Everyday it's getting more and more disheartening to read the headlines. Football players in this conference or that conference have perfected the art of wilding, and for some reason, their fans are defending their players' actions off the field.

Is this what it has come to? The fans, alumni and boosters succombing to players-gone-bad? All because they want to be the best football team in America? Have the players finally taken their coaches and fans hostage?

Go to any football team's message board, and it's always the same excuses on every post when a player gets arrested. "It happens everywhere", "all college kids drink" and "it's only a misdemeanor." Funny, no other NCAA-sanctioned sport suffers this problem. Let the dumbing down of American football fans begin.

Part of the whole problem with this situation is that most of these players think they are going to "hit it big" in the pros; who cares if they have a rap sheet? So what if less than 5% of all college athletes ever make it to the pros? They all are good enough to make it to the NFL- just ask them.

LSU quarterback Ryan Perrilloux is the second coming of Christ, according to Ryan Perrilloux, of course. Perrilloux did tell the press he was going to win four Heismans, but last season Perrilloux played a secondary role while Matt Flynn led the Tigers to the BCS Promised Land. Most LSU fans tired of Perrilloux' antics and many screamed about getting rid of him; "we don't need him", they cried. Then they won the BCS Championship. And everything changed.

"He deserves a second chance," the Mardi Gras-styled, BCS bead-laden supporters said. Of course he does. Read into this anyway you will, but the bottom line is this- the fans have tasted the crystal trophy, want more, and are now are willing to sell their collective souls for another one. Do you blame them? It's part of our nature and one of the seven deadly sins.

The Bayou Bengals want another BCS trophy and fully realize that if they dismiss Perrilloux, another hungry school, most likely in the SEC, will pick him up and have a potential weapon to win the conference championship. It's really that simple. Perrilloux is holding LSU hostage, and Les Miles is his tool to demand that ransom.

This isn't a rip on LSU, by the way, but they are the most visible school to be facing this hostage crisis, and frankly, it's not theirs to bear alone. Many other schools are suffering this same type of situation in their own backyards. Perrilloux' antics have been the most publicized, while Stephen Garcia, of South Carolina, takes a close second; his alcohol-related antics have resulted in a suspension until August 15th. Reinstatement is right before the season starts. Perfect timing there, Coach.

There are some coaches who will take a tough stand against "boys-gone-wild". Look at Joe Paterno. Penn State discovered that three players were arrested, and two of them were expelled from the team. Don't mess with Joe. The dilemma for Penn State fans is obvious, however. They haven't been legit contenders for the Big Ten Championship in a long time, and the fans are getting restless.

Maybe, just maybe, if these players were given "a second, or third chance", the Nittany Lions could keep up with the other schools who do allow thugs and derelicts to play for their school. Think there's not a little pressure to give in to the dark side? Think the Nit fans, for just one year, would love to say "we're #1" rather than "we have a high graduation rate" ? Damn straight. But they won't admit it. Yet.

Am I against giving players getting second or third chances? No, but there needs to be a heavier price to pay on the first "oops." This "indefinite suspension" garbage for a week or a month, clearly doesn't work. Just murmur Michael Vick's, Pac Man Jones', Lawrence Phillips' or Chris Henry's name around the ol' courthouse and brace yourself for "I-told-you-so."

And that's the problem facing teams like the Cincinnati Bengals, Texas Longhorns, South Carolina Gamecocks and LSU Tigers; they have players with great athletic ability but poor judgment and unsavory character.

Who's to blame? We buy the merchandise, we buy the tickets and we donate our money to the university. But when our team isn't doing well, we scream for a better coach who can recruit better players or we will close our wallets.

Unfortunately, most of the better players have not focused on education as their primary reason to go to college, so the coach is in a conundrum; sign the high-risk player and hope for the best, or pass on that player and watch him torch you for 200 yards when you play against him. Every now and then we get a Brady Quinn, who double-majored at Notre Dame, graduated, and got picked in the first round of the NFL draft. But he's a rare breed.

Nope, most of today's football 4 or 5-star prepsters are spoiled rotten and NFL tools; advertising bulletin boards for their respective high school's brilliant coaching staffs, recipients of preferential treatment throughout their high school years, and wooed and awed by every elite football program in the country. They are texted on a daily basis, gifted unofficial perks from wealthy boosters and catered and coddled by all the local town folk. The local sheriff knows who are the five-star recruits in town. Don't kid yourself.

