The System: The Glory and Scandal of Big-Time College Football (17 page)

But Craig James wasn’t amused. It was the first he’d heard that his son had a concussion. He took exception to his treatment. He texted back to his son, “Think about what you will allow me to do.”

“Okay, I’ll call you when I get out,” Adam texted. “Don’t do anything yet though.”

Later that evening, Craig spoke to Adam, obtaining more details. But Adam made clear that he didn’t want his father intervening—that would only make things worse. Nonetheless, he told his father about the colorful language Leach had used with the trainer.

As a former player, James was used to profanity from coaches. But as a father, he felt Leach had crossed the line. “You hear the f-bomb on the practice field all the time,” James said. “It just rolls off your back. But this here is an injured student-athlete with a concussion. Adam was humiliated.”

Nonetheless, at Adam’s insistence, Craig promised to stay out of it.

That night, Craig and his wife, Marilyn, couldn’t sleep. In high school Adam had sustained a concussion playing baseball. They worried about the effects of a second one. Lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, Marilyn peppered Craig with questions.

“Why is he in a shed?

“Why isn’t he in the training room?

“What if he had fallen down and passed out?”

Craig had the same questions. And he couldn’t help wondering what was in store for their son at the next practice.

The team didn’t practice the following day. But on December 19, Tech practiced at Jones AT&T Stadium. Adam James felt much better, and this time he showed up in appropriate attire. But the doctor still hadn’t cleared him to practice. When Pincock asked Leach what he wanted done with James, he said to do the same thing.

This time Pincock led James through the stadium tunnel to the media room, a space reserved for reporters to conduct postgame interviews. It contained numerous television screens, a table and some chairs. It also had a cramped electrical closet with wires, a panel of circuits and a pile of electronic devices. After removing the chairs from the media room, Pincock inspected the electrical closet and told James that the closet was off-limits.

Over the next two hours, James remained alone, standing in the darkened media room. At one point, unbeknownst to anyone else, he entered the electrical closet, closed himself inside and used his phone to record a short video of himself. “I’ll turn the lights on real quick,” he said into the microphone on his phone. “So I got to be … I got to be fast.” When asked later why he made the video, he responded, “So I could show my friends.”

Early that evening, Craig and Marilyn James had just sat down for dinner at a restaurant when Marilyn got a call from Adam. She asked how things went at practice. He reported that he’d been confined again. This time she put her foot down.

“This will stop,” she told Adam.

Craig looked on.

“You’re an adult,” Marilyn continued. “But you are still our child. We are going to put a stop to this.”

Craig agreed. “We never dreamed he would put him back in dark, solitary confinement,” he said.

They decided to approach Tech’s chancellor, Kent Hance. Earlier in the season James had met Hance briefly after a game, but he didn’t know how to reach him. However, Marilyn had a connection to the vice chairman of Tech’s board of trustees, Larry Anders. She called a friend, and within thirty minutes Craig received a call from Anders. He was at a wedding reception in Dallas at the Belo Mansion & Pavilion for Texas governor Rick Perry’s son. Kent Hance was there, too. James told Anders that his son had been mistreated twice and he wanted the chancellor to put a stop to it.

After speaking to James, Anders cornered Hance. “We’ve got a problem,” he began.

Hance said he’d handle it. It wasn’t the first time he had dealt with a situation involving Leach. Back in 2007, after Texas beat Texas Tech 59–43, Leach called the officiating crew “a complete travesty” in his postgame press conference. He pointed out that one official was from Austin and suggested that the Big 12 Conference take a serious look at using out-of-conference officials for future Texas–Texas Tech games. Commissioner Dan Beebe fined Leach $10,000 for questioning the integrity and competence of game officials. It was the largest fine in conference history. But Leach refused to back away from his comments. He also didn’t pay the fine. To resolve the matter, Hance paid the fine out of his pocket.

Hance ducked out of the reception and called Leach. He explained that the James family had made a complaint. The idea that Craig James had gone to the board of regents set Leach off. He decided he’d had enough of Adam James. “I’m going to kick him off the team tonight,” Leach said.

“You can’t do that,” Hance said.

