More from The Q&A: Charlie Johnson
Like millions of Americans, Charlie Johnson will watch the Super Bowl this weekend.
But unlike most of us, he’ll watch it after having played in the game.
The former Oklahoma State Cowboy was only a rookie two years ago when the Indianapolis Colts made the big game. He was a reserve offensive lineman, but when one of the starters was injured, he was called into duty. He played the last three quarters and helped the Colts to victory.
Jenni Carlson: Is watching the Super Bowl different after you’ve played in it?
Charlie Johnson: It gives you a different perspective. You see the things the guys go through during the week, and then you watch the game … and I can watch and say, “I know what he’s feeling. I can understand maybe what’s going through his head.” Seeing all the lights, seeing all the cameras, seeing all that stuff, I can kind of get a perspective on what they’re going through.
Before, I would watch it and root for a team, but now I watch it and it’s kind of bittersweet. I’ve been there. I want to go again. Like this year, with
JC: Did you have a “Welcome to the Super Bowl” moment?
CJ: Probably when we went to our media day. Just the amount of people that were at the media day was unbelievable. I think I heard somewhere that this year they gave out 633 credentials, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was close to that and it may have been more. There are sports people there who work ESPN and all that stuff, but then you see people from “Entertainment Tonight,” “Inside Edition.” You even see guest hosts for “The Jay Leno Show.” You see all these outside people. When you see that, you’re like, “This is big.”
JC: So, those type of folks aren’t usually there after practice on, say, a Tuesday in Indy?
CJ: (Chuckles.) No, you don’t see “E! Entertainment.”
JC: If you ever get back to the Super Bowl, is there anything you would do different?
CJ: Hmm, I don’t know. I’m a creature of habit and kind of superstitious. If something works, I’m going to try to stick to it. If I do something during the week and we win a game, I’m gonna do it the next week. Or if I do something and we lose, I’m not going to do it anymore. It’s easy to say I wouldn’t change anything, but I don’t know.
JC: What are you up to this off-season?
CJ: I’m in Indy. Just taking care of some stuff around the house because me and my wife are expecting the first part of April.
JC: Congrats.
CJ: Yeah, we are getting everything ready.
JC: So, does that mean you’re spending the off-season building a crib and things like that?
CJ: Some what. (Laughs.)
JC: Talk about this past season. Do you feel like you’ve found a permanent home on the offensive line?
CJ: I guess individually (the season) went well. I didn’t have any injuries. I started all 16 games, and then the playoff game. Individually, it went well, but as a whole, it’s disappointing. You feel like you have a team that has a chance … a team that could go all the way and win the championship. And when you lose, it hurts. I took it real hard there for probably about a week to two weeks. This was my first year that I played. I played a lot last year, but there was injury and I didn’t play in the playoffs, but this year, pretty much from camp, I was a starter. I went through a whole year. I put a lot more time in because I knew I was going to be playing a lot, so for the season to end like that … it was tough.
JC: What about next season? Change is on the horizon for the franchise, so have you started to think about what’s next?
CJ: Last year, the preseason was kind of weird. I was going to play one spot, and then, I moved over and I stayed there, but it was kind of back and forth. We’re getting some guys back and healthy that were former starters, so I really don’t know what’s going to happen with me. I would hope that last year proved a point that I can play a whole year and play well. Hopefully, I have a spot, but we’ll see.
Team-wise, I’m going to feel like any other guy and think that we have a good team, we have a good core in place. We’ve won a lot of games for a lot of years now, and I really don’t see that changing. A lot of people are going to say, “New head coach. New routine.” But I really don’t see a lot changing. Even with a new coach, things will probably stay how it’s been. I see us winning a lot of games and hopefully being in contention in January.
Thunder will miss Mason
Lest anyone questions the value of Desmond Mason, the Thunder thriller against Memphis is Exhibit A.
Late in the third quarter of Wednesday night’s game — with the Thunder humming along and keeping the Grizzlies at double-digit arm’s length — Mason injured his knee. Seeing it live was enough to keep me from wanting to see it again in slow motion. Mason went up to try to block a breakaway dunk by Kyle Lowry, who ended up crashing into Mason’s lower body. It wasn’t intentional. It wasn’t dirty.
But it was ugly.
Mason’s knee buckled, and as soon as he landed on the Ford Center hardwood, he motioned to the Thunder bench. “Send the trainer, and make it snappy,” his look said.
He knew something was wrong.
Tests in the locker room would reveal that Mason hyper-extended his right knee, and Thursday, the team announced that he would miss the rest of the season.
Too bad for the Thunder. It needs Mason.
After he left the game Wednesday, the Thunder had another late-game letdown. When it had a fourth-quarter swoon Monday night against New Jersey, it was because the reserves were in. When Memphis outscored the Thunder 29-19 in the fourth quarter Wednesday, the impact of Mason’s absence was evident.
No way Memphis scores 29 points in the fourth quarter after only 14 in the third if Mason is out there. No way the Grizzlies force overtime after the Thunder controlled the first three quarters if Mason is available.
