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Injuries have always been a debated topic in sports. Should a player lose his starting spot if he is injured during the season? Or is it next man up, and if that man is playing better when you are healthy so goes the luck of the draw? If you ask Air Force Head Football Coach Troy Calhoun, it might be just a little bit more than just your starting position you could lose.
According to a report from Yahoo! Sports, Calhoun is taking a hardline approach with Devin Rushing, who entered fall camp as the number one tailback for the Falcons. Not only did Rushing apparently lose his starting tailback spot to sophomore Jacobi Owens, he lost his game jersey. Calhoun has a long standing tradition of putting injured players in red jerseys and not letting them be on the practice field while practice is going.
Calhoun recently shared his vision on injuries and what type of player he wants with the Colorado Springs Gazette:
"I think at every position we're going to have tough, durable guys. If you aren't, you're going to get us beat. I think the other thing is you have a built-in alibi if you're a guy who gets hurt easily. If you're a guy who gets hurt easily, you need to find another activity where there's not contact.
Vnce Lombardi would surely agree with Calhoun on this ideology, but how does it fit into today's views on athletics? Calhoun has made several remarks this offseason leading into fall camp about building warriors and that warriors want to compete. He even made a comment to the Gazette saying "We are building guys that down the road are going to have to kill an enemy. So you better have combative, physical practices."
The Falcons are coming off a 2013 season that ended with a 2-10 record, and you can sense from the tone of Calhoun's comments that he does not want 2014 to have any kind of carryover from 2013. The 2013 season was highlighted by an injury-riddled quarterbacking situation and the head coach is definitely setting an early tone that injuries will not be tolerated this coming season.