Sportsfrog.com

Ok, yeah, bad joke. How many copy desk workers are going to use a pirate captain reference for the headlines for Mike Leach’s suspension? Gotta be quite a few.

Anyway, if this is true–and I stress that I think this is a big if–this is bizarre given the attention to concussions recently, and the player abuse allegations against Mark Mangino, Leach’s roommate when they started their coaching careers.

Dave Matter, the Missouri beat writer for the Columbia Tribune–and one of the best college-town beat writers around–has an interesting theory:

if Leach allegations are true, I’m convinced he wanted to get fired. He’s too smart to think he’d get away with this after the Mangino deal.

Leach may be batshit crazy, but he’s no dummy. (If you can get access to the feature on Leach in March’s Texas Monthly. It’s well worth your time. It’s an extremely long article, but one of the best magazine articles I’ve read all year)

But at the same time, why the heck would Leach want to get fired? He just signed a five year extension at Tech and at the time of the alleged incident, there were no primo college football jobs open. (Mike Leach to South Bend? That would go over well) Where would Leach go? Would he rather be an offensive coordinator in the NFL? I don’t think that the zone read scheme that Leach runs at Tech would be terribly effective in the NFL without Peyton Manning at quarterback.

Whatever this is, my guess is that it’s somewhere between what Leach and Adam James say. But if the resolution to this situation is Texas Tech and Leach parting ways, then Tech may very well toss its relevance on the national college football landscape out the window as well.

(Kudos to ESPN for taking Craig James off of the broadcast of Saturday’s game)

EDIT: Great piece by the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal.