been suggested that LSU’s team is full of criminals. Instead, those accused of wrongdoing are being discussed for their alleged mistakes.
If there is any mention of Miles throughout this scenario, it should be to commend him for doing such an admirable job.
Miles was honest about the situation, just as he was with the Ryan Perrilloux ordeal of 2007 and 2008, and he took swift and severe action when the time was right.
With numerous scandals of coaching infidelity floating around the country, Miles’ honesty has been a breath of fresh air.
Miles could have wrongly protected his star quarterback like former Ohio State coach Jim Tressel did. Tressel lied to school and NCAA officials about incidents of his players receiving illegal benefits so as not to jeopardize their eligibility before the start of the 2010 season.
Miles could have turned a blind eye to a rogue booster who gave his players cars, houses and everything under the sun like what happened at the end of the Pete Carroll era at Southern California.
Instead, Miles has taken action any time there has been a glitch in his program.
When allegations arose that former coach D.J. McCarthy had given illegal benefits to former player Akiem Hicks, Miles promptly relieved McCarthy of his duties, and Hicks never saw the field.
As soon as a direct link to wide receiver Russell Shepard and a potential housing problem was found, Miles held Shepard out of Southeastern Conference Media Days. And when Shepard was found in violation of an NCAA statute for talking about an ongoing investigation with a teammate, Miles declared him ineligible and is currently taking the proper steps to get him reinstated.
Then, there was the infamous fight. Miles sat back and waited to make sure the allegations were substantial before jumping to conclusions. Once quarterback Jordan Jefferson and linebacker Josh Johns were arrested and charged, he suspended them indefinitely.
All of these are individual actions that were not known or condoned by the program. These players, former players and former coaches went out and made mistakes of their own free will, as they should be allowed to.
Now that they have made mistakes, they must pay the consequences. McCarthy and Hicks are no longer with the program. Shepard is temporarily ineligible, and Jefferson and Johns are facing felony charges. They are paying for their mistakes, proven or alleged.
They have given themselves a black eye, not the program.
There is not one incident that someone can truthfully say Miles should have stopped this from occurring. Though he might eat grass and convert fake field goals with the greatest of ease, Miles is not Superman.
He can’t be everywhere at once. He can’t run faster than a speeding bullet to stop his coaches from giving out illegal benefits. He isn’t stronger than a locomotive to break up bar fights before they happen. He can’t leap tall buildings in a single bound to keep his players from living there wrongfully.
But he can control how he handles those problems. And as of now, he’s done so as well as any superhero out there.
 
Rob Landry is a 23-year old mass communication senior from Mandeville. Follow him on Twitter @RobLandry85.
 
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Contact Rob Landry at [email protected]