Tag: Opinion

Aaron Rodgers said his unlikely return hinges on the Jets’ playoff chances so you won’t see him this season

Aaron Rodgers’ “return” has been all about attention? Shocking!

Because he is Aaron Rodgers — a relentless attention-seeker who moonlights as a future Hall of Fame quarterback — we can never quite avoid him in the news. The man last took snaps in early September and remains a consistent fixture in headlines because he would seemingly enter a fugue state if he left the spotlight for a solitary moment.

Rodgers has kept himself relevant by continually hinting that he could legitimately return from an Achilles tear in just over a few months. Never mind that, per WebMD, the typical Achilles tear recovery time for an average human being with bog standard ligaments and tendons is 4-6 months at full activity (though it can take up to a year to return to full strength). No matter how he might deny it, Rodgers — who turns 40 in early December — is still a normal human being with the same fragile ligaments and tendons as the rest of us.

Nevertheless, this nonsense story persists because Rodgers knows how to play puppeteer with NFL media (which includes me writing this story about it, I know). During a Tuesday episode of the Pat McAfee Show, Rodgers professed that his (unlikely) return from an injury named after the fatal flaw of a Greek warrior rests on how he continues to heal moving forward.

Perhaps more importantly, Rodgers said part of his (again, unlikely) return hinges on where the Jets stand in the AFC playoff push. Dearest readers, the Jets are currently 4-7 and in 15th place in the conference. Tim Boyle is their starting quarterback. They score less than 15 points a game and remain a massive burden on their impossibly loyal fans.

Put another way: see you in September 2024, Aaron!

The Jets’ hopes of turning the 2023 campaign into a memorable one likely ended when Rodgers’ Achilles snapped in Week 1. Frankly, it is remarkable he has managed to keep some of the limelight despite everything. That is talent, no matter how grating it can be. But even Rodgers has to know Gang Green is terrible without his services and will already be a sinking ship by the time he considers “returning.”

Shout out to the awful Jets.

They’ve probably kept us from talking about the secondary part of Rodgers’ life — playing professional football — until next fall. Well, that is until Rodgers drops another soundbite about how he’s “thinking” about something and everyone drops what they’re doing to listen.

Texas A&M AD Ross Bjork said Aggies football ‘is not an 8-4 job’ and is only fooling himself

Believe in yourself the way Ross Bjork believes in the Aggies’ potential

Give Ross Bjork credit for this: He’s not backing down from a fight with reality.

The Texas A&M athletic director has dug a deep trench as he embarks on a search to replace Jimbo Fisher as the head coach of his football team. Despite 75 million reasons to keep Fisher around a bit longer, the ever-growing list of big-brand programs in need of a new coach and the rather thin market for the schools who do need a replacement at the top, Bjork remains undeterred in his quest to watch this all blow up spectacularly in his face by setting unreasonable expectations.

There are not a ton of high-profile coaches out there looking to jump to Texas A&M right now. Which means he’s going to have to pick from a group of rising names in the sport and hope he guesses right.

First Bjork tried to speak with Detroit Lions head coach Dan Campbell about the gig. And, never mind the fact that Campbell played his college ball at Texas A&M before spending a decade in the NFL, coaches simply don’t leave young Super Bowl contenders for a mid-tier SEC job.

Campbell, in the nicest and most relatable way possible, turned his alma mater down the way most of us do when they call asking for more money.

“I know some people there and I love my school,” Campbell told reporters in Detroit. “That’s my alma mater and I want to do anything I can to help them but coach for them.”

It would be malpractice if Bjork didn’t at least attempt a phone call with his employer’s most sought-after alumni. Sure. But in case anyone thought that was just a set up to lower expectations in College Station, Bjork is here to remind us all that, no, he’s very serious.

It is at this point I must point out that Bjork has been the athletic director for three FBS schools. From 2010-2012, Bjork was at Western Kentucky, where he inherited head football coach Willie Taggart, who never finished with more than seven wins in a season with the Hilltoppers.

From 2012-2019, Bjork was at Ole Miss. There he inherited head football coach Hugh Freeze, defended him until the bitter end and ultimately replaced him with Matt Luke when Freeze could no longer remain in control.

