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(Rate Your Students)
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politics, but she's pretty fabulous, so who gives a damn?"
(Tenured Radical)

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

Criminals Downfield

A strong-minded and not too badly written opinion column in Oklahoma State University's newspaper. It's about the Oklahoma University football team. UD admires the writer's toughness. SOS has a few suggestions.


The honorable tradition of college football is tarnished by the University of Oklahoma football team. [Take this out of passive voice for more force in your first sentence: The University of Oklahoma football team tarnishes...] The history and tradition [Don't repeat tradition so soon.] of OU football is richly filled [richly filled is a bit awkward. Just go with filled -- or find a better word.] with National Championships, hall of famers and uncontrollable players [Very nice conclusion of the sentence... sort of unexpected... "uncontrollable players."].

The school’s history of putting criminals on the field is not ending [won't end? continues? Try to avoid the to be verb formulation here.] with Bob Stoops. Barry Switzer’s gang of hooligans is not so different from Stoops’ band of heathens.

They have been involved in controversy after controversy regarding numerous NCAA violations. The most notorious OU coach to be involved with NCAA infractions was Switzer. [Note the short sentences and the reliance, again, on dull to be verbs. Punch it up!]

His history with the school includes winning three national championships, multiple Big Eight Conference championships and producing 54 All-Americans.

Switzer was also accused spying on Darrell Royal’s 1976 University of Texas team and bailing out on OU after the team was placed on probation in 1989.

For six months in 1988, players from Switzer’s team were involved with a shooting, a rape in the athletic dorms, a robbery and arrests for drug dealing.

The Stoops era seems to be steamrolling down an eerily similar path. [eerily seems to clash with steamrolling.] Since being named Oklahoma’s football coach in 1999, Stoops’ team has been involved with numerous scandals. [An awkward word order here makes it look as though the team was named coach.]

The decision to remove quarterback Rhett Bomar and offensive lineman JD Quinn were [should be was] not enough to evade an investigation by the NCAA. The NCAA charged OU with “failure to monitor players” and has forced the team to forfeit the winnings from the 2005-06 season as well as being placed on probation until the 2010 season.

The team has also been involved with a number of secondary violations including providing two banned substances to players, calling recruits multiple times and showing three prospects lockers with their high school number on an OU jersey.

All these violations lead me to believe that OU is showing poor leadership and giving college football a bad name. [Understatement. And poor leadership is a cliche. Speak more directly, with more force, here.] The reputation and tradition of OU has been tarnished and is only getting worse with the increased monitoring of the school by the NCAA. [Repetition of tarnished makes this short piece feel sluggish, as if it isn't going anywhere. Find another word.]

It is the responsibility of the coaching staff to control and supervise the players they recruit. If players could understand that they are being given a great opportunity by receiving many free educational services, I don’t think they would break the rules as often. [Content problem here. Many players don't give a shit about educational services, considering them an impediment.]

It sickens me to see talent like Bomar’s wasted because of greediness and failure to appreciate the rules. [sickens is very good. The piece would have been better altogether if the writer had used variations on the I almost plotzed metaphor throughout.] The NCAA has made these rules to preserve the tradition and reputation of college football. [Drop this sentence.]

Hopefully [hopefully is incorrectly used here] the recent punishments will turn a light on in Stoops’ head [turn a light on is awkward] that OU football is corrupt and needs to be changed.

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