Alabama takes Croom’s name off spring award
The University of Alabama football team gives out awards for spring practice. (Which, contrary to the ravings of various basketball pundits last week, is over.) They’re named after former players. One of the awards used to be the Sylvester Croom Commitment to Excellence Award. Now, it’s the Bart Starr Commitment to Excellence Award. (Starr was a great pro, but he was banished to the bench in Tuscaloosa by the monumentally incompetent “Ears” Whitworth. Alabama finished 0-10 Starr’s senior season. “Excellence”, indeed.) Croom (rejected for the Alabama head coaching job last year) took over at Mississippi State this season, and the guy who beat him out for the Alabama job, Mike Shula, decided that it’s not “appropriate” for an award to be named after a coach of another SEC team. Croom wasn’t even told — he found out from a reporter. Lame, lame, lame…
Mac Thomason
1 response so far ↓
lazarus // March 31, 2004 at 10:23 am
I still think Alabama messed up bad when they passed over Croom for head coach. They said they wanted to hire someone who could come right in and coach, so they hired a Baby Shula?
Croom would have been a recruiting dream machine, and would also have been a fantastic story. A call back to Alabama’s past (Award for Excellence, championships under Bear as coach and player, etc.), but also a step into the future as the first black head coach in the SEC.
Instead, they went for Shula. Why do I have this weird feeling we’re about to hear a whole year’s worth of Spurrier talk?