Notably, Luke was the interim coach at Mississippi after Freeze was forced out. He went 6-6 that fall with the only conference wins coming against Vanderbilt, Kentucky and Mississippi State. That was enough to convince Bjork to drop the interim tag and anoint Luke to navigate the program through the fallout of the NCAA’s investigation into Freeze. Luke was fired after three seasons. The six wins in his first season was the highest mark he’d reach there.

By then Bjork was already at Texas A&M where he inherited head football coach Jimbo Fisher.

Do you see where this is going?

Bjork is now leading his first real coaching search for a college football program at any level. There are no looming NCAA punishments to hold him back. No shortage of money to spend on his guy. No extenuating circumstances. Just the ego of a fanbase who believes they should be competing to national titles every year.

Which means all the pressure is on Bjork to nail this. Comments like his “8-4” jab will only make it harder on himself.

All of which is to say, in the new era of the SEC, where Texas A&M will have to contend with Alabama, Georgia, Texas, Oklahoma, LSU, Tennessee and Ole Miss, the Aggies could do a lot worse than routinely going 8-4.

Bjork should know, since that’s been the average record at Texas A&M for 12 years now.

Martellus Bennett accused the Bears of shamelessly selling 1985 nostalgia in candid rant

Martellus Bennett thinks the Bears are happy “selling the past” to their fans. He’s absolutely right.

Martellus Bennett might have been a Pro Bowl-caliber tight end in his NFL heyday, but he’s likely most known for telling it like it is. He’s a man who is never afraid to speak the truth and say what’s on his mind out in the open. That’s why his latest (kind of random?) rant about the Chicago Bears hits particularly close to home.

On Sunday, the Bears might have endured easily the most embarrassing loss of the Matt Eberflus era. Despite a game that they controlled for roughly 57 minutes over the rival Detroit Lions — where they held a 12-point lead with just about three minutes remaining — the Bears lost. Through nine NFC North games, the meat and potatoes of any bog standard NFL schedule, Eberflus’ iteration of the league’s charter franchise remains winless in its division. (Note: The Bears have not won a division game since Thanksgiving 2021, a.k.a. almost two full calendar years.)

It seems this Bears defeat lit a fire under Bennett, who played three seasons in Chicago from 2013 to 2015. He took to Twitter to accuse Bears leadership — namely, owner George McCaskey and any oaf lackey he pays to tell him “yes” — of brazenly selling nostalgia to the Chicago fanbase for years. (Note: The “try-hard-on-defense and hustle” Eberflus is McCaskey’s fourth head-coaching hire since 2013. They are on track to fire him and hire a fifth in January 2024.) Rather than play a brand of modern football that is conducive to winning in the 21st century, Bennett said the Bears are content with mass-marketing a bygone era of when they were great and were the NFL’s gold standard because that would interfere with what they perceive as the organization’s tough guy “brand.”

I highly urge you to read every piece of this rant, of which I will share a few key excerpts. (Note: There are some NSFW language elements.) Indeed, Bennett told not one lie about a franchise that used to own the NFL’s throne every year but is now content with so much less.

Yes, yes, YES.

As a Chicago native, I can’t tell you how often former 1985 Bears are paraded around local media. This is something that I suspect the Bears as an organization appreciate. They seem to believe that a good defense and running game (and nothing else) is how a football team should be built (because that’s what they can sell) despite never having a 4,000-yard passer. And I have no doubt they adore seeing someone like the legendary Dan Hampton pontificate on the late local news any chance he gets.

I’ve heard Bears coaches criticize their own players on live television so much of late. And that’s just in 2023. There’s something to be said about blaming a lack of execution. That’s fine. That happens. But when that lack of execution happens every week, that’s more on the coaching failing to get its message across than anything. But the next Bears coach to express a modicum of self-awareness will be the first in a long time.

These tweets probably speak to me the most from this rant. The idea of the Bears winning with tough defense and a solid running game is essentially a meme among the younger members of the fanbase (like myself). It’s something we joke that only our fathers could genuinely appreciate. I don’t think it’s a stretch to assume that the Bears love selling this brand of football to older people because they think they’re not comfortable getting with the times of a team with a legitimate personality and a vertical passing offense. The Bears don’t want to alienate these fans at the risk of losing the foundational support they provide … that they’ve already lost. Go figure.

And I agree with Bennett. I’d venture to guess that the Chicago Cubs or Chicago Blackhawks are demonstrably more popular with the city’s youth than the always-bumbling Bears. How could you possibly build up loyalty and admiration in a fanbase if all you do is lose in the most uninteresting fashion every week? News flash: kids need positive memories to love their sports teams. Crazy, I know! The modern Bears, as constructed, usually provide none.

