Please Come Back!

For those of you that know me really well and for those that have been paying attention to my blog, you all know that I have been paying a lot of attention to the recent headline in college football. My favorite player in college football now and probably my favorite athlete ever is Tim Tebow, and when he fell down lifeless I was like any college football fan when I held my breath until he was able to lift his head on his own. With my experience as a soccer player, we deal with a lot of concussions, so once I heard that was his only diagnosis, I was very relieved. I know concussions are a very dangerous injury, especially when you have a lot of them(and probably even more dangerous in football), but with the proper care, concussions are injuries that allow you to come back and play again. My bigger worry to this injury is the fact that with Tebow going down last week and Sam Bradford going down with a shoulder injury the first game of the season, young college football players and highly recruited high school players will look at these heisman trophy winners and opt to leave school early for the NFL in fear that they would also get injured.
I totally understand why players who are highly touted would want to go to the NFL early, but there is so much about the college life that these players would miss. It's not just the pride of playing for your school, but one more year of college means one more year of maturation and one more year learning what not to do when you sign a contract worth millions of dollars. There are almost more stories of young professional athletes who receive major contract deals that end up bankrupt than stories of players who keep signing lucrative deals and stay out of debt. There are also a lot of stories of players who come out in the first round and don't actually play until years later because they still need to work on their weaknesses that they could have worked on with one more year of college football. It's more of a rarity to see someone like Mark Sanchez in the NFL and more common to see someone like Ryan Leaf(ok, maybe not as dramatic as Leaf, but a highly touted athlete who ends up with a below average career). I don't even need to go into why another year of actual learning will help just about anyone! That's pretty obvious!
My point to this whole entry is to say to these athletes please come back to school! I know that you can finish your college degree anytime you want, but as someone who had to come back to finish just ONE semester, it is not nearly as easy as it sounds! I look at players like Peyton Manning and Tom Brady who played all four years and now look at their careers. They were able to experience everything a college education gives you along with how staying in college football can truly help your NFL growth, on and off the field. I truly hope that Sam Bradford, Colt McCoy, and Tim Tebow have wonderful NFL careers. I also hope that the media will stop questioning the players and the coaches as to why these players decided to come back. I saw a quote from Bob Stoops on espn.com and he responded well to the annoying questions the media were asking him.

"Everybody's entitled to their opinion, but for me to force a guy to go out and then what if it isn't the right decision? I don't need to tell you how things can always go in the draft," Stoops said."In the end, it's not my job to force a guy to come out. It's my job to educate my players on all the possibilities and then it's up to the individual and his family to make that decision."

In the end, no one can predict what will happen, but why take the chance of failing in the NFL so early? Enjoy all the experiences life gives you, and never stop learning. I admire these athletes and their desire to just be better people.

OK, so last weekend was a pretty bad weekend for me. With all the random upsets that I just didn't see coming, I wound up 6-6. Here's hoping for a better week!

UNC vs UVA- Go Heels!

Mich vs Mich St-Mich

Clemson vs Maryland-Clemson

Bama vs Kent-Bama

LSU vs UGA- Go Dawgs!

Washington vs ND-ND

FSU vs BC-FSU

Wake vs NC State-State

GT vs Miss St-Miss St

Auburn vs Tenn-Auburn

USC vs Cal-USC

Okla vs Miami-Okla