Football fans, it is our fault. And now, we, as a society have a bunch of malcontents, juvenile delinquents and thugs playing on our teams. We have officially been dumbed-down by the players. We watch them tarnish our schools' reputations and at the same time, boastfully point to our Trophy Hall as proof that we are the best.

Hypocrisy is our middle name. We brag, "so what, we're the champs" when the haters point out all of the scandals plaguing our school. We yell, " yeah, but you're losers" when another school brags about its high rate of graduation. And when we lose a big game and hear the jeers of "overrated", we respond with "at least our guys aren't felons."

We are masters in the art of spin.

Are we any better than "them"? Not as long we continue to allow these players to hold us hostage. Not as long as we continue to brag about how many of our team's players have gone into the NFL. Not as long as we continue to donate money to our alma maters, with an "only if it goes to an athletic scholarship fund" stipulation. Not as long as we demand a coach to be fired when his graduation rate is higher than his winning percentage. Not as long as we scream "he has learned his lesson, now can we get more offense?" while our starters are being suspended from action off the field.

Besides, everybody has this problem. He's just a kid. All kids drink while underage. Wanna touch our team's championship trophy? We're #1. Your team sucks. Pot isn't such a big deal. Hater.

If only we could figure out why these athletes are lacking character and morals.

It's not pretty folks. If you're a Michigan, Ohio State or Illinois fan, your behind has got to be raw from getting smacked around by faster, speedier schools. Last year was a wake-up call when Florida whupped Ohio State. This year's beating by LSU should have been a fifteen yard penalty; unsportsmanlike conduct for taunting another team.

Ohio State has been exposed, and it doesn't look like it's going to get better this season. Oh sure, the pollsters have the Bucks already in their preseason top five. Why? Their schedule, except for one game, dictates another glide path to the BCS game.

Youngstown State, Ohio, at USC, Troy, Minnesota, at Wisconsin, Purdue, at Michigan State, Penn State, at Northwestern, at Illinois, Michigan. That's a ten, maybe eleven win season, considering Michigan is without a quarterback that can run Rich-rod's WCO, and Penn State has no quarterback worth even mentioning. So far. Sorry Pat Devlin. Illinois could beat them again, if the planets all align in the universe, but that drubbing they got at USC may cause some serious character assessment.

But, first things first...Youngstown State, again? Yeah, I know, it was a favor for Tressel's old school. Excuses, excuses. This is pathetic scheduling and an embarrassment for Buckeye fans.

Since 1978, only five schools have never scheduled a non-division 1A, now known as FCS, school; Washington, UCLA, USC, Michigan State and yes, Notre Dame. Shouldn't this be an automatic rule when you play with the big boys? Play big boys? Now I hear a lot about the perceived weaknesses of the Pac-10 and Notre Dame, but can you really make that argument when 10 of 11 Big Ten teams play, or have played, lower division schools?

This wouldn't be such a big deal if these teams that do schedule lower division schools thumped them, but Appalachian State put that argument to rest. It is now, officially, a big deal. But Ohio State has now turned the tables on themselves by scheduling these laughable games. If they beat everyone this season, (not counting USC, let's get real here), will anyone give them props and rank them in the top five? They have proven two years in a row that an easy walk-through of regular season football is no longer indicative of how good they are. Their schedule this year is much more difficult, but only due to the addition of USC, and once they get hammered by the Trojans, no one will take them seriously. They committed suicide by schedule.

Michigan started this whole mess losing to the Mountaineers, but beat a very young Florida team in their New Year's Day bowl to make somewhat of a whimper. But that's it. The only team that beat Ohio State, Illinois, got the privilege of playing USC in the Rose Bowl and got soundly thrashed and embarrassed, 49-17.



As of now, the Big Ten isn't being taken very seriously, and that's a shame. Three of its big-hitters, Michigan, Ohio State, and Penn State, are reeling from gorgeous-looking conference records or expectations, but ugly overall results when you compare them to the dominating years before 1980. While Wisconsin and Purdue may make some noise this year (as usual), their schedules' SOS or BCS rules will derail them from being a third-wheel in the BCS system.

