Athletic Prowess Mustn’T Be Fig Leaf

Cougar head coach Mike Price has been unequivocal about what will happen if three accused burglars on Washington State University’s football team are found guilty: They will be off the squad, even a record-setting rusher.

It seems like nothing more than common logic to prohibit felons from playing on your college football team, but in a culture that exalts athletes, adulation too often displaces logic. The most notorious example, boxer Mike Tyson, has been behind bars for rape and assault. He presumably lost his boxing privileges for taking a bite out of an opponent’s ear. Yet he may be back in the ring professionally this year. Baseball’s Darryl Strawberry is another whose behavior betrays an expectation that jocks can have it all - the glory, the wealth and the ability to write their own rules.

Only a skimpy percentage of talented young athletes make it to the college level and fewer still to the pros. But they all have the dream and are quick to imitate those who’ve made their own dreams come true.

WSU’s Kevin Brown is among the rare ones, a gifted tailback whose raw talent might justify his dreams. But if he is guilty of the charges against him and Price stands by his word, Brown will have squandered his best chance to refine his talent to the point of marketability.

Now there’s a message that could make an impact on starry-eyed youngsters who idolize and emulate high-salaried sports heroes.

Last summer, Price suspended a promising defensive lineman, Taeao Salausa, who had been arrested in connection with a rape incident. The coach stood his ground and Salausa eventually transferred to another school, even before the case was resolved. A couple of years earlier, however, Price took it easy on an exemplary linebacker, James Darling, who had convictions for reckless driving and malicious mischief (running off with a store’s $6,000 gumball machine) - an exploit Price dismissed as a prank.

So far this year, five Cougar football players have had run-ins with the law, not that WSU is unique. Stories about professional and collegiate athletes and their legal difficulties have become common reading on sports pages. And while it’s true that most student-athletes, like most students at large, behave themselves, those who perform in the spotlight tend to set standards for acceptable behavior. When the still-maturing athletes themselves fail to recognize that responsibility, it is Price’s and other coaches’ job to impose it, and reinforce it, as stringently as they do their expectations of responsibility and discipline on the field.

Our culture isn’t likely to stop worshiping star athletes. By sending the right signals now, perhaps we can remind the next generation of idols they have to show themselves worthy.