Ryan’s Song: Snyder Stands Behind Kealy

It was all he had left, 11 more games, maybe 12 if Arizona State was good enough to get into a bowl, and then Ryan Kealy would be done with football and it would be time to get on with his life.

He had no NFL option, really. Kealy had thrown for 6,274 yards and 44 touchdowns in three years for the Sun Devils, and when his career was over, would rank only behind Jake Plummer in the school’s record book. But, unlike Plummer, Kealy doesn’t have pro football ability and, more important, he doesn’t have pro football knees.

His are the knees of a 55-year-old with a cane in his future.

Five times they have been cut on, once on the left, four times on the right, and each time he has required rehabilitation and each time he has come back to play.

Well, four times anyway.

At 11:30 on July 23, as he was about to begin that fifth comeback, those last 11 or 12 games vanished into a Tempe Sunday night when a university police officer, parked near an intersection by Sun Devil Stadium, saw a car rolling back and forth, trying to trip a light that refused to turn green.

The officer found the Arizona State quarterback’s behavior curious and asked Kealy to step out of the car. He refused the Breathalyzer test and opted for a blood test a few hours later.

The results came back negative for alcohol, but positive for three painkilling drugs and THC.

Kealy had prescriptions for the drugs, but the THC, the active ingrediant in marijuana, was another story.

“I think, and this might sound goofy, that that started the whole thing,” Arizona State Coach Bruce Snyder says. “In my opinion, it could have been a life-saving thing.

“I think it showed him that he was at a dead end and something had to happen. There was no time for denial. I think he knew that he had hit a brick wall. Where we were lucky is that there wasn’t another car involved.”

Rumors had long circulated that Kealy, who says he had been living the life of a typical college student, was enjoying that life immensely.

Maybe to distraction.

He had been the Sun Devil starting quarterback since his redshirt freshman year, 31 starts in all, and that made him the most experienced quarterback in Division I entering this season.

It also gave him renown of a sort, because if Phoenix has all of the major league teams, Tempe has Arizona State--and the NFL Cardinals, which is another story--and its athletes often achieve celebrity status.

Kealy talks about none of his energetic student life for publication, but acknowledges, “I’ve made some bad mistakes.”

On the morning of July 24, he showed up on Snyder’s doorstep saying, in effect, “Coach, I screwed up.”

The Sun Devil offense, like most, is built around the quarterback. His picture was already on the cover of the media guide.

And now the rumors, well, at least some of them, apparently were true.

Snyder suspended him.

Not every coach would.

Kealy hadn’t hurt anyone but himself, but Snyder was unmovable.

An appeal from Kealy and from his parents did not alter his status. Snyder said he would review the suspension after two games and laid out a plan for Kealy to show that he should be taken back onto the team.

Kealy worked with a local group of at-risk youngsters, forming a basketball team. He did other community service, pretty much anything the coach told him to do.

Snyder gets to his office at 6 a.m. Kealy was told to be there daily at 6:45. Snyder had an office boy. A week ago, the most experienced quarterback in Division I was stuffing envelopes for the coach.

When the Sun Devils trooped out into the heat for practice, Kealy went along as a team manager. He worked out and threw in individual drills, but when it was time for the team to do something, he picked up a clipboard and charted the efforts of Jeff Krohn, a walk-on redshirt freshman who suddenly found himself the starting quarterback.

First the humiliation of arrest.

Then the aftermath.

Maybe that’s the formula for redemption.

“I think I have matured a lot,” Kealy says. “Going through some of these situations that I have, you tend to learn a lot about yourself and life in general. It has taught me to be a better person overall and to make better decisions in the future.”

Last Thursday, Snyder told Kealy his sentence was up, that he could rejoin the team after the Sun Devils played Colorado State on Saturday.

Krohn, whose lone college playing option was Cornell before he decided to walk on at Arizona State, remains the starting quarterback, backed up by Griffin Goodman--another walk-on--and Matt Cooper. Kealy is the new fourth-string quarterback.

“Ryan is the established leader of this team,” says Krohn, whose play has been spotty in two games, both victories. “I’m going to support whatever the coach’s decision is.”

The hope in Tempe is that it’s a beginning for Kealy.

“I put Ryan on a very tight, short leash, with several responsibilities that he had to live up to,” Snyder says. “I am convinced that this young person has changed, and changed for the better. He’s done everything I’ve asked him to do.”

Kealy, who began practice on Tuesday, assumes nothing.

“It would be an honor to take another snap as a Sun Devil . . . but I also understand that there is the chance that I never will again,” he says.

That snap could come as early as Saturday, when Arizona State plays host to Utah State. More likely, it will come in two weeks, when UCLA is the opponent.

TROUBLED HUSKY

At Washington, everyone is watching to see if 6-foot-7 sophomore receiver Jerramy Stevens will be squeezed out of the program. Stevens, who caught seven passes in each of the Huskies’ last two games--victories over Miami and Colorado--is awaiting a decision from the King County prosecutor’s office, which is investigation an allegation of sexual assault lodged by a university student. That decision could be known this week, which is an off-week for the Huskies.