When is the Big Ten going to realize, that failing to sign faster players (and not just fast for the Big Ten, but bada$$ fast, period) and continuing to beat each up in their own conference, is no longer impressing anyone? When will they start realizing that everyone has their number? The dinosaur is dead, yet the Big Ten continually tries to feed it to make the old-school fans happy. You may say "three yards and a cloud of dust" is history, but when you play the elite schools, it gets awfully dusty out there from the same-old results.

Sure you're running more plays to get the tailbacks and tight ends involved in the passing attack, but when the rest of your team doesn't have the proper personnel to run the WCO efficiently, what's the freaking point? The quarterback is going to be sacked or the tailback is going to get tackled. Quickly. Florida, LSU and USC have already proven that point, time and time again, against the Big Ten.



Bottom line is this; the BIg Ten needs to get some respectability back. Fast. They can do this only one way- beat a quality team. That spells it out succinctly, but harder to implement. The Bucks get the Trojans in LA, no easy task. If they beat the Trojans, then pollsters might give them th benefit of the doubt and keep them in the top 5. If they lose by more than 7, the Bucks can kiss their season goodbye, even if they go undefeated in the Big Ten. They may go to a BCS bowl, but they will not be going to the Big Dance. The fans are tired of it. Other teams are tired of it. Even the sportswriters are tired of building up a game when they know all-too-well that a team which plays one big boy and loses, isn't up for the task. Again.

Buckeye fans, circle the date. September 13th. Just look for ESPN's College Game Day crew. The world will be watching. And good luck. The fate of the Big Ten rests on your shoulders.

This is my first blog. I welcome any constructive criticism, and hope to have some great debate here on FoxSports.com.

Looking at Glenn Dorsey's failure to work-out at the NFL combines, coupled with his injury-plagued last half of the year with LSU, I have to wonder if he's really worth the gamble. A bad back, sore hamstring, knee injury and a stress-fracture (ankle) that plagued him for all of 2007 are hard to overcome in most non-athletes- how much harder is it to overcome with a constant beating in the NFL?

His game was affected when he was on the Championship LSU Tigers'  team. Pundits can point out that he played through pain, often double and triple-teamed, but when you're trying to increase your stock status, that's a smart move. Show the scouts how tough you are. Smart, very smart. Of course, you're interviewing for a multi-million dollar job, so if you get hurt, are you still going to play? Or park on the the aluminum while collecting paychecks? That's a GMs worry.

It's been almost three months since that BCS game, where supposedly you were healthy, and no workouts in the combines. What gives? You've had plenty of time to re-coup, and conditioning skills and re-hab should be showing some dividends right about now. While you missed the workouts in Indy due to your grandmother's death, some NFL scouts may remember that Adrian Peterson showed up to the combines just hours after his brother was shot and killed.

Contrary to what most fans believe, the combines are not just about times in the forty, shuttles and vertical leap ability. It's first priority is to accurately measure a player's height and weight. Most players have minor fibs on their resumes; the scouts know it, the GMs know it, thus the reason for them being re-measured and weighed. Their second priority is to #### the player's attitude and character. And here is where Dorsey might fall a few spots in the draft.

So far, the combines are the most important week of his life, and he didn't show, until Saturday. While the grieving process affects different people in different ways, his lack of mental toughness is not looking very good right now. A professional football player faces constant pressure from fans, the media and upper-level management- will he miss a game if some off-the-field-problems arise? That's the million dollar question.

And that question is worth millions. Drop four and five spots on the boards, and all of a sudden, you're looking at a luxury condo in Fort Lauderdale, not that fancy mansion in South Beach. Did Dorsey blow it? Possibly. But more importantly, is his slow-healing stress fracture worth the gamble?

He's a stud, no doubt, but linemen and ankles are about as symbiotic to each other as Steve Spurrier and visors. They need each other. One cannot co-exist without the other. And a slow-healing tibia is worrisome, especially when it is supporting 300 plus pounds. On the other hand, he's the most decorated player to come out of LSU, and collected almost every trophy he was in the running for, including the Outland. There is no question, he's the best DT in the draft.

But the question remains this: is he worth the gamble? Do you take him early in the first round, and lay a huge contract on him, with out a combine workout to gauge how well he has healed? Or do you take him a little later in the first round, relying on spectacular game film, to save some coin?