He grew up a 100 mile drive down I-30 in a small town called Mount Vernon and played his way to number one recruit status. He turned down Bear Bryant in favor of Dallas’ SMU, where he founded the university’s Fellowship of Christian Athletes chapter. He finished third in Heisman voting in 1958. Then he went on to become the only kid from a Dallas high school or college to come start for America’s Team. They slapped his name up on that Ring of Honor in 1976. That’s Twenty-Two years ago for those keeping score.

So can anyone tell me why the ample brain trust that is the SMU Hall of Fame Committee has just now decided to retire Meredith’s hallowed number 17? It’s been a long time coming, but you’d think that someone would have noticed considering that SMU and the Cowboys shared the same field as tenants of the Cotton Bowl. The committee consists mainly of members of the Letterman’s Club, but unfortunately I couldn’t find any info on this organization on SMU’s interwebs. My guess is that they don’t want to be reached, considering the tardiness of this decision and the fact that they are the same people behind this.

I know that by now it’s old news that the Pro Bowl #85 for the Cincinnati Bengals has officially changed his name to Chad Javon Ocho Cinco, but I literally laughed out loud when I spied this while perusing opening day NFL rosters on the ESPN web site. As of yesterday, his Wikipedia page as well as his ESPN profile still referred to him as a Johnson. Today, though, all is well in the world. I look forward to seeing it on the field Sunday.

With the announcement last week that the SMU football team would be sporting “new” uniforms, I felt the need to bring up the Mustangs’ schizophrenic handling of the color blue.  Now I’m not old enough to remember, but I can’t recall ever seeing the SMU athletic teams wearing anything but royal before the mid to late 1990s. But navy was the preferred hue of blue that the football team adopted in 2003. And there seems to be no explanation for this at all. For a school with as rich an atheltic heritage in the city of Dallas as SMU, it is a sad tale how much apathy has surrounded its programs since the NCAA dropped the Death Penalty on them in 1987.

Look at the school’s official colors and you’ll see that they are “Harvard Red and Yale Blue.” WHY?  That automatically dooms the Mustangs to aspire to be a copy of another school, AT BEST!  I’m sure schools with such strong ties to their colors as the University of Texas look at SMU and just laugh.  Who can tell me where the non-official usage of navy came from?

Its not just the football team, either.  In recent years the soccer teams, basketball teams, and even the cheerleaders have been seen clad in navy. Let’s hope with the introduction of these new football duds, which hearken back to the Pony Express days of Eric Dickerson and Craig James, we are now seeing the abandonment of navy, which is not even a sanctioned school color.  Oh, and by the way, with the new June Jones-era unis the school has introduced are in a shade called “SMU Blue.”

Looks like hoops are back in royal now, though.

Why oh why SMU do you play fast and loose with your colors?  What other sports team, at any level, does this?  Southern Methodist University — pick one color and stick with it. Please.  Maybe you’ll see that people care about your teams when they think that you actually do.

What do you think? Please tell me what you think in the comments.

Thanks to hombre de steel for the vintage banner photos.

Simply brilliant. Especially for an Arsenal fan.

Dallas Cowboys sign Pacman Jones. ESPN article here.

From the Dallas Morning News. SMU’s record-setting junior quarterback Justin Willis has been suspended from spring practice and his name has been removed from the roster on the school’s official website.  Safety Bryce Hudman has also been suspended – both for violations related to academics and missing team functions.

Let’s hope that this deal gets done and that this horrible distraction will go away.  Furthermore, I’m looking forward to see how Jones’ advanced offensive tactics will be suited for talented SMU quarterback Justin Willis.  Good luck Mustangs!

***UPDATE***

SMU will sign June Jones as their head coach.  ESPN article here. Forbes.com article.

Here we see a fan make his way onto the field, spicing up an otherwise subpar Thursday Night Football matchup on the NFL Network.  I know that it’s been discussed at length in multiple forums, but with the quality of production for these last two weeks, I do not understand how the NFL Network expects people to pay extra to hear Bryant Gumbel and Chris Collinsworth painfully suck at their jobs.  And why are we denied the right to see some real action happen on the field?  This guy had a chance to be a real legend, but when he got face to face with NFL linemen it seemed that he thought better of whatever harebrained idea he originally came up with. Enjoy.