Bryce Brown May Be Adding K-State To List Of Schools He's Spurned

Which school will running back Bryce Brown next play for? According to one report, the Kansas St. Wildcats migrant by way of the Tennessee Volunteers and Miami Hurricanes won't, in fact, play for a school.

Knoxville's Jimmy Hyams reports Brown has been staying in the area, "doesn't plan to play college football anymore," and "hopes to get drafted and play in the NFL next year." We also learn Brown will attend the Vols' upcoming game against the Georgia Bulldogs and attempt to run a 4.4-second 40-yard dash at some point, just a tick away from the 4.3s he was reportedly putting up in high school.

Even considering Brown's travels, that's disappointing. The former five-star has had the talent to catch on with any team in the country, but what NFL team is going to take a chance on a player who's changed his allegiance three times since 2008? 

For more on K-State, head to Kansas State blog Bring On The Cats.

Bryce Brown's status as a member of the Kansas St. Wildcats is in doubt, with K-State unable to confirm or deny whether he's still a member of the team. Coach Bill Snyder said, "Bryce is going through some difficult times right now and we'll try to help him all we can," and now you know about as much as everybody else knows.

Brown transferred to Manhattan from the Tennessee Volunteers last year, sitting out the 2010 season according to NCAA rules. He's yet to make much of an impression on the field for the Wildcats, carrying the ball only three times this season.

That this comes just days after Brown and brother Arthur Brown played against the Miami Hurricanes in their hometown helps raise even more speculation about just what might be going on. So, speculate, if you want.

For more on K-State, head to Kansas State blog Bring On The Cats.

You know, it's almost like recruiting kids who graduate high school already equipped with their own managers is an irredeemably terrible idea!  Bryce Brown, the '09 prequel to the exasperatingly drawn-out recruitment of Seantrel Henderson, he of outsized hype and 460 ill-gotten yards in 13 games, will not be returning to the Vols for his sophomore season, and you'll just never guess how his coaches found out. Via Tennessee beat writer/radio impresario Josh Ward's Twitter feed:


In retrospect, the staff should've known this kind of stunt was a real danger. Last week we managed to get through Derek Dooley's entire press conference at SEC Media Days without a single question regarding Brown's status, and that had to sting the kid. (We can blame this all, of course, on Brett Favre. Just look at the acceptable standards of needy behavior you're passing on to our nation's young athletes, you miserable sack of grizzle.)


The latter part of this is believable, but why Brown's father would expect Bryce to stop playing Petulant Petulant Princess at this point after enabling his behavior for the past 18 months is anyone's guess. At any rate: Our long, long regional nightmare is over (... right?), and with any luck, this new Tennessee staff will shy away in the future from pursuing players whose on-field contributions are so directly tied up with their needs to be coddled.

Join the orange hallelujah chorus at SBN's Rocky Top Talk.

Bryce Brown has expressed his desire to transfer from the Tennessee football program, and has since made no further statements to contradict that desire. This news is exactly two months old today, so you can understand Derek Dooley's frustration at still being asked about it twice a day:

"There's been no new news on Bryce. Everybody loves creating the story. Here are the facts: The facts are we reached a point prior to the spring when we said he was going to leave the program. And there's been no indication that he was coming back, since that time. And, so, this has been just tremendous fodder for the fans, to speculate. I don't know what else to say on it."

But your polite indignation is new to them, Coach! It's new to everyone who has never gotten to ask you his-or-her own self, every, every time. There's always the chance you'd choose to withhold news concerning your team's highest-profile get in 2009 just for funsies, after all, and we've all got column inches to fill.

According to newly-minted Tennessee head coach Derek Dooley, Bryce Brown's self-imposed exile could end any time Bryce Brown wants it to. Emphasize the latter part of that condition one more time for us, Coach:

"I don't think he's coming back, but if he wanted to, the first thing I'd do is talk to our team to see if they'd want him back," Dooley said. "I think at the end of the day, our team would welcome Bryce back, if that's what he wanted to do.

"But Bryce is going to have to want to come back. He's not going to be easy. He's not going to be handed anything. I'm not going to make a recruiting pitch to get him."

This may seem a bit icy, but make no mistake: Dooley's detachment is cool relief to both a team and a fanbase sick of a coach who showcased Brown in scoring drives as a recruiting tool at the expense of playing time for Tennessee's stable of green but talented backs who weren't fortunate enough to come to Knoxville equipped with their own "manager." The sooner Brown gets off to someplace where his presence can be overappreciated again, the better for all involved.

Tennessee head coach Derek Dooley has made a statement to the media, in which he ascribes Bryce Brown's possible departure to "a lot of personal and family problems":

“They’re concerns that I believe stem from — and what he told me stem from — some of the reasons why he came here, and his experience over the first six months that he was here.

It's the "reasons why he came here" part that gives pause, because nobody had their motivations on Signing Day and beyond questioned more than Brown, but if the kid's gotta go home, he's gotta go home.  SBN's fine Tennessee crew at Rocky Top Talk already have their heads on straight regarding Bryce Brown:

He has the look and build of a future star, which goes with that whole number one recruit in America thing.

But things have changed in Knoxville, and just as Lane Kiffin was not the right man for Lennon Creer, so too may Derek Dooley not be the right man for Bryce Brown.  These things do happen with coaching changes, and though we may like it less when it happens to guys with Brown's hype, we handle it better when it comes at a position of great quality depth like tailback.

Tennessee fans now have to shift their focus back to basketball, as the Vols prepare for their first-round NCAA tournament tipoff against San Diego State, but we'll be following this story as long as it's a story, here and at Rocky Top Talk.