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Sidelines
Kalani Simpson
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Is it more courageous to play now or heal up for Division I foes?
WELL, by now MY ankle is starting to hurt.
With all of the ankle updates and all the shots of Colt Brennan on crutches I wouldn't be surprised if half the crowd at Aloha Stadium tomorrow showed up walking with a subliminal limp.
So, now here it is, we're dealing with the aftermath of the Legend of Colt's Purple Ankle, which is: Ow.
As you may have heard, Brennan, Hawaii's fabulous quarterback, has a bad ankle. After a heroic effort (the Legend of Colt's Purple Ankle!) at UNLV, he's spent most of this week on crutches. (He'd hurt himself the way most of us do -- fooling around; to me, this only furthers his everyman appeal.)
He's said he's determined to try to play this week. But as we're seeing, this is what happens after you play on a bad ankle: Ow. And it apparently just isn't healing as fast as anybody (at least publicly) thought.
Dave Reardon reports that Colt did manage to Willis Reed it out there for yesterday's practice, but he was noticeably limping and was reduced to -- gasp! -- handing the ball off. So it does not sound good.
Ideally, you want him healing, not spending another week -- and this time leading into a Division I opponent, this time a WAC opponent, this time a road opponent -- where he's on crutches until Thursday. Ankles are temperamental enough. If you've got some time, take it. Heal up as much as you can while you can, because it's likely never going to be 100 percent the rest of the way. You'd rather have his ankle be a week better, in the end against Boise State and Washington, rather than a week worse.
Yet, there is still hope he'll find a way to make it out there for Saturday's game.
No, of course he shouldn't risk everything just to stay in a rhythm, just because he really wants to, or any of the other reasons offered. It just doesn't make sense. He should look to his partner in cosmetology/geography, fellow Hawaiian Islands map-head Blaze Soares, for a lesson in (if against his will) restraint. Soares has been held out of three games now as a precaution due to injury, and the poor guy might lose his mind if he's not allowed to hit somebody soon.
So if that's the precedent, why risk your best player's long-term availability and effectiveness against a Charleston Southern team that's just completed a 4,700-mile trip?
Oh, Brennan will probably be better by Saturday, and he'll probably be fine in the game. But if that means next week is like this one (ow) ...
Still, this week and the all ankle all the time only reminded most of us why we enjoy Brennan so much. I especially liked Reardon's story yesterday about Brennan's only other significant injury, in Pop Warner: "I had a really bad concussion as a kid," Colt said. "I was throwing up. I was taking too many shots to the head."
OK, anybody else get that? Colt Brennan? Throwing up? Then he grows up to be a great quarterback? It's like he discovered his super power, like Spider-Man!
(Also, another notch for his everyman appeal -- who among us has not taken too many shots to the head?)
A small part of me does want to see him out there on Saturday.
That part, however, is not my ankle, which for some reason seems to hurt. Careful, Colt. There are no inspirational tales of courageous comebacks from injury heading into games with Division I-AA teams.