Leach Saga Overshadows Texas Tech Victory

As I watched Texas Tech defeat Michigan State 41-31 in the Alamo Bowl last night, it was hard to watch the Red Raider players celebrate without being distracted by the saga that cost coach Mike Leach his job.

The 'he said, she said' about how receiver Adam James - son of ESPN analyst Craig James - was treated after being diagnosed with a concussion has been on the front page of every national newspaper, and his inability to compromise with his administration resulted in his being fired prior to the bowl game.

Andy Hutchins of the Sporting News reported that Steve Pincock, the Texas Tech trainer who originally supported Leach's decision to put receiver Adam James in a dark place, reneged on his word in affadavits released Saturday by the university.

Pincock, still employed by the university, is probably walking back his statements to salvage his job. That's understandable. It's less comprehensible that the Leach/Tech dispute is not even a week old, is already this contentious, and will no doubt get uglier as time wears on.

Part of that is attributable to ESPN. Their broadcast of the Alamo Bowl verged on travesty, announcers Mike Patrick and Bob Davie focusing on the off-field issue of Leach's firing as the production truck cued up snippets of Leach's interview with ESPN in a game that remained close throughout. Twitter blew up with complaints that the announcers and network were rendering the game unwatchable, from slips of the tongue to general incompetence to presenting a one-sided account of the Leach maelstrom. It was another lump for ESPN, which has taken its fair share in the past week for permitting analyst Craig James, Adam's father, to use air time to knock Leach.

What I am having a rough time dealing with in this story is how this was even able to potentially happen in the first place. A head coach of a major Div I-A BCS football program like Leach was at Texas Tech is more like a CEO of a Fortune 500 company than he is a little league coach - delegating most of the coaching and interactions with the players to his assistant coaches, coordinators and support staff while managing over all aspects of the program.

I know that a number of stories about strange behavior and discipline from Leach has come out over the past week, but I can't understand why Leach would have this much interaction with James, who was both a third-string wide receiver and injured. I have a tough time believing that there wouldn't be more contact between James and the offensive coordinator, wide receivers coach and sports medicine/athletic training staff than there would have been with Leach.

If an offense like this was to of happened, it would lead you to believe that a paper trail would show a number of others who have committed error here - I just don't know how this could have happened without other members of the coaching and support staff also not accepting some of the responsibility.

There is more to this story than has been leaked (yet), because a lot of the puzzle pieces don't seem to match up. Regardless as to who was at fault, it was unfortunate that this saga had to overshadow Texas Tech's performance last night.

All in all, it was a terrible end to a generally awful day of college football.