So, here the Bears are, at another franchise crossroads.

They will very likely finish in last place in the NFC North for the second straight season. It will be their seventh losing campaign since 2014. They have not won a postseason game since January 2011. And try as Justin Fields might; they are still searching for that mythical franchise quarterback. McCaskey could, of course, elect to blow it up and find a new head coach and general manager to steer the Bears back in the right direction. Heck, he probably will.

But there’s the rub. As Bennett professes, the people who run the Bears have a different idea of the “right direction.” I personally can’t wait until they hire another conservative-minded goober who loves running the ball, playing disciplined defense, and ignoring the most important position in the sport. Paying attention to and helping the quarterback does not align with the Bears’ brand of being overzealous bullies (who never win anything). It never will.

It is that archaic mindset which will inevitably only bring them more failure.

What’s next for Matt McMahon and LSU men’s basketball?

LSU dropped a buy-game to Nicholls last Friday night. What’s next for the program?

After opening the year with a 106-60 win over Mississippi Valley State, LSU’s year took a turn last Friday, dropping a home buy-game to Nicholls State.

Head coach [autotag]Matt McMahon[/autotag] wasn’t shy about expressing his frustration. He began his press conference by saying he was out-coached for 40 minutes.

“For whatever reason, I didn’t have our team ready to play in the first half,” he said. “They just spaced us out, whipped us off the dribble. We struggled to communicate defensively and credit to Nicholls State, they made us pay every time.”

McMahon didn’t stop there. Growing animated, McMahon described getting to play at LSU the opportunity of a lifetime.

“The price of admission for that is you come out and play your tail off every second you’re on the floor, and you compete, and you show some passion and some heart. And I didn’t get it done. I didn’t have them ready to play that way,” McMahon said.

McMahon is in Year 2 with the Tigers. He took over a program in turmoil after nearly the entire team transferred following the firing of [autotag]Will Wade[/autotag]. McMahon’s had to rely on transfers the last two cycles to fill a roster.

He’s an accomplished coach who won 25+ games on three occasions in his seven years at Murray State. But so far at LSU, the Tigers have yet to turn the corner.

LSU tipped off conference play last year with a win over a good Arkansas team, putting the cherry on top of an 11-1 start. But that was followed by a 14-game losing streak, and LSU finished last in the conference.

This team is supposed to be improved. Even after the loss to Nicholls State, LSU ranks top 70 in KenPom and BPI. It ranked outside the top 150 in both when last year ended.

The Nichols loss shouldn’t necessarily change anyone’s outlook on the program or McMahon’s capability to lead it. I remain a believer in what McMahon has done over the course of his career and acknowledge the challenges of his current position.

It was a tale of two halves on Friday night. LSU was outscored 44-25 in the first half before flipping the script in the second and outscoring Nicholls 41-24. LSU led by three with under a minute to go, but Nicholls got the final word with a late three to reclaim the lead.

LSU was 3-19 from behind the arch while Nicholls was 12-30. The Colonels also shot over 90% from the free-throw line. Efficiency from deep and at the line is a recipe for an upset and LSU caught Nicholls on a good night.

The pressure’s now on. This is a team with an outsider’s chance at making the NCAA Tournament. In that position, every single game matters. LSU needs to play like it.

McMahon’s passion after the loss was promising. He took accountability and acknowledged his team’s shortcomings. The players probably noticed it too.

LSU faces its toughest opponent yet on Thursday when it faces Dayton in Charleston. The Flyers rank 67th in KenPom and will serve as a measuring stick for LSU.

A win and the Tigers are trending up again.

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The NFL’s explanation for what constitutes roughing the passer just makes it more confusing

The NFL’s roughing the passer explanation is all vibes and all garbage.

No major American sports league seems to understand its rulebook less than the NFL. What’s a catch? No one knows! Can the ground cause a fumble? Sure, why not? Whatever floats your boat!

These days, the most egregiously inconsistent application of NFL rules might be roughing the passer. Every single week, it feels like we have multiple instances of highly questionable roughing calls based on nothing but fostering safety “vibes,” not creating actual safety. The NFL has now, more or less, confirmed it essentially goes with the flow with a rule that is flat-out impossible to legislate with good precedent while giving defenders zero breathing room.

