August 22, 2005, - 12:04 pm
Lawrence Phillips: The Tom Osborne Legacy that Keeps on Giving
By Debbie Schlussel
While former Nebraska football coach and current Republican Congressman Tom Osborne runs for Nebraska governor, one of his many prized former football players, Lawrence Phillips, has, once again, proved the point–criminal multiple-offenders don’t change. And they don’t change when football coaches give them Ted-Kennedy-style multiple chances.
Driving a stolen car, Phillips struck three teenagers with whom he’d played a game of pick-up football. He was already wanted for twice assaulting his girlfriend, earlier this month, once choking her into unconsciousness. These are only the latest in Phillips’ lifelong string of violent assaults and other crimes.
Phillips, kicked off his NFL team for “insubordination,” helped lead the Canadian Football League’s Montreal Alouettes to the 2002 Grey Cup, but was released before the start of the 2003 season for not meeting the team’s “minimum behavioral standards.”
For Tom Osborne, there was no such problem, because the legendary football coach was also legendary for not having any minimum behavioral standards.
Unfortunately, Osborne has never been forced to answer for any of his molly-coddled criminal former players, a la Phillips, because Nebraska voters not only look the other way, they have practically sainted Osborne. He will soon be elected chief of Nebraska for his “efforts” in developing a cache of future such O.J.s who plague the country.
Tags: Canadian Football League, chief, chief of Nebraska, choking, football, football coach, Governor, Grey Cup, Lawrence Phillips, legendary football coach, Montreal Alouettes, National Football League, Nebraska, NFL, stolen car, Tom Osborne, unconsciousness
I’ve never understood how success at coaching or playing on the athletic field can be easily parlayed into a career in politics. Tom Osbourne is untouchable in the state of Nebraska, and the citizens of Nebraska are blinded by a couple of National Championships in College Football. Nebraska got tired of getting their ass kicked on New Year’s Day year-after-year, so Tom Osbourne gave in and started recruiting the major metropolitan urban dregs to change the predictable Orange Bowl outcome.
Yiddish Steel on August 22, 2005 at 1:23 pm