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Give a guy a chance

Wildcat File Photo Arizona Daily Wildcat Mike Jenkins

The anticipation of looking at the cut list is grueling. You just gave every ounce of your energy in the attempt of achieving a dream. For some, this has been a lifelong dream. For others, an attempt to make something of their life. This is walk-on tryouts at the University of Arizona for the three major sports: basketball, baseball, and football.

Your chances of making either of the three teams: virtually none. The problem with walk-on tryouts is that you are not given a fair shake.

Basketball is the toughest to make of the three sports. Only 12-13 roster spots are available and almost, if not all of these spots, are already given to scholarship players. Some players are told not to even try out. The issue at hand, is giving every person an attempt to show what he or she can do on the court.

A guy that I know was offered positions at other Division I schools but was told to not even bother with trying out. What is that? If he is not good enough, cut him. Why not run him through an extensive workout. What do you have to lose?

Baseball at this school would figure to have more positions open due to the number of players on a squad. Fat chance. The baseball program is notorious for not taking walk-ons. I have known a few people that have tried out for baseball, two all-region players and one all-state player in high school, and all of them were cut. I asked them about their workouts and their response was; "I threw about twenty pitches", or "We hit a little and fielded a few ground balls." The worst thing about baseball is that they don't put up a list to show who has made the team. They tell you that they will call you if you made the team.

Great! Put a guy through misery for an undue number of days, even weeks, in anticipation of a phone call to tell him his dream has been fulfilled. Again, put the guys through a better workout. If there are too many guys, split it into two workouts. You never know what you will uncover.

After hearing about these two incidents, I wanted to see a walk-on tryout for myself. So on Monday, I wandered over to the practice fields to watch football walk-on tryouts. What I saw astonished me. About 40 players went out and after running two 20 and 40 yard dashes, they were split into groups by position. I happened to be watching the wide receivers. They ran a total of four drills. Every group ran about four drills! Then they were promptly measured for height and weight and told to check the list the next day. Nice workout!

I bet you are really able to test true talent in four or five drills. It's not like the team doesn't need help at certain positions, like cornerback, wide receiver, and kicker. Maybe some route-running with wide receivers running against cornerbacks. This would also test the quarterbacks ability to throw into coverage. When a coach was asked about the possibility of this happening, he chuckled and said, "Are you kidding me?"

Hey, I'm not a coach and some of you may think I am bitter. Well, I'm not. I just get extremely agitated when people don't receive a fair chance in any aspect of life. The way tryouts are run now isn't fair. If you aren't going to change the procedures, then eliminate the whole walk-on process for these sports. It will save us all a hell of a lot of time.