The Comments that Weren't about Les Miles

My favorite purple coach is at it again.   You may have heard, about a week ago that Gary Patterson was in the news for apparently slamming Les Miles' decision to play Jeremy Hill in the LSU season opener against TCU.

Hill, LSU's leading rusher was let back onto the team after 1) the LSU team voted him in to play and 2) the judge presiding over his sucker-punch-probation-violation case chose not to send him to jail. 

This puts Hill in the starting lineup for the the Horned Frogs season opener against Miles' Tigers.   When asked about it on August 7th, Patterson told the Fort Worth Star Telegram:

“I’m sure if it was some opponent they’d beat by 100 points (the players) wouldn’t have a vote. It’s not my worry. I’ve got to play whoever they put on the field,”

 

The funniest things about that statement are the assumptions that A) Miles wouldn't stoop that low for any win, which I personally think he would and B) LSU couldn't beat TCU by 100 points.   I'm not saying they could hang a Benjamin on TCU (and they didn't), but on any given Saturday, any team can lose by 100 points.  You've just got to have the perfect storm.  It takes a pretty cocky man to say otherwise. 

 

Speaking of storms, did I mention that TCU's Big XII Defensive Player of the Year Devonte Fields was on the bench during the TCU/LSU game?  Back in May, TCU stated in a press release that lineman was suspended for the first two games of the season "due to a violation of university and team policy."

 

Here's where it starts to get sticky for Coach Jerkface Patterson.  When word got out he'd made comments about Coach Miles' decision to lift Hill's suspension, (such as):

 

“My whole team would vote Devonte (Fields) to be back on the team because they all want to win,” Patterson said. “That doesn’t teach life lessons.”

 

suddenly he recanted, and insisted he wasn't talking about LSU at all:

 

“I know what I said. I didn’t mention Jeremy Hill. I didn’t mention Les Miles,” Patterson said after Thursday’s practice. “It was more about Devonte Fields. If they want to make something up so they can get all fired up… I can get the same thing when I go home. Everyone can stand in line.”

"I must not tell lies"

Patterson is claiming that every person in the world who read those comments put the wrong dots in the wrong order and stretched his words out to make it seem like he was implying something he wasn't.

Right.  And Voldemort never came back.

He even sent Coach Miles a doctored transcript of the press conference, just to prove he wasn't being bossy pants.  Yeah, Patterson.  You may not have said their names, but who exactly were you referring to when you spoke to the press about "playing whoever is on the field" and "the players" not having "a vote" if it was "some opponent they'd beat by 100 points"?

 

Contrary to what Gary thinks ("Anybody who knows me knows that’s way outside of character, so why would I do it now?") I think it was completely in character as I've pointed out here, here, here, here and here. 

Also, did I mention I'm a psychic-ish?

That's okay, Gary.  You sit on your high horse and...oh, wait! What?  Have you and Kevin Sumlin been hanging out lately....?  Because what's about to come out of your mouth sounds alot like what Sumlin tried to feed us last year regarding suspended players when his season opener was rescheduled.

 

"Steven Jenkins and Howard Matthews were suspended for the first game. As a matter of fact, last week, neither guy was involved in our preparation for Louisiana Tech and that'll remain the situation," Sumlin said. "As a matter of fact, Howard Matthews played scout team wide receiver last week. A lot of things have changed because of that since the storm and they will still be suspended for the Louisiana Tech game. That won't change."

 

Wait. What?!  I digress.

The TCU press release said Fields would be suspended for the first two games.  Suddenly, Patterson is saying the suspension is his call.  That could absolutely be true.  But why bring that up?  Because suddenly Fields is listed at the top of the depth chart.  And all of a sudden, we hear that TCU's Campus Life Organization voted (voted?! gasp!) to lift Fields' suspension even before the LSU game.   And suddenly, sitting a player out for two games is dangerous!  And it leads to "an opportunity to get hurt."

(Play Film Noir music in your head here.)

And, even though the suspension was ALL GARY, ALL THE WAY, if the TCU Chancellor approves, Fields will probably play the next game.

You know, so he doesn't get hurt.  Granted, TCU probably doesn't need Fields to beat SE Louisiana, but it sure would be nice if Fields had a little playing time before the Texas Tech Big XII opener next week.  But has Fields has suddenly learned his lesson, or, contrary to his earlier comments, does Patterson believe that sometimes life lessons DO take a backseat to wanting to win.

Plus, Fields was sad:

 

“I think he was physically hurt that he was in that situation and he couldn’t help,” Patterson said.

 

Literally, physically hurt. 

And instead of telling us the lessons Devonte learned, Patterson brought it all back to Patterson, and how the mean old media is so mean to him:

"That reporter over there.  He was being mean to me."

 

“As far as all the blast I get about not getting a pass rush, nobody said Devonte Fields was gone,” he said, although most reporters pointed out Fields’ absence. “They just said we didn’t have a pass rush. No matter which way you look at it, you still get hammered. As a football coach, you get hammered one way or the other, it doesn’t make any difference.”

 

Yeah, I know how you feel buddy.  Nobody talked about how we lost the National Championship to Bama because Colt McCoy was gone.  Oh, wait.  That's all anyone talked about.  Never mind.