Baylor Fires Art Briles As Head Coach

Baylor University is about ready to cut ties with head coach Art Briles after a series of ugly media incidents involving his players.

It shouldn’t come as the biggest surprise.  Though Briles has enjoyed a run of success on the field for the Bears, built around one of the more explosive offenses in college football.  However, ongoing allegations surrounding several of his players, many of them involving rape has led to widespread scrutiny of how he and the university have handled not only player discipline but player recruitment as well.

Perhaps the straw that broke the camels’ back was when defensive end Shawn Oakman, considered one of the top draft prospects coming out of Baylor in 2016, saw his football life come crashing down when allegations surfaced of him raping a woman.  TMZ had the report back in April.

"“Former college football star Shawn Oakman — who was once hailed as a top NFL prospect — has been arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting a woman earlier this month. Waco police confirm the 24-year-old was taken into custody Wednesday. As we previously reported, the former Baylor defensive end allegedly brought a woman home from a bar between 2 and 3 AM and forced her into his bedroom where she claims the 6’9″, 280-pounder ripped off her clothes and sexually assaulted her. Oakman told police the sex was consensual and denied any wrongdoing.”"

Naturally Oakman went undrafted but the incident also brought to light the fact that there were six other such sexual assault incidents among Baylor players when Art Briles was head coach, an egregious charge for any man who considers himself the leader of one of the more respected football programs in college sports.

It remains unclear what the future may hold for him, whether it was entirely his fault or not but chances are it will be difficult for him to find work for some time.  As for Baylor, it’s going to take some serious effort to emerge from the cloud of gloom over this disaster.