I keep hearing how everyone feels so sorry for Chip Kelly this week after he had to suspend his starting Quarterback Jeremiah Masoli for the entire 2010 season after he plead guilty to second degree burglary (he stole two lap top computers and a guitar from a campus fraternity). Is anyone seeing a pattern here?

In last week's College Football Saturday in 500 Words Or Less: Draft, Combine and Dirty Ducks Edition, Danny Hobrock brought some of this to our attention.

• LaMichael James, who ran for 1546 yards last year as a freshman, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of harassment for an altercation with a former girlfriend outside his apartment last month. He was sentenced to 10 days in jail and 24 months of probation.
• Rob Beard, Oregon's kicker, plead guilty last week to harassment for his involvement in a street fight in which he was seriously injured.
• Linebacker Kiko Alonso was charged with DU.
• Defensive end Matt Simms was charged with simple assault.
• Wide receiver Garrett Embry was mixed up in the Masoli thing.
• Wide receiver Jamere Holland was dismissed from the team after a trashing the coaching staff in the public forum of Facebook.

Kelly's first year at Oregon was in 2007, he held the position of Offensive Coordinator. He installed the spread offense into the game plan and it proved to be the most potent offense in school history averaging 38.15 ppg and 467.54 yards per game in only his first year. His second year as OC proved to be even better, breaking the school record set the previous year averaging 41.9 points per game and 484.8 yards per game. In March 2009 Head Coach Mike Belloti resigned and Oregon AD announced that Chip Kelly would take over as Head Coach on March 30, 2009.

Kelly has done a remarkable job on the field as a Head Coach of Oregon. In 2009, his first year as Head Coach, Oregon dismantled Pete Carroll's USC Trojans and became the first Pac-10 Head Coach in history to win an outright conference championship in his first year as Head Coach. The Ducks had their first Rose Bowl appearance since 1995 and Kelly was named the Pac-10 "Coach of the Year".

I could go on with the accomplishments of Chip Kelly in only his first year as Head Coach but I am having a problem with something Kelly is doing. Everybody remembers LaGarrette Blount in the season opening game between Oregon and Boise State when he sucker punched a Boise State player and went after fans in the stands, yet not many people actually remember the boring game in which there was only 158 total yards of offense in the first three quarters. It's not a good thing when you remember a collegiate football game because of a fight and have little recollection of the actual game itself.

Here my problem with Coach Kelly:

Blount had clashed many times with veteran Coach Belloti, earning his first suspension for the first quarter of a loss to the Cal Golden Bears in 2008 for not following team rules. At the end of the season on Feb. 10, 2009, Belloti suspended Blount indefinitely for "failure to fulfill team obligations". Obviously, Blount was having some issues with things and didn't want to follow directions from coaches or his professors in class.

Why did Kelly re-instated Blount the day he became the Head Coach? Blount was suspended AGAIN, this time for the remaining 2009 season. Blount remained on Scholarship and was allowed to practice with the team and go to team functions throughout the year. Later in 2009 the Ducks requested that the Pac-10 reinstate Blount for the November 7th game against Stanford. The Pac-10 denied the request but after the Stanford game announced that Blount would be reinstated for the November 14th game against Arizona State. Blount suited up for the Arizona State and the following game against Arizona but Kelly made the decision to not play Blount since freshman RB LaMichael James was playing so well. Kelly did play Blount in the final game of the season in which he ran for 51 yards and scored one touchdown.

Kelly has been involved in recruiting for the Oregon Ducks since the 2007 season and was all for bringing on these players that have performed criminal acts and poor sportsmanship. Is it a coincidence that almost all of these trouble makers happen to be on the offensive side of the ball? Does Kelly really care about the kids he is recruiting or does he just care about winning a football game?

I know there is a lot of pressure on winning with the rising salaries in which these Head Coaches are getting, however, ethics has to come into play somewhere. I bet if we look back into these players High School days we will find some issues there as well. Maybe Kelly was able to recruit these players because the other top teams in the Country didn't want the head aches that would come along with them. There are College programs that actually care about their reputation on and off the field and want to recruit players that will not damage the University's name.

How many more players are on Kelly's team will be suspended? At the rate it has been going, Kelly might have to put an ad in the Schools newspaper asking for anyone that has experience on the football field to come try out!

Hopefully Kelly has learned his lesson on recruiting and will also look at the players actions off the field before offering them a very expensive College education at the expense of the University. If Kelly's players keep up with this behavior, this is what your team will be looking like on game day. Kelly is a great Coach but obviously a poor judge in character. - Bob Bearden

Bob is a regular guest contributor on sports talk radio in the Southeastern United States. Bob's views and opinions on professional and college sporting events can now be found right here on the MC3 Sports Media's family of websites.

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