If the Kansas football team can’t snap out of its funk this weekend with a victory against a Central Michigan squad coming off a 37-point loss and likely coming to town without its best player, it’s quite possible today was Charlie Weis’ final Tuesday presser.
If that’s the case, I’ll miss the candid, entertaining sessions.
Even coming off a 41-3 loss at Duke and doing his best to check his sarcastic tongue, Weis didn’t give boring answers to the questions sent his way.
Some of his statements understandably don’t sit well with administrators and athletes, but for reporters, Weis’ candor is a dream come true.
My seven favorite answers from what could be his final Tuesday presser:
**1 — Question:** “What was the Duke defense doing that shut down (Nick) Harwell?”
**Answer:** “Montell (Cozart) shut down Harwell. Duke’s defense didn’t shut down Harwell.”
That’s 100 percent accurate. KU’s vastly improved receiving corps doesn’t have the numbers to show it because, in order, a) Cozart isn’t finding open receivers; b) He often misses them when he finds them; c) He’s too entrapped by rushing defenders to see them.
Not many coaches would respond in such a colorful way and would be too fearful of hurting the quarterback’s confidence.
**2 — Question:** “This may be kind of a simple, dumb question, but …”
**Answer:** “Go ahead. Dumb is right up my alley.”
That’s not ersatz humor so often uttered by coaches. You know, C material that gets A laughs. Instead, it was genuinely funny, especially coming off a 41-3 loss to Duke, a game in advance of which he had sounded “confident, bordering on cocky,” to use a phrase he recently used on another topic.
**3 — Question:** “You already mentioned (running back Corey) Avery, but first road game for a bunch of your freshmen and obviously a lot of them got out there, too. Just the whole experience, what do you think of how those guys handled the road trip?”
**Answer:** “Well, Avery doesn’t act like a freshman, so it’s tough for me to look at him like a freshman. I think there are different guys you look at different ways. There are a couple guys that looked like they were more looking at the opposing stadium, and really it wasn’t a very intimidating place now. There were about 25,000 people there. They’re far away from you. It wasn’t loud. So there really was nothing to be intimidated about.
“I mean, you’re playing against a nice, solid team. They’re not great, but they’re a nice, solid team that’s turned the corner and they’re winning, so you’re going to have to play well, so really there should have been — field was in great condition, weather didn’t turn out to be an issue, but I mean, really you could look for reasons. There really isn’t one. We’ve gone to places where a freshman walks in and says, ‘My God.’ You walk in and there are 88,000 people there or 100,000 people there, and some of them get overwhelmed, but that game, that should not have been the case.”
It would be difficult to find another coach who just lost to a team by a 41-3 score refer to the victor as, “a nice, solid team. They’re not great, but they’re a nice, solid team.”
What does that make Weis’ team? Well, at least 38 points worse than “nice” or “solid.”
**4 — Question:** “We saw how well your team played in the first quarter with the emotion against Southeast Missouri. Is that a big key for you guys, just playing with that emotion in a home game coming up?”
**Answer** (second half of it): “The problem really started between the quarterback and the center, okay, and before you know it, you’re punting and you never even gave your team a chance.
“Put it like this: I’m glad there are lights out there because when the practice is over, the quarterback and center are going to hang out together for quite some time. I don’t know what time tutoring starts, but hopefully they’ll be in in time for tutoring. We (coaches) can’t be out there because that would exceed the four?hour day.”
Weis paints a nice picture with words and in this case what I pictured was being forced to stay after school to pound chalkboard erasers to clean them, scraping used gum off the bottom of desktops, etc.
**5 — Question:** “How much did having (suspended running back Thomas) Rawls and not having Rawls have to do with the two different outcomes (a decisive victory against Purdue; a blowout loss to Syracuse).”
**Answer:** “I mean, he’s a 100?plus yard rusher every single game, and looking at, following the issues that are going on, I’d be kind of surprised if he played this week. Sign me up for that.
“But I’ve got my own guys’ issues on and off the field. I don’t wish bad on anyone else, but I think that the kid is a legitimately front?line player. I think he’s really good. So would it have affected them, yeah, it probably would have affected them.”
Regardless of whether it was his intention, Weis pretty much let it be known he thinks it wouldn’t be right to play Rawls, given his off-the-field issue. In fairness, all he said was that he didn’t think he would play, so I’m taking a little bit of a leap there.
Rawls was scheduled for a Tuesday court appearance on larceny and credit-card fraud charges, dating to an April 8th incident at a casino. Rawls, who rushed for 155 yards in a 38-17 victory against Purdue on Sept. 8, is accused of stealing a woman’s purse and using her credit cards.
Rawls, the Chippewas’ best player, was arrested by Saginaw Chppewa Tribal Police the day after his big game. Who would have ever guessed casinos employ video surveillance. I mean, with all that money changing hands, what a shock!
**6 — Question:** “The problems on third down, is that just another example of the passing game needing to be more efficient, or is there anything more to that?”
Answer: “Well, it really was the passing game on every down. Third down gets magnified. If you’re not throwing and catching, if you’re not throwing and catching, third down gets magnified because now you’re punting. It wasn’t like every third down was third and 12. We had third and and 4s, we had plenty of manageable situations right there, but our efficiency in the pass game was not good, and it’s definitely magnified on third down.”
Good point.
**7 — Question:** “Referencing what you said earlier about some guys playing a pretty good game, was Michael Reynolds one of those guys?”
**Answer:** “No, I would not put him in that group of people that played really well. … I think when Michael Reynolds was rushing the passer, he looked good. When he wasn’t, he didn’t look very good. You’re not going to get me to say, ‘Yeah’ on very many players you could bring up right now.”
Given the final score, that’s appropriate.