Jeremiah Masoli

Jeremiah Masoli, the University of Oregon quarterback and one-time Heisman hopeful, was already serving a season-long suspension for his involvement in a fraternity-house burglary. He'd blown it, and promised to do better. And while carrying that fragile opportunity, Masoli was cited by police this week for possession of marijuana, driving with a suspended license, and failure to stop at a driveway or sidewalk.

Coach Chip Kelly kicked Masoli off the team on Wednesday. That conversation, in case you wondered, was brief and to the point. Said Kelly: "It wasn't a heartfelt discussion. There wasn't any room for conversation. We had a plan in place for Jeremiah, and he failed."


So let the head shaking begin. A guy who had all the promise in the universe a year ago officially went Cheech and Chong on his program. Masoli could read a defense, he could run the spread-option offense beautifully, but what he couldn't do was follow simple instructions from a coach who believed in him and gave him a far wider berth than most of the rest of us would have.

The absurdity and hubris laced in the story of Masoli's downfall ends up belonging in a Shakespeare festival play. The Big Bard long ago gave us Hamlet, King Lear and Macbeth. "All the world's a seven-man defensive front." All that stuff. And Shakespeare would have had a career day with Masoli's last stand.

The quarterback's demise is a painful exercise in vanity. Masoli is an idiot for failing to grasp the gravity of his final days as a college football player.

In the weeks after Masoli's burglary arrest I heard from a number of Oregon students who told stories of the community college transfer quarterback who showed up on campus appreciating his opportunity, and promptly won some games and transformed into a pompous player who introduced himself in social situations with, "You know, I'm the QB."

He's the "ex" now. Ex-quarterback. Ex-Heisman wisher. Ex-leader. Ex-problem child.

Yet, try as I might today to erase those riveting football images of Masoli running over a defensive back for a first down. Or him finding an open receiver. Or him scrambling in space, with the eye-black smeared down his cheeks, I just can't.

Masoli could really play, couldn't he?

And therein lies the deep lesson wrapped in the riddle that is Masoli's amateur career. The temptation is to look at the bookings and citations and too frequent run-ins with police, and the last chance he was given, and see a guy who lowered his head and bulled over his own coach.

But Masoli's true betrayal wasn't of his coach. He betrayed his own talents.

Masoli didn't respect his athleticism. He didn't just blow his final chance, he trashed it, humiliated it, and that's all a lot of people are going to remember of Masoli.

Kelly told me he was "surprised" by Masoli's failure to follow the rules. Said Kelly: "I'm surprised by anyone who wouldn't be able to follow simple parameters that were set up for you to make it back on the football field. It was black-and-white stuff. Not complicated at all."

Masoli didn't buy in. Kelly learns, maybe. And the rest of us move on.

Kelly can only hope that removing Masoli completely from the program is a step toward repairing its image. Most of us already wondered what the point of keeping a lousy influence around might be.

But the bigger question is what happens to Masoli now that he has trampled his last chance.

Football players have to follow the rules of society. They have to follow the rules of their game, and their program. But Masoli did one better. He didn't even serve as a good steward of his own dreams. Masoli lowered his head and drove them into the dirt himself.

Nothing more shameful than that.