FALLING STARS
If things get any crazier in the land of Pete and honey, they’ll have to change their slogan.
From Fight On, to Heads Up!
It’s been quite a week for the Trojan football program, whose perception has suffered the same fate as its four highest-profile players on Saturday’s draft day.
Falling, falling, falling, falling.
Reggie Bush, surrounded by questionable advisors, fell out of the top spot into No. 2, a $6-million plunge.
Matt Leinart, plagued by a questionable arm and Hollywood focus, fell from last year’s probable top spot to No. 10, a plunge worth double-digit millions.
LenDale White, alleged to have questionable character, fell from projected top 10 to 45th, a drop as large as Coach Pete Carroll’s infamous high dive.
Winston Justice, haunted by a questionable past, fell into the second round in a league desperate for offensive linemen.
It was a statement of disillusionment not only about the players, but their program.
It was more than just a bad day, it was an awful ending to the worst of USC weeks.
“The worst week since I’ve been here, yeah,” Carroll said in a phone interview Saturday night. “It’s been very, very difficult.”
It was a week that wore out the Trojans worse than Texas, and frightened them more than Notre Dame.
It was a week that was trickier than Norm Chow and as explosive as Ed Orgeron.
It was a week when the program’s Teflon coating finally seemed as thin as the smile on Carroll’s face.
“This week we learned some things the hard way,” Carroll said.
Maybe none of these things will stick. But things are sure looking sticky.
The week started with the revelations that Bush’s family spent the year living rent-free in a house purchased by a businessman who wanted to work with their son.
Bush clearly knew, and you have to wonder, why didn’t he tell anyone at the school? Why did he feel his parents could get away with it?
The week continued with the arrest of quarterback Mark Sanchez on suspicion of sexual assault.
No charge has been filed, nothing may happen. But when your program’s future leader is led away from his apartment in handcuffs, something has already happened.
Then, Saturday morning, there surfaced a report that White had failed an NFL drug test.
The report has yet to be confirmed, but considering the draft’s best big back was only the fifth back taken, perhaps somebody certainly believed it.
There were other areas of the draft that made you wonder.
Why would Bush suddenly drop out of the top spot that was all but promised to him?
Could it be the Texans didn’t feel they could strike a deal with an entourage that included Joel Segal, an agent once suspended for paying a player, and Mike Ornstein, a marketer formerly convicted of mail fraud?
What is Bush doing with those guys anyway? Why didn’t somebody in the influential Trojan family steer him elsewhere?
Then there was Leinart, the choice of America’s paparazzi, anointed as the next New York Jets quarterback by none other than Donald Trump.
Well, guess what? The Jets passed on him.
So did the quarterback-less Oakland Raiders and Detroit Lions.
So did the Tennessee Titans, whose coach is former Trojan Jeff Fisher and whose offensive coordinator is Chow.
If a guy who tutored Leinart for two consecutive national championships can’t persuade his owner to draft him, you know something stinks.
Most of the questions were about his arm strength. But some folks also wondered about his glamour bent. Dumping a football agent for a Hollywood agency probably didn’t help.
Then there was Winston Justice, the seemingly perfect NFL specimen whose character was ripped by announcers as he dropped from spot to spot to 39th.
“Only the so-called experts thought these guys fell,” claimed Carroll. “They didn’t fall, the expectations were wrong. They were taken where the NFL thought they belonged.”
But as the first day of the draft ended, the falling continued.
The week will end today with this newspaper revealing that receiver Dwayne Jarrett, the Trojans’ top returning player, owes $10,000 in rent money to Bob Leinart, Matt Leinart’s dad.
It is a gift that could result in an NCAA sanction, and raises a repeat question.
Why didn’t Jarrett tell anyone? Why did he think he could get away with it?
Through the hangover throttling the Trojan nation today, it is an issue that must be pondered.
Has the program become so player-friendly that its players have stopped worrying about consequences? Did the 34-game winning streak make them feel bulletproof, not just on the field, but off it?
After five years here, is it time for Carroll to tighten his grip?
“We needed to see this coming, and we didn’t,” Carroll admitted. “It’s gone beyond all the heads up, all the alerts, all the education we give these kids. We need to do more.”
Carroll said the program needs to focus more on educating the players about outsiders.
“Our guys are marked guys, they have had success and there’s people trying to get in on that, and we need to do a better job of making them understand the problems there,” he said.
Carroll said he was not going to change the embraceable style that has made him possibly college football’s best coach. But he vowed to be tougher on those who would stand between him and his players.
“We have moved into very different territory now, all the hype, all the distractions, all the people who want to influence us, and we will be more aware of that,” he said. “We will work harder to control that.”
As this week has taught Carroll and the Trojan nation, the hard part is not achieving greatness.
The hard part is surviving it.
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Bill Plaschke can be reached at bill.plaschke@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Plaschke, go to latimes.com/plaschke.
