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Missouri's Gary Pinkel: Players' coach or simply pragmatic?

COLUMBIA, Missouri – Michael Sam saw his old coach on Tuesday and couldn't help but give him a hug.

"Coach," Sam told Gary Pinkel, "you are an amazing person."

The head football coach at the University of Missouri made a historic decision over the weekend when he supported his players in their protest of racial inequality at their school. The team vowed not to practice or play until graduate student Jonathan Butler ended his hunger strike, and Pinkel chose to back them. In that instant, the student movement went from curious to serious in the national zeitgeist.

And Pinkel's reputation among players and onlookers rose to unprecedented levels.

A cynical person can point to the pragmatism in this. If Pinkel did not back his team, he could have lost his team. He could have lost recruits. Taking it a little further, he could have lost games and perhaps, eventually, his job. There was a lot to gain by joining with his players, and relatively little to lose. He has been quite successful here, winning consecutive division titles, so even if he were somehow fired for daring to support a student movement, he would not have been looking for work for long. He empowered his players, and empowered himself as well.

Gary Pinkel walks to practice on Nov. 10, 2015 in Columbia, Missouri. (Getty)
Gary Pinkel walks to practice on Nov. 10, 2015 in Columbia, Missouri. (Getty)

All that notwithstanding, Pinkel's most impressive (and useful) trait over the last several days has been in the way he says a lot without saying much.

Sam mentioned this in his recounting of how Pinkel supported him when he decided to come out during his final year at the school – another national story that could have thrown the team into turmoil. Sam remembers Pinkel saying simply, "I got your back."

"He had my back since Day 1," Sam said. "He made me feel so comfortable."

What was remarkable then is remarkable again now: the lack of visible dissension or dispute among the Missouri players. The team was not of one mind during this process, and some players were reportedly "pissed." Yet that didn't surface in a way that caused a great deal of public controversy.

During Sam's career, teammates knew about his sexual orientation long before the public did, and still no one said a word to the media. Credit goes to the players, first and foremost, but Pinkel deserves some as well. The team has stuck together through two runs to the SEC Championship Game and two national stories that had reporters prying for days on end.

To be sure, some of this can be traced to reticence. The players were not made available to the media this week. Their usual media day, Monday, was canceled as the school's president and chancellor stepped down and protests swept the campus. If there were one or more media sessions, there would have likely been grist for a news cycle, and perhaps further cracks in the united front the players showed.

But again, Pinkel spoke for the team in a terse but admirable way, saying on the SEC conference call Wednesday that the fear on campus after social media threats to black students was felt by people of all races and ethnicities. "Anybody could feel scared," he said, "and not very secure."

There's some dark irony to that, as Pinkel was embroiled in a scandal last year when ESPN reported the coach knew about a rape allegation against former running back Derrick Washington, and he did not discipline the player because police didn't file charges. In 2010, Washington was charged with deviant sexual assault. ESPN reported Washington was accused of assault by four different women before his arrest and dismissal from the team. The situation was not too dissimilar to the recent events at Baylor, where head coach Art Briles was skewered by the media for his lack of vetting of a transfer from Boise State with a checkered past. The transfer, Sam Ukwuachu, was convicted of rape after arriving at Baylor.

In the aftermath of that 2014 report, Missouri university chancellor R. Bowen Loftin issued a statement admitting, "our internal processes broke down." He went on:

"Our students and their parents, our faculty and staff, our alumni and community neighbors all deserve a safe and secure campus environment, and you have my word and my solemn promise that I and our entire administration will continue to work toward that end."

That statement put heat on Pinkel in a similar way the coach's decision this past weekend placed extra scrutiny on the chancellor. Both the coach and the administrator were under pressure to ensure a hospitable campus environment. Pinkel survived; the chancellor did not.

Gary Pinkel (R), Michael Sam (52) and Robert Luce look on before the Cotton Bowl in January 2014. (AP)
Gary Pinkel (R), Michael Sam (52) and Robert Luce look on before the Cotton Bowl in January 2014. (AP)

A lot of this is because of the inordinate power of the football coach. Pinkel makes more than $4 million a year, and if you include the $1 million paid to BYU for this weekend's game, any administrator is relatively expendable in a fiscal sense. Then there's the power structure within the sport, where a coach can decide who to recruit, who to play, who to renew on scholarship. If student-athletes revolt against a president or chancellor, there's little fear of reprisal as long as the coach is in support. If players revolt against their coach? That's a different story.

Still, the message Pinkel has sent to his players was one of clear support. In a campus environment where minority students have not felt appreciated or understood, Pinkel has succeeded in making them feel heard. That is something that will ingratiate him to recruits, and perhaps to the history of this school.

"He's under a lot of pressure, but he's handled it with grace," Sam said. "He's doing the right thing. Sometimes doing the right thing, people don't like when you're doing the right thing, and that's really sad. He'd do it again, too. Because that's who he is. That's the type of man I play for. A man who cares about his athletes and cares about you as an individual."

During a week of fear and distrust, Pinkel has provided what his players wanted most: reassurance and belief.