Scooter column: Looks as if Bama-LSU will mean something

Published 2:05 pm Friday, October 23, 2015

For such an outwardly agreeable fellow, Les Miles sure is begging to wear a black hat these days.

Let’s see.

There was the shameless showboating for actor Tom Cruise, who was a guest at last week’s LSU-Florida game, when Miles raised his hand to suggest, “I would be a good bad guy, I think. A guy that Jack Reacher beats up.”

Miles’ motives there were unclear, but thus far he hasn’t gotten a call-back for that self casting call.

That came on the heels of Miles’ pronouncement that “I can very comfortably be the bad guy” and “shut it down” should Leonard Fournette ever grow weary of the never-ending media obligations that go along with being a Heisman Trophy front-runner.

Again, Fournette appears to be none the worse for the media wear and tear, seemingly comfortable in his skin and enjoying the spotlight. He certainly hasn’t said anything untoward. In fact, he’s said very little that didn’t involve either credit for what really is a very good offensive line or sympathy for the plight of South Carolina flood victims.

Fournette even survived the dreaded Sports Illustrated cover jinx last week.

Miles’ latest, though, is a little trickier, and takes a subtle guiding hand, lest he come off as a Little League Daddy.

So far Miles is on point with, sort of, kind of gently bringing up the notion (in a backhand sort of way) that maybe the pleasantries at the end of some of Fournette’s runs aren’t exactly cookies and cream, nor tea and crumpets, down there in the scrum.

Miles said he sent in a few clips to the SEC’s head of officiating this week, but hasn’t followed up on it with a phone call. In other words, he’s trying to make a point without making a federal case out of it.

“Yeah, I’m concerned for his well being,” Miles said. “But again, to a point. It IS football.”

Your average Joe can’t relate to much of what Fournette goes through, but the squeamish look of anguish on his face toward the end of the Syracuse game was one of them. He was recovering, as it were, from what he described as a blow to the “downstairs” region, and there have been suggestions it wasn’t altogether an accident.

We’ll never know.

But the clips Miles sent in this week were all from the Florida game, and it didn’t sound like the coach was accusing the Gators of anything.

He’s trying to walk that fine line between being a concerned parent and coming off as whining, overprotective Uncle Les.

And you’re always careful with suggestions as to how the officials might better do their job.

It sounds like Miles’ point is that, even with Fournette’s breakaway shenanigans, there comes a time when he’s absolutely, 100 percent, completely stopped.

“One thing about it,” Miles said. “When you have a back that’s fighting like heck for yards and he’s on his feet and you have (him) stopped — you have forward progress (stopped), the whistle needs to be blown.”

He said a series of those instances were what he sent in to the league office.

“You know, the driving back and (then) falling on him, I think there’s a point in time where that’s called a personal foul.”

There did seem like several times last week when the Gators were given time to form a posse to gang up and take shots at a stationary Fournette — and why wouldn’t they if the whistle hadn’t blown?

“When the whistle is blown,” Miles said, “the defense is (then) allowed to let go of them as opposed to continue to drive him 10 yards back and throw him on the ground. Those kind of things need not to happen.

“So yeah, I’m concerned for his well being. “

Former LSU basketball coach Dale Brown went through this with Shaquille O’Neal 25 years ago, long before Miles was on campus.

That was when SEC basketball opponents unveiled the famed “Hack-a-Shaq” defense on the Big Aristotle. It basically involved gathering all available hands and hanging, clawing and mostly hacking on Shaq, looking much like Lilliputians swinging through the air.

Brown probably learned that nobody feels too much sympathy for a 7-foot-1, 300-pound Goliath.

Miles, although letting his mind wander to what kind of tight end Shaq might have made, said he wasn’t sure the comparison to what’s going on with Fournette fits anyway.

He’s right. My guess is that Fournette, if called upon, could probably shoot free throws.

Scooter Hobbs covers LSU athletics. Email him at shobbs@americanpress.com

(Kirk Meche / Special to the American Press)

Kirk Meche