He adds a toughness that the Thunder lacked late against the Grizzlies.
Sure, the Thunder dominated overtime and won going away, but it doesn’t even need overtime if Mason is available. He’d have made a stop or hit a shot or done something to stem that fourth quarter tide.
Mason doesn’t get lots of headlines, but his importance to this improving squad was obvious Wednesday. It likely will be for the rest of the season.
How high can Sooners surge?
The gals wearing burnt orange walked into the postgame press conference looking glassy-eyed.
A 20-point loss tends to have that effect, but there was something different in those looks after what the Oklahoma women’s basketball team did to Texas on Sunday afternoon. Sure, the Longhorns knew they were facing a good team. Sure, they knew the task of winning in Norman was a big one.
But you could tell — they had no idea just how good the Sooners are.
And we’re starting to see that these Sooners are very, very good.
They have emerged as the clear favorite in the Big 12, though a tough road game at Baylor looms later this week. But if OU wins in Waco, then on Saturday against Missouri, it will set up a game with monster ramifications.
Tennessee comes to town next Monday.
The Volunteers are the gold standard in women’s college basketball. They have championships. They have prestige. They have the best coach in the game. They are the program by which every other one is measured.
Sure, this season, Connecticut is in a class by itself, but even the Huskies have to measure themselves against the Vols.
The Sooners will have a chance to do the same next week. OU has played Tennessee three times, all coming since 2003 and the Sherri Coale-led resurgence of the program. The Vols have won all three games, and they’ve won by an average of 15 points. Had it not been for a three-point game last season, the average margin would’ve been much, much bigger.
The Sooners should change their losing ways this time around. OU is better than Tennessee. The rankings say so. The eye test says so. The Vols are rebuilding after losing Candace Parker and a talented senior class. The Sooners have Courtney Paris and a talented senior class now.
Beat the Vols, and the Sooners will signal that they’re not only the favorite in the Big 12 but also a favorite for the Final Four.
Beat the Vols badly, and the Sooners might just signal that they are the challenger for Connecticut, the team everyone is shooting to beat but is struggling to keep within 20 points.
If that happens, it’ll be the gals in the Tennessee orange who will be looking all glassy-eyed.
More from The Q&A: Bill Young
Bill Young had spent nearly three decades coaching football when he finally got a shot at the big time.
The NFL.
The man recently hired as Oklahoma State’s new defensive coordinator joined the Detroit Lions in 2001. He had just completed stints at Ohio State, Oklahoma and Southern Cal, so a jump to the NFL seemed a likely next step. But Young stayed just one season in Detroit.
Why?
Young and I talked about that Friday afternoon after I initially asked him about his early experiences in high school coaching. His first paying job was at Carl Albert, his second at Putnam West, not far from his alma mater, U.S. Grant.
Jenni Carlson: Did you ever want to go back and coach at your alma mater, at Grant?
Bill Young: You know, I think that was an ambition of mine, especially when I was an assistant in high school. Then, once I got into college, I really got into that and figured that was the direction I wanted to go.
JC: Having said that, you spent just one season in the NFL. Was the pro game not your cup of tea?
BY: I had a two-year contract, and they were nice enough to let me out of the second year. The whole reason was I just enjoyed the college players much better. You’re talking to a young guy and coaching him up, and you tell him something, and it may be the first or second time he’s heard it. In the National Football League, they’ve heard it a thousand times. The eagerness, they’re like sponges, college players are. You just feel like you’re more involved.
JC: Did you know pretty quickly the NFL wasn’t for you?
BY: Not really. It took a little while. I enjoyed it. I could do that, too.
Thunder coach deserves job
Sam Presti needs to pull the trigger now; take the interim tag off Scott Brooks’ title.
The Thunder head coach deserves to have the job outright. No waiting to see how the rest of the year goes. No letting the season play out before giving Brooks the job for real and true.
After all, everyone knows that every NBA coach’s status is really day-to-day anyway. Any of them could be fired or quit or leave at any time.
So come on, Sam. You’re the Thunder GM. Make Brooks your coach.
Truth is, it might have been something the Thunder folks wanted to do more than a year ago. Back when the Thunder were still the Sonics and still playing in the Pacific Northwest, they needed a coach. Thing is, this was the same time that the franchise needed a GM. And, oh by the way, the team was also under the new ownership with the Clay Bennett-led crew.
So, you had a new owner looking for a new GM and a new coach.
Bennett and Co. tagged Presti as the GM, a somewhat daring move considering he was only 30 years old at the time. He came in with solid credentials, but still, giving over the keys to the franchise’s future to someone so young was bold and risky.
Maybe that’s why the team went the opposite direction with its coach. The franchise tagged P.J. Carlesimo, a grizzled coaching veteran.
Brooks, though, was in the mix. He was one of the candidates who got a serious look. Heck, he nearly got the job in Sacramento a few years earlier. But I’m sure somewhere along the way, someone with the franchise decided it was just too risky to have a first-time owner, general manager and coach all at the same time.
