It was certainly one of the greatest nights of his life. Kyler Murray (shown), the quarterback for the storied football program at the University of Oklahoma, had just won college football’s most coveted award — the Heisman Trophy — giving the Sooners their seventh winner (a number matched only by the historic programs of Notre Dame and Ohio State), when USA Today decided to dig up tweets Murray made when he was a 15-year-old boy in Allen, Texas.
Scott Gleeson, a USA Today writer based in Chicago, who, by his own admission, “focuses on issues outside the general sports arena — on LGBT athletes and coaches” and other such “social issues” — reported that Murray had evidently not been as politically correct when he was 15 as Gleeson felt he should have been. Gleeson wrote, “But the Oklahoma quarterback’s memorable night also helped resurface social media’s memory of several homophobic tweets more than six years old.”
Gleeson said, “When Murray was 15 years old, he tweeted at his friends (via his since-verified Twitter account) using an anti-gay slur to defame them. Four offensive tweets remained active on his account late Saturday night.”
That a reporter would actually dig up remarks made by a teenage boy bantering with his friends in order to throw a cloud over his great night is certainly reprehensible, but not surprising. After all, one only has to recall how Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee chose to dig up an old high-school yearbook in a vain effort to smear Judge Brett Kavanaugh, and keep him off the Supreme Court. But, of course, that is politics. Apparently, to some on the Left, nothing is off limits, even if someone is not running for political office.
Murray has had a remarkable athletic career, winning three state championships as quarterback for his Allen, Texas, high-school football team, never losing a game, and garnering records leading him to be considered the greatest quarterback in Texas high school history. After originally attending Texas A & M in College Station, Texas (where his father was a star quarterback), he transferred to OU, only to find himself sitting on the bench, backing up last year’s Heisman Trophy winner, Baker Mayfield.
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There was no drop-off at the quarterback position at OU after Mayfield graduated, and Murray had a season that, if anything, eclipsed even Mayfield’s record-breaking season. Despite playing only one season at OU as the starting quarterback, Murray emerged without any pre-season hype to win the Heisman Trophy.
It was particularly amazing, considering that Murray had already been drafted in the first round — in the Major League baseball draft to play for the Oakland Athletics. He could have simply left OU behind and taken the nearly $5 million contract, but he wanted to play football at the college level for one more season.
In addition to his athletic prowess, Murray made his mark in Norman as a model citizen who never got into any trouble whatsoever. He used some of his baseball earnings to take his offensive line out to eat every Wednesday at the Campus Corner restaurant, Tea Café. The most trouble he ever got into at OU was being late for a team meeting — once — when he failed to set his alarm.
In his Heisman acceptance speech, he showed tremendous humility in thanking multiple numbers of people, including his mother, his father, his teammates and coaches, the fans — even his nutritionist —and above all, God.
Obviously, this is someone who should be in the crosshairs of a left-wing USA Today reporter.
Where will this madness stop? Will actions and comments from grade school, or even daycare, now be considered proper material for enforcing the liberal code of political correctness?
When the USA Today story came out Monday, Murray offered an apology, explaining that he “did not intend to single out any individual or group.”
Gleeson needs to offer up his own apology, along with the editors of USA Today. Fortunately, as The Blaze reported, “USA Today received widespread condemnation on social media for publishing the story — and even attempting to reach Oklahoma University’s athletic department for comment — on a night of celebration for both Murray and Oklahoma University.”
One person on Twitter summed it up neatly: “Kyler Murray just had the greatest moment in his life and you guys want to ruin it with a stupid tweet you dug up from when he was FIFTEEN YEAR OLD?! … There’s no low mainstream media won’t dive down to for clicks.”
Photo: AP Images