On Thursday, the league’s football operations department released a video that was supposed to clarify what actually constitutes roughing the passer. The obvious intent was to keep loyal fans informed. The clip achieves none of its goals.

From noting that roughing the passer is based entirely on a ref’s split-second opinion to saying “defenders may initiate contact no more than one step after the throw in certain situations” — like, what on earth? — it’s all complete malarkey. Worse yet, this ambiguity about what defenders can and can’t do from impossible momentum-filled positions only diminishes textbook defensive play.

The NFL’s bizarre interpretation of roughing the passer doesn’t actually take quarterbacks out of harm’s way. It just confuses everyone and lowers the quality of play. All this reeks of a league trying to make the game “safer” on a surface level that serves no one, especially when the goal should be to provide clear and concrete ways to improve players’ safety.

I don’t want to sound too much like an Old Man Yelling at a Cloud, but this is opaque garbage. It explains nothing. Provides clarity on nothing.

Some of the plays the league uses as examples feature picture-perfect form tackles taught at the youth level to play football responsibly — if that’s even possible. And somehow, large grown men are supposed to defy the laws of physics and stop at a “red light” one millisecond after driving 100 miles per hour. Oh. Try to picture how that would work out in real life while on the road. Hint: not great!

I hate to say it, and I know it’s conflicting, but at a certain point, you’re accepting a Faustian bargain by watching any level of football. It is an inherently dangerous game, making what the league is asking with roughing the passer even more silly.

I appreciate any initiative that ostensibly negates some of the danger of football while maintaining the game’s sanctity. If earnest, it should be applauded. The NFL’s roughing-the-passer standard does not do that. Not even close.

The league’s precedent seems more about letting quarterbacks do whatever they want and, somehow, potentially rewarding them with the ability to lose but re-gain special protections in the face of tough defense. Either the quarterback is a runner outside the pocket or he’s a protected player the whole time. Pick a lane. But the league is a football conglomerate trying to save face (and money) by eliminating all risk of injury to quarterbacks, seemingly the only position that matters to the powers that be.

Congratulations, NFL. You have somehow diminished your product while simultaneously making another rule seem even more Byzantine.

(Slow clapping) Bravo.

Jason Benetti joining the Detroit Tigers’ booth is the latest gut-punch for White Sox fans

The White Sox keep finding new ways to torture their fans

All summer long on the South Side of Chicago, the cries for Jerry Reinsdorf to sell the White Sox grew louder and louder in the very literal sense.

The latest decision to let beloved play-by-play man Jason Benetti go should make those cries even louder.

The sentiment has been there for years, of course, but beginning with the ill-fated decision to hire his old pal Tony La Russa to guide the team’s equally ill-fated rebuild to the finish line, chants of “Sell the team!” had become as much of a tradition at Guaranteed Rate Field as the seventh inning stretch or fireworks after home runs.

Fans paid for billboards outside the park and flew banners inside it demanding Reinsdorf just give it up already. The 87-year-old seems to have taken that as a challenge.

You think you have it bad, now? You think our decision-making is problematic? Just wait.

Here’s your new general manager, Chris Getz, a man who failed so poorly at developing a farm system for the White Sox that he could only fall up.

Don’t like that? Don’t worry, Getz is poaching from the Kansas City Royals — the only franchise more woebegone than Chicago in the American League Central — to advise him.

Still not done complaining? Ok, say goodbye to Tim Anderson. We’ll dump him without even trying to learn if his bad 2023 was an aberration or see if there’s trade interest for him at any point next year. Dylan Cease is on the block, too.

The war of attrition took a drastic turn on Thursday morning when the team announced Benetti is leaving to join the booth of the rival Detroit Tigers.

Benetti is a born-and-raised South Sider. A man who grew up rooting for the White Sox and someone who instantly engaged fans with intelligent discussion, silly antics and fun brain teasers that made tuning into games worth it — even when there was no reason to care about the players on the field.

When Hawk Harrelson retired, landing Benetti felt like a godsend. He was the complete opposite of a broadcaster who had become more catchphrase than person. Someone who revived Steve Stone in the analyst seat next to him and proved the former Cy Young winner could still have fun at the ballpark. Benetti knew, above all else, the show was not about him and yet he still found a way to elevate every major moment.

