Editor’s note: The following article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the author’s own. Read more opinions on theGrio.
Selfishness is a relative concept. It’s a blight on society when maxed out, but perfectly understandable when utilized sparingly. The degrees between those extremes foster endless debates among friends, relatives and colleagues.
Take, for instance, USC quarterback Caleb Williams and Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders.
Both have benefitted from recent NCAA rule changes on transferring schools and making money. Both are highly rated prospects at the NFL’s most valued position. Both have the option of returning to campus or entering the NFL draft in April.
The similarities seem to diverge on that last point. Sanders is set to remain in college another season under his dad, Coach Prime, while Williams has decided to skip USC’s bowl game, presumably to prepare for the pros.
Old heads who romanticize the era of limited choices and misplaced loyalties will salute Sanders for sticking with his team while painting players like Williams as selfish quitters whose hearts are in the wrong place.
But critics’ heads are up their you-know-what, longing for the days when sitting out bowl games was taboo. Never mind the time-honored tradition of coaches bolting for new gigs before their team plays a bowl game. When players do likewise, part of a growing trend that’s now common, some folks see a problem.
“You’ve got an obligation to the place that helped build and develop you and finish it out in the bowl,” the late Mississippi State coach Mike Leach said two Decembers ago. “You owe it to your team, you owe it to your fans, you owe it to your coaches, and it’s the most bizarre thing in the world to me.”
As he spoke, coaches Lincoln Riley, Brian Kelly and Marioa Cristobal packed up and left their respective teams — Oklahoma, Notre Dame and Oregon — prior to their bowl games,…
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