Fat chance Fournette won’t shed pounds, tacklers

Published 6:45 am Sunday, May 15, 2016

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">These are supposed to be more caring, sensitive times we live in, forever tiptoei</span><span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">ng on egg shells so as not to offend, embarrass or slight anyone or anything, animate or inanimate, on the entire planet.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">So what is Les Miles up to anyway?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Leave it to the LSU coach not to play by the rules.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Can’t take him anywhere, it seems, particularly anywhere near a live microphone.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">He didn’t get</span> <span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">the p.c. memo, evidently, that bullying in out great nation has reached epidemic proportions, particularly among the impressionable youth.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">So as we creep up on the slow, dog days of summer in anticipation of another football season, there’s another question mark for the Tigers who have fewer than most this time around.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Mainly, what shape will Leonard Fournette’s self-esteem be in when the star running back’s Heisman campaign gets going in September?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Put another way — what shape will Leonard be in?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">And are they interrelated?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">You can’t be too careful, you know.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Will Fournette be able to find a “happy zone” on campus, one of those “safe” places that are such hot items on any list of student-protest demands these days?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Bullying is no laughing matter.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">And Miles may have set up Fournette for a hellish semester with his peers (though admittedly he has few) among the civilian student body.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">You know how kids can be.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Maybe it was an innocent remark.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">In fact, it started as an offhand comment by Miles in the immediate moments after LSU’s spring game.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Nobody really paid it much mind, to be honest — and after a spring game, believe me, anything passes for breaking news.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Anyway, it was then that Miles first suggested that perhaps he’d like to see Fournette drop a few pounds by the time the Tigers report for their August preseason toil.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Skeptics at the time noted that Fournette had received several spring awards issued by the coaches. But the counterpoint to that — maybe more telling than we believed at the time — was that LSU passes out some two or three thousand spring plaques for this or that modest achievement. It’s the football’s team rare venture into the summer camp syndrome of everybody getting a participation ribbon and a pat on the head.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Media investigators were dispatched to eyeball Fournette one more time, and it did not appear that his football britches were about to burst at the seams. There was no visible evidence of a spare tire.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">He had played sparingly, but that was written off as him having little to prove in a meaningless exhibition.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">And that was kind of that.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">There were no documented reports of students lurking in the hallways to mock his weight gain, which, to be honest, nobody would have suspected it if Miles hadn’t mentioned it.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">No donuts were left on his doorstep to taunt him.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">No “hey-hey-heeeeys” were side-whispered as they passed him in the quadrangle.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Oh, but Miles wasn’t through.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Thursday he was turned loose on a Baton Rouge radio station, where he rekindled the Fat Fournette dilemma.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Miles told the radio station that his running back “was 235 to 233 (pounds) or so during spring. We want him right around 225 so his strength and speed are maximized. He’s an elite guy and he wants to be an elite body as he goes into fall.”</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Translation: No Twinkies for you.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">So Miles thinks Fournette would be well served by dropping about 10 pounds.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Well, wouldn’t we all?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Of course, most of us aren’t being counted on to outrun the Alabama secondary this fall, so it’s just a personal matter and not a statewide emergency.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">So will this latest bombshell bring out the bullies on campus?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Who knows?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Also, this week it came to light that Fournette has a pair of $10 million insurance policies to protect him against any debilitating injury that might hamper his future, substantial NFL earnings.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">This isn’t news. It’s commonplace among elite college players.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">But you wonder if he really needs them?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">He’ll do fine as an entrepreneur regardless of how the football thing works out.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">Less than 24 hours after Miles publicly challenged him to drop 10 pounds, Fournette reported back on Friday, via Twitter, that:</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">“I lost that weight for you big man, LSUCoachMiles”</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">What? In one day? Ten pounds?</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">What’s the secret? Could it be turned into a video for a late-night informercial.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">The beach season is fast approaching. The Leonard Fournette Instant Weight Loss Plan could be a gold mine.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">So it would seem the crisis has been avoided.</span>

<span class="R~sep~ACopyBody">But make no mistake about it. Fournette is still a BMOC at LSU.</span>

<span class="R~sep~AZaphdingbatdot7pt">l</span>

<span style="font-weight: bold;" class="R~sep~ACopyEditors~sep~endnote">Scooter </span><span style="font-weight: bold;">Hobbs </span>covers LSU athletics. Email him at shobbs@americanpress.com

<p class="p1">Follow Scooter Hobbs on Twitter at <a href="https://twitter.com/ScooterAmPress">twitter.com/ScooterAmPress</a>