Coach's Corner

I don't know why it's impossible for me to root for UT football teams. I really don't. Thirty years ago I thought it was an all-white, Southern, dull style-of-play thing ... and maybe it was. In any case, it's grown way beyond that. Nobody likes being an outcast, banished into spare bedrooms to glimpse snippets of games on small televisions. So I've tried to change. I can't. No more than I can root for the Cowboys. It just is. I accept this. I move on.

I do pay a price. My wife (a card-carrying UT Ex) and I have some, let's say awkward moments and let it go at that. One of those moments came Saturday night. We're watching Texas, Chris Simms specifically, in the process of internal detonation. I'm honestly surprised. I think Texas will win the game. Fantastic, surreal events of the past two weekends strongly suggest this team is sprinkled with pixie dust. So I'm bewildered (but inwardly leering) as the implosion initiates an incredible chain reaction. However, I'm careful (I think) to be quiet. Apparently it's not good enough.

"This is all your goddamn fault!" my wife exclaims, whipping the remote control at my head, "Get out. Go upstairs. ... Just leave." I resist this subtle invitation, exclaiming innocence as pure as freshly driven snow. "Honey," I say, trying to be reasonable as another Colorado linebacker scampers merrily up the field, "I haven't said a word."

"Get out," she repeats, this time (with nothing deadly like an ashtray or knife handy) throwing a TV Guide and a paper plate my way. The TV Guide flutters gently to the ground. The paper plate lands in my lap, "I hear you muttering. I know what you're doing!" I try to be conciliatory, but I make it clear I'm not leaving. She renews her attack. "You're a bad man! You murdered my cat! You killed my dog! [A very low blow.] You and your rotten attitude, you made all this happen!" She stops to catch her breath. She's coughing now, lighting a cigarette. Perhaps it's the wrong moment to mention the theoretical connection between her cough and the cigarette ... but I mention it anyway. As the coughing fit passes, she makes a new suggestion. "Why," she says, now deadly calm, "don't you just move to Colorado? You'll be much happier there." I don't leave the room. I don't move to Colorado. We don't speak again that night. The next morning, though it's pouring outside, her first words to me are, "Why aren't you out running?"

Still, with all this out on the proverbial table, I have more compassion for Simms than most of you do. As his final turnover of the season is being rumbled back toward the UT goal line, I feel sorry for this kid. The boos are raining down from 65,000 "hometown" fans, a home-field advantage gone painfully awry. He's having the worst night of his life. A total meltdown on national television. It's humiliating. A nightmare where all his worst fantasies come to pass. Something like this could psychologically destroy a person. Who'd change places with Chris Simms at this moment? It says something good, I hope, that he's brave (defiant?) enough to stand on the sidelines with his helmet off. He's not hiding from the taunts of Longhorn Fan. I would've kept mine on for sure, the better to be invisible.

That all said and sincerely meant, Chris Simms is the quarterback. He did, by himself, lose the game. The spin this week about it being "a team effort" won't fly. It's his cross. That's the hard truth -- 90% of it anyway. The other 10% is the astonishing collapse of what we all thought was a top-rate defense. If that defense were anywhere near as good as the newspapers say they are, those turnovers could have been turned into three field goals: The damage contained. The deficit manageable. But the defense isn't that good. Simms' turnovers are turned into lots of points. It's a hard game.

With objectivity, grounded without emotional investment in this nasty situation, Major Applewhite should start in the Holiday Bowl. It's only fair. But it's not about being fair, or Applewhite would've never lost his job in the first place. It's about, as Mack Brown has said repeatedly, "who gives Texas the best chance of winning a football game." That isn't Simms. Not now.

I've already listened to pundits wondering if Brown will be concerned about destroying Simms' confidence for next year by benching him. That's ridiculous. If his psyche's that fragile (and I doubt it is) he may as well drop football and concentrate on his studies. Brown's not doing anybody any favors with that kind of mommy-coddling.

Simms has next year -- with no fan favorite sitting on the bench -- to redeem himself. (Though the truth is this: He could win the Heisman next season and lead UT to a national title, but his college career would still be considered a disappointment. His sophomore and junior seasons didn't deliver anything remotely close to the high expectations.)

In any case, it would be redemption of sorts; the kind of stuff ESPN would do a weepy feature piece about. And I'll be rooting for Simms to do well. Really. I don't root against individual Longhorns.

I'm a big-picture guy. I root against the team.