Leach rattled off a series of issues with Craig and Adam James, including the time Adam broke a door at the coach’s office.

“Well, hell, you should have kicked him off the team back when he did those things,” Hance said. “But you can’t do it now.”

The longer the conversation went, the more adamant Leach became.
Hance, a former lawyer and congressman, was looking for a quick solution. He proposed some options for Leach to consider:

“If he will transfer, I will give him a release,” Leach said.

Hance said he would talk to Craig James. In the meantime, he wanted Leach’s assurance that Adam would not be put in any kind of confined areas during the next practice.

It was midnight by the time Hance reached James, who had waited for the call. He gave Hance an earful. “He tells the trainer put his fucking pussy ass in a place so dark the only thing he can do is reach down with his hands and touch his dick to know he has one?” Craig said. “I’ve been in this business all my life, and I’ve never heard a coach anywhere at any level put someone in confinement like that, especially with a concussion.”

“I’ve spoken to Leach,” Hance told James. “He said this is all about playing time and you’re a helicopter dad.”

James was incredulous. As an ESPN analyst, he hung around lots of teams and attended plenty of practices. It wasn’t unusual for coaches like Mack Brown at Texas, Pete Carroll at USC and Urban Meyer at Florida to invite him on the field. “But when I went to Tech practices, I made a point to stay on the sidelines and away from the football kind of stuff,” James said. “Adam would not have wanted a perception by his teammates that anything was going on.”

Hance offered up the same three options that he had previously discussed with Leach. But James said his son had no interest in leaving the program—he loved Tech and his teammates. Rather, Craig wanted Leach held accountable.

Getting nowhere, Hance decided to conduct an internal investigation.

Charlotte Bingham didn’t work directly with athletics at Texas Tech. A former trial lawyer with the Lubbock firm Crenshaw, Dupree & Milam,
she joined the Texas Tech University System as assistant vice chancellor for administration. She reported directly to Hance, and her responsibilities included oversight of any employee complaints related to discrimination or violations of university policy. On the afternoon of December 20, Bingham received an urgent call from Hance. He told her about Craig James’s allegations. He asked her to get to the bottom of the matter.

Over the ensuing forty-eight hours, Bingham interviewed Craig and Adam James, the team doctor, the team trainer and members of the football staff. Leach was the last person she interviewed. While Bingham questioned Leach on December 22 in Lubbock, Craig James flew to San Diego to work the Poinsettia Bowl. That night over dinner he told a colleague at ESPN what was going on. His colleague gave him one piece of advice: consider hiring a PR firm. “This will be a big deal if it breaks,” his colleague told him.

James didn’t hesitate. Already weighing a run for U.S. Congress, he called his political consultant back in Texas as soon as he got to his hotel room that night. His consultant recommended Spaeth Communications in Dallas. Spaeth’s Web site said it specializes in “mastering the media,” “witness preparation and trial support” and “crisis management.”

The following day, James authorized his lawyer James Drakeley to retain Spaeth.

Meanwhile, Charlotte Bingham met with Kent Hance, university president Guy Bailey and athletic director Gerald Myers and gave an oral summary of her findings:

Bingham’s findings were also shared with two senior members of the board of regents—Larry Anders and Jerry Turner, a prominent attorney
who had been the captain of the Tech football team in the late 1960s. Disturbed, the trustees wanted Craig James’s complaint handled swiftly.

Hance called Craig James in San Diego and told him that his complaint had been “substantially verified” by Bingham’s investigation.

“Okay,” James told Hance. “What’s going to happen?”

“Tell us what you guys are looking for,” Hance said.

“He needs to apologize for what he’s done,” James said. “And he needs to be held accountable.”

After hanging up with James, Hance received a text message from him that left no doubts about James’s stance. “Adam’s claim has been verified,” James texted Hance on December 23. “If any person or organization associated with Tech did what Mike did to Adam, they would be fired, which is exactly what we expect to happen to Mike.”

The decision whether to fire the head football coach rested with the athletic director, who reported to the president. But neither Myers nor Bailey wanted to fire Leach. They thought it was unnecessary and suggested some ways to resolve the matter that weren’t so extreme.