So, why not do now what the team just couldn’t pull the trigger on then?
Make Brooks the coach. Period.
Brooks, after all, has taken largely the same cast of characters who looked like an NBA jayvee team under Carlesimo and turned them into a solid bunch. The Thunder has won four of its last six games, a streak that would’ve seemed impossible only a month or so ago.
Brooks deserves the job, one that it’s looking more and more like he was qualified for when the franchise cared more about his experience than his ability.
Local athlete needs your help
On several occasions, I’ve written about Caleb Spady.
The first time was a column back in the fall when the Hinton boy had a Make-A-Wish day with the Texas Rangers. Since then, I’ve had the good fortune to write about the care package he received during the Major League Baseball playoffs from fellow Caddo County native Reggie Willits as well as several blogs about Caleb’s battle with brain cancer.
I consider it a privilege each and every time I can write about him. Because of his strength and his faith, this little boy has brought so much inspiration to everyone who knows his story.
Well, now it’s time to return the favor.
Today is Caleb’s 11th birthday. He recently told his mom that he didn’t want a big to-do or anything but that he wouldn’t mind getting birthday cards.
Even though it will get to Caleb a little late, I hope you’ll send him a birthday card today.
(His mom, Kim, shared their address on her blog, so I hope she won’t mind me sharing it here: Box 308, Hinton, OK 73047.)
Just in case you need evidence of what kind of kid Caleb is, he and his class at Hinton raised money for Just One More Day for Love, Hope & A Cure (www.justonemoreday.org), a non-profit corporation dedicated to finding a cure for diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma and to supporting the families of children like Caleb who have the disease. It is an inoperable form of cancer because the cells are sprinkled within the brain stem.
Caleb’s class raised $500 by selling “Pray for Caleb” wristbands.
Way to go!
As a reward, the class got a visit earlier this week from Pistol Pete; Caleb and his entire family are huge Oklahoma State fans.
Caleb’s mom e-mailed me about the festivities: “The devotion of Caleb’s classmates to finding a cure, and their level of innocence, was brought home to me when one of his best friends told me, ‘I can’t wait until we send in the money we raised for research. Then they’ll find a cure for Caleb’s brain tumor!’”
Rest assured, that will be my birthday wish for Caleb.
Dom Franks, meet Larry Birdine
So, Dom Franks went a little Larry Birdine on everyone Sunday.
You remember Birdine spouting off a few years ago. The Oklahoma defensive end said some things before the national championship game against Southern Cal that ended up looking down right silly after the Trojans blitzkrieged the Sooners.
Fast forward four years. Franks, a normally calm and collected defensive back, stepped out on a limb Sunday and said Florida signal caller Tim Tebow would’ve been the fourth-best quarterback in the Big 12 this season.
Truth is, you could make that argument with Sam Bradford, Colt McCoy and Graham Harrell.
But the other truth is, that is big-time bulletin board material for the Gators.
Listen, I’ll be the first to say that bulletin board material isn’t worth squat once the game starts. Winning and losing comes down to blocking and tackling, Xs and Os, not something someone said four days before the game.
Heck, the Gators have been offering up their own bulletin board material before they even secured a spot in the national championship game. Everyone from coaches to stars to reserves has offered up their two cents.
Am I surprised Franks said what he said? Frankly, I’m surprised a Sooner hadn’t popped off before.
But here’s where things get tricky — the Sooners haven’t won a BCS game since these current players were in middle school. Not a national championship game. A BCS game. The program’s BCS swoon is well-documented, so comments like Franks’ look worse than they are.
All that changes if the Sooners back up what he said. If they go out Thursday night in Miami and win the ball game, all of this talk becomes mute. If they stop the slide and claim the title, that will be the focus.
But if they don’t, then things like Franks’ comments will be remembered and re-hashed.
Franks wasn’t foolish for saying what he did, but he’ll look that way if the Sooners lose on Thursday.
More from The Q&A: Russell Westbrook
Russell Westbrook is in the running for a spot in the NBA Slam Dunk Contest.
As the Thunder rookie talked about in The Q&A today, he’s still a relative newcomer to the dunking world — he’s only been dunking since his senior year of high school — and yet, he is already one of the more dynamic dunkers in the NBA.
He’s a big fan of the dunk, too.
Jenni Carlson: Top three dunks of all time.
Russell Westbrook: I liked the
JC: What about your best three dunks?
RW: I had one in high school. It was a fast-break. A guy tried to take a charge, and when a guy takes a charge and you hit ‘em, sometimes you go up another level. So, I hit him and I went up another level, so it looked real nice. Then, the two I had in college last year. The
JC: Which of the college ones do you like best?
RW: I’d probably have to say the Cal one.
JC: CBS still uses a dunk of yours in its college basketball lead-in.
RW: I still couldn’t dunk then. As I’ve gotten older, my legs have gotten better. I always used to work out on my legs, but I never saw nothing. Nothing every shows up. Eventually … I started jumping higher.
