Stephen Garcia and his Idiot Switch

The big news to come out of the University of South Carolina's football program this week is the indefinite suspension (his fifth suspension overall) of senior quarterback Stephen Garcia from team activities for allegedly having shown up to an event organized by the South Eastern Conference smelling of alcohol and acting boisterously. ("Boisterously", in this context, has not been defined - for the punishment he's facing, I'm hoping he at least had the decency to strip down to his skivvies in front of a group of dignitaries and do his best Ric Flair impression.) This was after Garcia had been suspended just weeks earlier for having engaged in what we'll call "extracurricular activities" with a number of young ladies and a significant amount of liquid courage in his hotel room while the team was in Atlanta, GA last year for the SEC championship game. ("Pffft - amateur...", Charlie Sheen was heard to have commented.) After having served that suspension, Garcia spoke to the media and assured us all that it was the end of his wild ways - he even went so far as to guarantee that "nothing bad" would happen again.

To say that Garcia has a reputation of questionable judgement and behavior at Carolina would be an understatement - in fact, I'd go so far as to say that it may be his legacy at the school even with his statistics as a quarterback being what they are.  It seems almost as if Stephen (who was a sought after prospect coming out of high school) has been at USC for a decade, seeing as how he started school early in hopes of getting a leg-up on competing at a collegiate level.  He was arrested twice in 2007; first for public intoxication and failure to stop for a police officer, then again less than a month later for malicious damage to property after he keyed a professor's car.  He was suspended again in 2008 for an alcohol-related charge and hadn't been in hot water with the authorities or school officials since that time - up until earlier this week, that is.

Spurrier facepalm - we feel your pain, Steve...

I'm a believer in second chances.  I've screwed up plenty of times and fortunately there are no police records to account for any of those instances.  But Stephen is beyond a second chance.  For that matter, he's beyond a third and fourth chance as well.  He's a 23 year old man with a child and yet he still conducts himself as if he doesn't have any legitimate responsibilities, either to his family, school, or teammates.  You'd think he'd have learned to act like he had a touch of common sense by now but I'm guessing that would be asking too much of him.

If this entry comes off as sounding like it was written by a scorned fan, then you're very astute in your observation.  I feel particularly disappointed by Garcia because he has so much potential yet he's let us as members of the Gamecock faithful down on a multitude of occasions, not only off the field but on.  His tendencies of throwing passes directly into coverage, attempting to run his way out of pass rushes only to wind up with negative yardage plays, and being something of a butter-fingers when it comes to holding onto the ball while rushing are all well documented.  I mentioned his stats earlier in this post; Garcia is 17-13 all time as a starting quarterback at Carolina and this past year he threw 20 touchdowns and 14 interceptions.  His passer rating is respectable, but I would contend that it is what it is more so because of the receivers he's had to work with than his aptitude as a quarterback.  Take away Alshon Jeffrey and his passer rating drops by at least 50 points.

All these things have lead me to believe that Stephen has what I call an idiot switch buried somewhere within his brain.  Truth be told, we may all have an idiot switch as I think most people are capable of doing imperceptibly stupid things from time to time.  Like when Kyle Parker decided to give up close to $1,000,000 from the Colorado Rockies in order to play one more season of football for Clemson University. (Oh, please - like I'm going to write an entire blog post about something relating to Gamecock football without taking a shot at Clemson...) His idiot switch got flipped but he's since come to his senses, and most people who do get their idiot switch flipped find their way out of the predicament.  Unlike most of us, however, Garcia's behavior has lead me to believe that his idiot switch is permanently stuck in the "ON" position.

Durrrrr, it don't turn off...

Garcia's prospects of playing in the NFL weren't that great but his character issues will more than likely take him out of any serious consideration for anything other than a back-up position.  He'll probably be OK in life ultimately, though.  He's a sociology major, so with that, his criminal record, and his proclivity for drunkenness he could be a congressman or senator, no sweat.