Campbell Should Be Allowed to Pursue His Dream

Of course, now people are talking about how classy Caleb Campbell is -- many of them the same people who were calling him a traitor and a deserter a couple months ago. He's the same person now as he was then. The only difference is that the Army let him down.

What the self-righteous super-patriots don't understand is that Campbell would have been more valuable to the Army had he made the Lions than he will be in combat. (By the way -- he won't be in combat this fall. He'll be coaching football at the Army Prep School. No doubt the country will be a safer place with Campbell coaching future cadets than it would have been with him playing pro football.) The two greatest recruiters in the history of the Naval Academy, without any question or doubt, were Roger Staubach and David Robinson.

Staubach was so gifted as a quarterback that he was able to excel for the Dallas Cowboys in the NFL after serving four years ¿ including a stint in Vietnam ¿ after his graduation from Navy. Robinson served two years -- confined to a desk job because of his height -- before going on to a Hall of Fame career with the San Antonio Spurs.

If Campbell had made the Lions, every time he made a play, the TV announcers would have talked about the fact that he was a lieutenant in the Army, working as a recruiter. Because he's bright and articulate, he would have been a perfect spokesman for the Army and for West Point. His presence in an NFL uniform would have been a huge morale boost to those serving overseas and to those in uniform, not to mention the midshipmen and cadets at the academies.

The Army's decision to give him a chance was applauded by ex-players -- at Navy and Air Force as well as at Army. Knowing full well that the number of athletes who would be affected by this rule would be less than a handful at each school, they all know that it would help recruiting -- just as the rule that Oliver Drake took advantage of helps recruiting. The difference, of course, is that the rule that allows a student to leave the academy after two years is for everyone; this rule is for a tiny handful of those who are exceptional in a specific area -- in this case athletics.

The Army's decision to renege on Campbell and the four other athletes who were in the program is, unfortunately, part of a continuing pattern. Army hasn't had a winning football season since 1996, and the military leadership of the school -- both at West Point and in the Pentagon -- has made one mistake after another.

First came the decision to join Conference USA, a league that had exactly one school (Tulane) that was in any way similar to Army academically. The move was a disaster from Day One. Then came a bunch of military people deciding they knew enough about athletics to hire an athletic director ¿ in this case, Rick Greenspan. Not only did Greenspan arrive having already decided to fire football coach Bob Sutton (who had led Army to a 10-2 record in 1996), but he had also decided to bring his own guy, Todd Berry (whom he had previously hired at Illinois State). He fired Sutton, who had worked at Army for 17 years, on a street corner in Philadelphia, then hired Berry while ignoring others who were interested in the job -- including Jim Tressel and Paul Johnson.

Three years later, Johnson's first Navy team -- which went 2-10 -- crushed Army 58-12 in a game in which it was apparent that the Cadets had quit on their coach. Why? Perhaps they were tired of hearing Berry publicly blame them for his failures.

But both Greenspan and the military brass refused to fire Berry. That led to the worst college football season in history -- 0-13 -- a year later. Berry was finally fired midway through that season and Greenspan mercifully left for Indiana a year after that. At Indiana, instead of destroying a football program, Greenspan blew up the basketball team. Army football, meantime, still hasn't recovered from the Greenspan-Berry era.

In the meantime, Johnson, who couldn't get an interview with Greenspan, took Navy to five straight bowl games, five straight Commander-in-Chiefs trophies and six straight wins over Army -- the longest streak in the rivalry's history.

Only this fall, after four more failed seasons trying to run a pro-style offense, will Army return to the option offense that was successful for Jim Young and Sutton.

The decision to allow Campbell the chance to make the Lions appeared to be the first positive thing the military leaders had done for Army football in at least a dozen years. It was a smart decision and, if it had forced Navy and Air Force to follow suit, that would have been a good thing too. You see, what the flag-wavers don't want to understand is that, even in the midst of a disastrous war in Iraq and a war that won't end in Afghanistan, not everyone in the military is overseas. Some serve stateside in important roles -- recruiting in a time of war being one of the most important.

Had he made the Lions, Campbell would have been a great recruiter for the Army. He will no doubt serve the Army very well on active duty. The shame is that the Army didn't serve him or the country well with a decision that was both foolish and, more than that, cowardly. The Army should have stood up for Caleb Campbell in the same way it expects Caleb Campbell to stand up for his country.