The Real Outrage: Why isn't Dooley Losing Control of His Team

If you follow me on Twitter (wow, two begs in a day), you know I go way overboard on the 'Mark Richt has lost control of...' meme. I do that because it helps me from going medieval on folks over the ridiculousness of the idea that he has lost control of his team...or controls the independent actions of college aged men. But I do have to ask, with appropriate props to Corbindawg at The Grit Tree for getting me thinking about this, why isn't [fill in your favorite media hit troll] outraged at what is going on in Knoxville?

If Aaron Murray had two Tier 2 police interactions in one month, ESPN would be doing stand-ups in Athens. The AJC's unholy duo would have used countless column inches decrying the lack of accountability in Mark Richt's football program/discussing how clean/awesome Georgia Tech is. Missouri fans would proclaim themselves Archdukes of the SEC East. South Carolina bloggers and fans would have had meltdowns over how unfair the schedule is. Tech fans would have used Klingon to spell 'tUga' in Morse code.

In short, it would be a big deal.  Yet Tyler Bray starts acting like he is a quarterback for South Carolina and it isn't a big deal. Imagine if in the past two years Georgia football would have had a bar room brawl that put someone a police officer in the hospital. Imagine if you had another player in that time arrested for domestic violence. Imagine if another was rung up for beating down a dude for talking to his woman in a bar. Imagine if another was busted stealing laptops from team mates. Imagine if Georgia had signed Da'Rick Rogers.

Jetsking allows Bray to sport his art
(Image:NOBOC)

For the record, I don't blame Dooley for what is going on with his college students. Now, we can have the debate over how the two universities handle suspensions or how the local constabularies handle arrests, but under no circumstances do I think either Mark Richt or Derek Dooley are responsible for creating a culture that encourages these behaviors.

Tell me where that outrage is. Maybe it has more to do with where Tennessee's football program is. Maybe it because Dooley is a good interview. It could be Lane Kiffin just recruited bad character guys. It could also be that fans tend to regurgitate whatever tripe the media is feeding us instead of thinking about issues on our own.

TD

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