The Hook and Lateral

Well, a little over a month after Ryan Perrilloux was suspended indefinitely by Coach Les Miles for “unspecified team violations,” he is back from suspension and could be practicing again with the team as early as Monday, according an AP report on Yahoo! Sports. These unspecified team violations were later revealed by his high school coach and family to be missing classes to attend his father’s funeral without telling his coaches and missing a mandatory team meeting for reasons not directly related.

On one hand, Perrilloux has been plagued with problems since last May, when he was cited for trying to gain entry to a riverboat casino in Baton Rouge using his brother’s ID. After being reinstated in August, Perrilloux began to play an important role in LSU’s offense as he gave the defense a different look than Matt Flynn offering a type of “Tebow Package.” However, Perrilloux was suspended from practice for the week before the Alabama game in 2007 for the participation in a nightclub brawl. The latest suspension would have seemingly been a third strike.

On the other hand, one cannot rush to judge the extent of his violations. First of all, if it is true what his family and former coach say about his reasons for missing class, then I will forgive that. True, he should have given the coach’s notice, but when something that tragic happens in your life, you are not likely to be thinking of collegiate athletics as first priority. I do not know the reasons for missing the mandatory team meeting, but that’s an internal matter to deal with at LSU and will only affect the team’s and coaches’ respect for him and Perrilloux’s learning progress. I do not feel that missing a team meeting would be grounds for complete expulsion from the team, even after the rest of Perrilloux’s issues in the past.

In an effort not to be judgmental, I give Perrilloux the benefit of the doubt on this latest suspension, but one has to believe that Miles will be quick to pull the trigger if anything else happens that could affect his team’s cohesiveness. While I don’t blame Miles for his decision in this case, one has to ask this question: if this was T-Bob Hebert, 3rd-string red-shirt freshman center, would he still be on the team?