The final outs of no-hitters thrown by Lucas Giolito and Carlos Rodón immediately come to mind. So do the less extraordinary accomplishments throughout the season, like when another Luis Robert Jr. robbery in centerfield was met with “Outrageous, 88!”.

Even spring training games were worth tuning into when Benetti was on the call. As his national profile grew stronger with gigs calling college football and basketball, the Olympics and ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball, it was impossible not for Sox fans to feel a sense of pride.

“He’s ours.”

Now, he’s theirs. A damn Detroit Tiger.

How much worse can it get for Chicago? The limit does not exist.

Hell, at a sports business conference in Los Angeles, Reinsdorf got up on stage admitted the best strategy was to just be decent until September to keep fans coming out. He ranted about being at the mercy of the “dumbest” owners around the league who had the audacity to spend money on quality players.

If we’re being completely honest. the clock is ticking on Reinsdorf’s tenure whether he sells or not. He’s 87, remember.

The real shame of it is that when that day does come, when the Sox broadcast clicks on for the first time without Reinsdorf occupying the owner’s booth, they’re going to want to have someone with heart summarize the highs and lows, the World Series and rebuilds and the muscle of Reinsdorf on those few days when he did care.

No one was better suited for the job than Jason Benetti.

Fans crushed the NFL for sending Houston a cease-and-desist letter over Oilers-themed uniforms

If the University of Houston can’t wear Oilers-like uniforms, why do the Titans get to?

To start its 2023 season, the University of Houston unveiled powder blue Oilers-like uniforms against the UTSA Roadrunners in September. They drew rave reviews and were generally well-received by almost everyone.

That is, except for the NFL.

According to the Houston Chronicle, the league’s merchandising and license division sent a cease-and-desist letter to the school to stop any further usage of the Oilers’ trademarked uniforms. An NFL attorney reportedly threatened Houston with further legal action if the school didn’t stop its “blatant copying” of the old Oilers’ jerseys. Houston apparently decided to wear the uniforms anyway after the NFL had already warned the program. The Tennessee Titans — the extremely loose spiritual successor to the now-defunct Houston Oilers — wore the official trademarked version of the uniforms in their 28-23 win over the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday.

More from the Houston Chronicle:

“The Houston Cougars’ attempt to free ride on the popularity of the NFL and the club violates the intellectual property rights of the NFL and the (Tennessee) Titans,” attorney Bonnie L. Jarrett wrote in the Oct. 13 letter.”

All of this raises an important question. If Houston, the school, can’t wear these uniforms, paying obvious homage to the city’s former pro football history, then why do the Titans get the golden opportunity to maximize them?

Yes, the Titans are still owned by the late Bud Adams’ family. (These days, it’s his daughter, Amy Adams Strunk.) And yes, Bud Adams transferring over the Oilers to Nashville did initially mean taking all of their uniforms and history with them. But as veteran Nashville reporter David Boclair wrote in a Facebook post, Adams only rebranded the Oilers because the people of the city threw a “hissy fit” over the team not having an original Tennessee identity and flavor. (This I can understand because the regular Titans’ uniforms are boring abominations borne of a Create-A-Team in Madden.)

Not to mention that the city of Houston seemingly barely wanted the Oilers to stay around before they moved in the mid-1990s:

That’s the rub here.

If Nashville wanted the Titans to be distinct and represent their city on their own merits, they deserve that right. A pro football squad can and should be an important cultural appendage of a bog-standard American town. But why does the NFL continue to allow them to wear uniforms from a now nonexistent pro football team from another city? It’s thoroughly hypocritical. It’d be like the Oklahoma City Thunder wearing Seattle Supersonics “throwback” uniforms in the NBA. It also speaks to a bizarre cognitive dissonance where Nashville and the Titans are allowed to brazenly dig up the grave of an old franchise with little continued connection to them (to almost certainly make money off selling throwback jerseys) while a school tangentially related to the Oilers can’t even pay proper tribute.

The NFL and Titans, by extension, need to get their priorities in order. This is not a copyright battle worth fighting, and it only makes both parties look incredibly silly.

Roger Goodell’s cowardly stance on the NFL’s grass field debate is so unsurprising

Roger Goodell continues to be utterly spineless.

Aaron Rodgers’ season-ending Achilles tear has sparked a new conversation about NFL player safety. Specifically, it centers around the poor condition of artificial turf fields that some players believe put them at risk of significant injury, like what happened to Rodgers.

