Kirk Ferentz returned from the Hawkeye fan cruise thingie March 4.
He said he would take in all the facts before he made any decisions on James Cleveland and Arvell Nelson.
From the looks of things, Ferentz unpacked and listened to the facts, presumably from both sides, and decided he'd had enough of Cleveland and Nelson.
The Iowa sophomores are now former football players.
“It’s disappointing anytime one of our players doesn’t complete his career with our team and go on to earn their degree from Iowa,” Iowa Coach Kirk Ferentz said in a news release. “That being said, we wish both James and Arvell success in the future.”
Cleveland, 19, faces up to seven years in prison for drug tax stamp violation, a Class D felony, and two counts of unlawful possession of prescription drugs, both serious misdemeanors. Nelson, 19, was arrested for possession of marijuana, a serious misdemeanor carrying a maximum of one year in prison.
One interpretation, Ferentz heard their stories, talked to whomever he talks to with the UI police and acted unilaterally.
Another interpretation, these two were on strike six. There are things that don't end up on the police blotter. There is also classroom. Strike seven, a very public and damaging strike seven, was too much.
The Hawkeyes have had 14 arrests involving 13 players during the past year. Three Hawkeyes have been arrested for felonies (Dominique Douglas, Anthony Bowman and Cleveland). A sexual assault investigation that focused on three Iowa football players remains open.
Time for zero tolerance? No. Iowa can't recruit all Iowa kids who are sons of coaches. Iowa is a program that has to recruit out of state and find players from places coaches just don't know. Iowa has to take some "shots" in recruiting.
If it's time for anything, it's time for hands-on enforcement. If Ferentz and his assistants are tired of the headlines, they'll have to babysit. "They can't babysit an entire team." No, they can't. But what else is there at this point?
With the CBI (the Facebook.com group), whatever that was and whomever it included, now gone, maybe things cool off. But nine other players have been in trouble.
It's come to this, some sort of babysitting. I have no idea the form, but if you want the headlines to go away . . .
When all the Les Miles stuff was going down with Michigan, I read somewhere that he has face-to-face meetings once a week with his players. I'm not sure if it was the 105 roster or the 85 scholarshipped.
I can't imagine there is enough time in the week for such meetings, so I doubt it was the whole 85.
But who knows? It's an idea. It's something to discuss. A weekly face-to-face meeting with the man who holds all the cards to your future (playing time, status, whatever else) could be a powerful thing. If you know the coach, not the position coach you hear from everyday, has you in the crosshairs, maybe you make some changes. Most definitely, you're both on the same page and know what the count is.
You can program all you want. Hands-on might be the ultimate deterrent.
Which headline do you dislike more? The 14 arrests? Or the 6-6 and no bowl?
I think the two go hand-in-hand. The flow of college football at the University of Iowa comes with blips, 6-6 no-bowl blips. It hasn't come with a rap sheet.
Fourteen arrests don't belong here.