Aaron Colen/The Oklahoma Daily

Right Idea, Wrong Time

College football’s opening weekend was supposed to have a strong emphasis on sportsmanship. However, one unfortunate event took up more headlines and air time than any of the shocking upsets did.

Oregon Ducks running back Legarrette Blount’s sucker punch of Boise State’s Byron Hout after Thursday night’s game exposed a flaw in the NCAA’s sportsmanship initiative.

The NCAA and the AFCA urged college football teams to organize pre-game handshake lines between teams. If the two teams were in a mandatory handshake line after the game, instead of the mayhem that usually takes place on a football field after the game, the chances of a brawl on the field would decrease significantly.

Nobody to Blame but Yourself

It was shocking to hear national sportswriters and analysts take the burden of responsibility off of Blount’s shoulders and put it onto his teammates and coaches. I heard several people ask the question: “Why didn’t his teammates and coaches get him off the field immediately after the game?”

By most standards, Blount is an adult. The only judgment that should be brought into question in that situation is his. Just because there was a history of bad blood between Blount and Boise State, that does not mean it is anyone else’s responsibility to make sure he didn’t punch an opposing player.

He deserves every consequence that comes his way for that action, because even a second’s worth of rational thinking on Blount’s part would have prevented him from throwing that punch. At the very least he should have come to his senses after that, instead he proceeded to go after a fan.

Not Exactly an Innocent Victim

Byron Hout doesn’t get a free pass in this incident, either. Just because he took the punch, let’s not forget the classless and unnecessary taunting that provoked Blount in the first place. I won’t go so far as to say he deserved it, but he certainly doesn’t come away from the conflict with clean hands.

On Second Thought…

I wrote in a previous column that the new sportsmanship initiatives were unnecessary and extreme. After this weekend, I’m starting to think they aren’t such a bad idea, if for no other reason than to prevent the trash-talking culture in college football from getting any more violent.

Aaron Colen is a journalism senior and the basketball beat reporter.