In the wake of Rodgers’ injury, the NFLPA has formally called for grass in every pro football stadium. On Wednesday, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell appeared in a one-on-one interview with Stephen A. Smith on ESPN’s First Take to discuss many of the league’s pertinent issues. That gave Goodell an opportunity to take a decisive stance on a problem that is clearly very important to his players.

Since Goodell is a de facto mouthpiece for owners, he predictably straddled the line and said nothing of substance on the grass field debate.

Ah yes, Goodell wants to lean toward the mythical “science,” a.k.a. “I do not have a better answer right now, probably won’t in the future, and I won’t say anything strong or definitive about this sensitive subject on national television.” Never mind that I’ve literally never heard a single NFL player profess that they actually prefer playing on turf compared to grass. Goodell’s comment is the equivalent of tweeting “many people are saying.”

Oh yeah, who, Roger? Provide one example.

The next time Goodell displays any kind of meaningful leadership in a pivotal moment for the league will be the first. Someone’s got to take a step forward and change the playing surfaces for the league. You just know it won’t be Goodell who leads the charge until public pressure forces him to cave at the absolute last moment OR the NFL owners allow him to.

COLUMN: Expectations are here for Brian Kelly and LSU

Expectations are high for LSU this year. This is a group ready to embrace that.

Nobody expected anything from LSU last year.

People didn’t know how [autotag]Brian Kelly[/autotag] was going to work out in Baton Rouge, [autotag]Jayden Daniels[/autotag] was a transfer quarterback coming off a bad year, and the roster was left in shambles at the end of 2021.

If LSU went 5-7, it wouldn’t have surprised anyone.

But LSU didn’t go 5-7. The Tigers bounced back from an inconsistent first month to beat Ole Miss and Alabama and take control of the SEC West.

LSU finished the year with its first 10-win season since 2019 and the immediate outlook suddenly shifted.

This was no longer a rebuild. This was a team expected to compete. Not in a few years, but now.

That time is here. LSU will kickoff against Florida State tonight and be tested right away.

This is a ‘Noles team that got the best of LSU last year and only got better down the stretch. Similarly to LSU, FSU enters 2023 with renewed expectations. Florida State is loaded with talent across the board.

Whatever happens on Sunday night, there are sure to be overreactions.

Remember last year? Social media declared LSU dead in the water. Baseless rumors began stating that [autotag]Kayshon Boutte[/autotag] was leaving the team.

This game’s on an even bigger stage, which means the Monday morning quarterbacking will grow to a larger scale, too.

Whatever team wins this will be picked to make the playoff while the loser is forgotten for a few weeks.

That’s what having expectations brings.

Last year, LSU was playing with house money. Winning mattered, but it was more about laying a foundation for Kelly’s program.

The flip scripts when the entire fanbase is expecting a win in every game. The pressure is upped a few notches. Games, even against the lesser opponents, grow more tense.

Smaller mistakes are magnified and narratives are amplified.

Kelly’s been around a long time. Coaching a decade at Notre Dame will teach a coach how to handle this type of spotlight.

This roster bought into the Kelly regime last year. The culture is set.

Because of that, I have trust in how this staff and team will handle a different set of expectations. I don’t think this is a group that’s going to shy away from any of this.

On Sunday night, I think you’re going to see an LSU team play with a lot more composure than we saw in the opener last year.

Kelly embraced the hype in the offseason. He didn’t say, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

He accepted it and said, “That’s why you come to LSU.”

That mindset should trickle down through this team. The Tigers will be ready for this moment on Sunday night.

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COLUMN: NCAA oversteps by suspending Maason Smith

The NCAA again overstepped its reach with the Maason Smith suspension.

LSU will have to wait an extra week for the anticipated return of [autotag]Maason Smith[/autotag].

The star will miss LSU’s opener against Florida State after the NCAA handed down a one game suspension, according to Wilson Alexander of The Advocate.

Smith tore his ACL early against Florida State in 2022 and missed the entirety of the season.

Per the report, this suspension stems from an autograph signing in July 2021. Smith was just a freshman and hadn’t even played a game yet. Name, image and likeness deals weren’t legal but would be a few weeks later.

Smith would have served the suspension last year if it weren’t for his injury. Now that Smith is healthy, the NCAA is officially enforcing it.