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If you haven’t heard, the big story this week in Cal athletics is that Nate Longshore has been playing with a chipped bone near the back of his ankle since the Oregon game. Nobody is really sure where exactly the chip is, but it’s somewhere there. Coach Jeff Tedford and everyone else on the team were well aware of Nate-Nate’s ailment, but decided to keep it from the public and maintain that it was only a high ankle sprain.
No wonder at the Big Game this past Saturday Longshore had difficulty completing the most basic of screen passes (his completion percentage was a lousy 46.8% for the game.) For the season, Nate-Nate’s passing percentage has actually gone down, and going into the bowl game, he has already thrown as many interceptions as last year with six fewer touchdowns. Dare we say that we may have the next Reggie Ball on our hands?
Of course Tedford was asked that if he had known about this all along, then why did he not start Kevin Riley instead? Tedford replied that he defers to his “veteran” quarterback for those type of decisions. Veteran, really? Nate-Nate has played one full season, unless of course you count a medical redshirt as another one.
Tedford was a football player back in the day and should realize that players have their reputation to worry about. Nate-Nate does not want to be seen voluntarily taking a seat on the bench and therefore being labeled as a player who lacks heart. For this precise reason the decision has to be taken out of the player’s hands by the head coach.
But wait, it gets better.
He has asked Longshore on several occasions if the injury has caused his poor fourth-quarter performances, and each time, Longshore maintained that it does not.
For a minute here, let’s assume that Longshore was answering Tedford’s question honestly (which we doubt). What about subbing Nate-Nate out of the game for simply royally sucking?
Image Source: Jessica Kuo, The Daily Cal
Chipped Bone Plagues Longshore [The Daily Cal]
