Good night, Knight

All week long I've been watching the big media flap about Bobby Knight, who lost his day job as basketball coach at Indiana U. last week after he grabbed a college boy and read him the riot act. The Knight story made me realize something I never thought about before -- I could have been a college coach. Fuck, yeah. I would have loved it.

Obviously, you don't need the talent to play the game yourself. Knight's a fat guy with grey hair who can't dribble unless he's eating soup. I've watched too many replays of Bobby Knight's antics over the past few days, and I couldn't help notice that he never once touched the ball. Not once.

He touched his players, though. He choked the shit out of one guy at least a foot taller than him. And get this. This young, tall, well-built basketball player didn't do jack shit. He took it like a puss. Afterward, Knight must have had himself a nice Scotch and soda and thought, "I get to yell, choke and bitch-slap my basketball players who could kill me if they wanted to, and yet I get away with it. I fuckin' love this job."

Who wouldn't love it? Provided you don't coach at the professional level, where the players are more likely to choke the shit out of the coach. Or have you whacked. I would consider that a drawback.

And Knight's not the only good coach gone bad. I've seen footage of Woody Hayes knocking the shit out of a Clemson football player and Frank Kush slapping around one of his football players. And you know not one of them could take the player in a fair fight.

Still, I kind of feel sorry for Knight. Ha! Just kidding. Fuck Bobby Knight. If I feel sorry for anybody, it's the Indiana basketball players. Now they'll have to transfer to North Carolina. Not good.

Some will say Knight got a raw deal. After all, he was blindsided by an antagonistic student, Kent Harvey. This youth (I call him youth, since he exhibits criminal tendencies) said, "What's up Knight?" As Knight explained in his press conference, "You can call me Mr. Knight or you can call me Coach Knight, but you can't call me Knight. You've got to respect your elders."

I have a similar slogan. You can call me buddy or you can call me guy. But you can't call me Buddy Guy.

Some will say the incident was a setup, since the kid happened to be the stepson of one of Knight's more vocal critics, radio sports evangelist Mark Shaw. Me? I don't think it was a setup. Not after watching Keith Olbermann interview Shaw on FoxSports. I believe Shaw when he says the entire snafu was nothing more than a coincidence. For had it been a setup, the kid could have done a much better job.

"What's up, asshole? How's the zero tolerance thing working out?" After that, all the Harvey kid would need to do was make sure his friend's handycam was rolling when Knight choked the living shit out of him.

The weirdest thing about the FoxSports interview was when Olbermann told Harvey: "I understand. My mother was hit with one of Chuck Knoblach's errant throws. Coincidences do happen."

No shit? Olbermann's mother got hit by a baseball thrown by a Yankee head case second baseman? How come no one tells me about these things? Baby, that wasn't a coincidence, that was a conspiracy. I don't buy the lone second baseman theory at all. I think Knoblach turned to Derek Jeter and said, "Look, it's Olbermann's mother. Check this out."

I also watched the ESPN interview with Knight and he didn't come off sympathetic to me, especially when Knight turned to Jeremy Schaap -- son of veteran sportscaster Dick Schaap -- and said, "You got a long way to go to be as good as your dad. You better keep that in mind."

Translation: Don't think I wouldn't choke the living shit out of you too, microphone boy.

Wow. I think I've gotten completely derailed here. What was I going to say? Oh, yeah, I was going to talk about what I would do if I were a coach.

Not much, really. But I would write a code of conduct called "Coach's Credo," engrave it on a mahogany plaque, then hang it on my office wall.

1) Coach is always right.
2) No one ever rats out Coach.
3) Coach will use whatever it takes to motivate the team: yelling, screaming, throwing chairs, right crosses, gunplay -- whatever it takes.
4) No player is allowed to retaliate on Coach. Ever.
5) Each player must always remember to be grateful that Coach is not gay or else there would be many more rules, such as...
6) If the Coach wants to fuck you up the ass, you've got to let him fuck you up the ass.

That should keep the kiddies in line.

Here's the truth: Bobby Knight is an old school college coach, blunt, loud, violent, outspoken, arrogant and egotistical. But his behavior is totally unacceptable. Why?

The fucker hasn't won a national championship in over ten years. There's your zero tolerance, baby.

STANDARD DISCLAIMER: This column aims to be funny. If you can read anything else into it, you're on your own. Copyright 2000 by Mike Jasper.