World Bullying Day Starts Out West

I see that today, Oct. 1, we're suppose to wear blue in support of anti-bullying.  Sure hope that's not UCLA Bruin blue based on today's dispatches from the West Coast.

Seems one of the assistant SIDs let media wander to the wrong spot in practice, and new UCLA head coach Jim Mora Jr. let him know about it in front of the whole team.

I pick it up from one of the Bruin blogs via a colleague on Facebook.  Frankly, the Los Angeles Times source for the story is far more cutting than the blog.

Not gonna act like I haven't received or seen such ass chewings -- just not usually in full view of the public, the team and the people you're suppose to work with.

T.J. Simers, the LA Times columnist, picks it up:

It's what we've come to expect from our really good college coaches as they set out to make men out of the kids in their programs.

And you know the Bruins had to just love it, with UCLA fans no doubt also admiring Mora's drive to be the very best at whatever the cost of human dignity.

That's when a program knows it has the right guy, or as Mora put it: "I'm not going to jeopardize what we're doing as a football team because of the incompetence of some people."

I think it's pretty well understood football is the most important thing going on at UCLA, and every man, woman and child needs to understand that.

UCLA is 4-1.  It's all good.  Nothing to see here.  More along.  Just inside the house banter.

Sports might not build character, but it sure can reveal it.

Before I get emails and calls from colleagues in the field, look, you all know that you do that behind closed doors.  Even that is tantamount to creating a hostile workplace and sooner or later, it is a college campus.

Another colleague said it: coaches at that level are kings.

The collective we allows this.  Don't forget, they're winning.  Before you cluck about your school or your rival, ask yourself an honest question: would you let the coach go bat guano crazy on helpless staff if you thought it would lead to a 4-1 mark?  Hell, they'd volunteer for it (and at many institutions, functionally speaking, they do).

Oh, and by the way, that Stomp Out Bullying Day artwork?  Yeah, it's blue and gold.