Thursday, September 6, 2007

Coddled One Time Blue Chip Continues to Shoot Himself in the Foot

According to the Baltimore Sun, Maryland Backup QB Josh Portis has been accused of copying another student's homework. Portis was supposed to play this season, but has now been declared academically ineligible by UM. He admitted to violating the school's honor code, but no details were given.

While Portis may not be a household name to the average football fan, just a few years back he was supposed to be the next thing.....at least according to his momma. Back in 2005, she announced to the Gainesville Sun that her son needed to be at a school where all of his talents can be taken care of"......read into that "not sit on the bench behind former #1 National QB Recruit Chris Leak and pushed by future program savior Tim Tebow". While the idea of knocking Leak off was a bit much , the concept of Portis reading the tea leaves with Tebow is a stretch--especially since Tebow had yet to sign with the Gators by the time Portis left.

Digging back a little more to Portis' high school days, you see his mom moved him around several high schools in California, then they committed to Utah after their BCS run with Alex Smith. Of course, that was coached by Meyer, who left for Florida and Portis followed (not a major shock there). Of course, this just goes to show that Portis in less than 6 years has had commitments (whether binding or not) at 6 academic institutions-- 3 California High Schools as well as Utah, Florida, Maryland.

His mom was the mouthpiece through which the decision to move Portis from Florida, announcing on a Thursday night to the Gainesville media, only to have Josh confirm the next morning. She had also been a beat writer's dream with comments and quotes since she couldn't stand the empty nest in LA and moved with her son 3,000 miles to Florida as he enrolled.

I'm sure she'll have a good excuse for this latest incident as well. Or at least creative, but something tells me it won't be about responsibility. It's never her son's fault.

Yeah, we all knew kids like this who were about as sharp as a bag of wet hair, but their mom just had to put him in that honors physics class and it was the teacher's fault that her kid was failing. Or that the 5'4", 120 lb kid that couldn't walk and chew gum was being cheated out of starting by the coach. Never mind the 6'3" 240 lb mass of muscle that had just signed with State might really just be better.

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