If Ole Miss hires Beard, then success outweighs arrest
A coach’s introductory news conference usually includes a few perfunctory thank-you’s.
The coach thanks his family for their support, his new bosses for the opportunity and his past players and previous employer for the fun ride.
If Ole Miss hires Chris Beard as its men’s basketball coach, his introduction ought to include a few other thank-you’s.
Beard can thank Perry Minton, the lawyer who represented him after his arrest on a felony domestic violence charge.
He can thank José Garza, the Texas district attorney who declined to prosecute Beard and dropped the charge.
He can thank Randi Trew, his fiancée who said she never intended for Beard to be arrested in December or prosecuted. Trew shouldered blame for the “physical struggle” that resulted in her 911 call, police allegations that Beard had strangled her and Beard’s firing at Texas. Trew later said Beard never strangled her.
We’ll never know every detail of what occurred on the night of Beard’s arrest, but we know this: Beard is available to coach college athletes again, and he ought to feel thankful – and fortunate – as he attempts to resurrect his career at warp speed.
Beard is Ole Miss’ top candidate for its vacancy, ESPN reported Wednesday, thanks to an industry where your arrest record matters less than your win-loss record.
In a span of three months, Beard can go from mugshot to teaching jump shots again.
Beard’s alma mater fired him for cause in January, following his arrest. The prosecutor dropped the felony charge last month.
James Davis, the University of Texas vice president of legal affairs, wrote to Beard’s lawyer upon his firing that the university deemed Beard’s behavior “unacceptable” and that UT determined he was “unfit” to be its coach, regardless of whether the district attorney pursued charges.
Ah, but a coach who wins as often as Beard and who did not face criminal prosecution usually can find an administration willing to award a second chance. In slinks Ole Miss.
The Ole Miss administration would tell you, I’m sure, that it exercised due diligence in vetting Beard, and I don’t doubt it at least peeked inside Beard’s closet to count skeletons.
Apologists will do what they always do: They’ll speak of the need for second chances, and, hey, the charge was dropped.
But, let me ask this: If you learned your daughter or sister just got engaged to Beard, would you pop a bottle of bubbly and eagerly await the save the date? Maybe, but only if you didn’t read the police report or your Google search failed to turn up Davis’ letter that conveyed a stinging rebuke from Beard’s alma mater.
Fortunately for Beard, he’s a proven winner with a Final Four on his resume. And, fortunately for Beard, Trew said she didn’t want to pursue prosecution.
A December police affidavit cited Trew as saying a days-long argument had turned physical and that Beard choked her, bit her, caused bruises, threw her off the bed and went “nuts.”
Trew later apologized for breaking Beard’s eyeglasses and said that sparked the physical struggle. Beard acted in “self-defense,” Trew said, and he was not “intentionally” trying to harm her.
Anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of the criminal justice system knows prosecuting a domestic violence charge without a victim who desires prosecution is futile.
Honoring Trew’s wishes, the prosecutor walked away from the case, saying the “felony offense cannot be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Voila. Problem solved. The lack of felony prosecution made Beard hirable. So does his 237-98 career record that includes a 2019 national runner-up finish with Texas Tech.
Could Beard, 50, win at Ole Miss? He’d probably give the Rebels as good of a chance of success as anyone. He’s won everywhere he’s coached, although thriving at Ole Miss inside an SEC that grows deeper and stronger might rank as his biggest challenge.
Beard would need to recruit nationally and internationally, and he’d have to do it for a program without much pedigree. Nearly every basketball program needs a broad recruiting base. Certainly, Ole Miss does. Beard recruited far and wide at past stops, but the best player on his 2019 Texas Tech team that won 31 games was an instate signee. Don’t count on that advantage at Ole Miss.
Beard’s past success affords Ole Miss no guarantee. Auburn’s Bruce Pearl excels at a football school in a football-first state within a football-first conference, but other big-name coaches, like Ben Howland, Tom Crean and Cuonzo Martin, wilted in the SEC.
Jeremy Foley made the best SEC men’s basketball hire of the past three decades when he tapped Marshall’s 30year-old coach to awaken Florida. Billy Donovan remains the last coach to win consecutive national championships. More recently, Alabama and Arkansas struck it big by hiring from midmajors, and Missouri is ascending in its first season after plucking Dennis Gates from Cleveland State.
Keith Carter is a smart athletics director and a former All-america basketball player for the Rebels. Surely, his Rolodex is thick, but hiring Beard would be unimaginative, not to mention imprudent.
Some would compare such a move to Carter hiring Lane Kiffin, but while the Ole Miss football coach is a renegade who hasn’t always colored inside the lines, equating these two is an insult to Kiffin. Show me the police affidavit that accused Kiffin of a violent assault against a woman.
The charge against Beard didn’t stick. For that, he ought to feel gratitude.
Blake Toppmeyer is an SEC Columnist for the USA TODAY Network. Email him at Btoppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @btoppmeyer.