By Andrew Kulha,Yardbarker
Copyright yardbarker
The South Carolina Gamecocks may be without star quarterback LaNorris Sellers on Saturday as they take on the No. 22 Missouri Tigers on the road.
Of course, head coach Shane Beamer isn’t just going to come out and give the Tigers his game plan, or the true status of Sellers, until he has to.
“Nope, we have an injury report for an SEC game that we release on Wednesday nights,” Beamer said on Tuesday when asked about the status of his quarterback, according to Alex Byington of On3.
Sellers, a sophomore quarterback from Florence, South Carolina, left the Gamecocks’ Week 3 loss to the Vanderbilt Commodores with a concussion he suffered at the end of the first half.
He’s officially questionable heading into the Mizzou game, but if you read between the lines of what Beamer is saying, it sounds like he may not be ready to go in time.
“Yeah, we have a pretty consistent policy if you don’t practice Tuesday or Wednesday, you’re not going to play,” Beamer said. “I don’t care who you are, if you don’t get out there and practice on Tuesdays and Wednesdays especially, it’s really tough to just practice on Thursday. Practice on Thursdays are important here, but it’s a little bit of a shorter day, and the base or bulk of your gameplan is (installed) on Tuesday and Wednesday.
“So whether you’re an offensive player, a defensive player, or a special teams player, we need to be able to see you do something on Tuesday or Wednesday.”
The phraseology to keep an eye on here is the “I don’t care who you are” from Beamer.
If he were talking about a special teams player being out, he’d likely just say it and move on. Heck, if a special teams player was working his way back from an injury and lobbying to play, that’s a pretty easy “no” from the head coach.
Instead, what it seems like he’s doing is signaling to both the South Carolina fanbase as well as his team that nobody, not even the star quarterback, gets preferential treatment when it comes to sitting out of practice with injury and then getting to play in the game.
Not only is Beamer providing expectations to the fanbase to buckle up for a contest against Mizzou against Sellers, but he’s low-key reinforcing his authority as not just the head coach, but the CEO of the program. He’s not just in charge of Xs and Os. He’s in charge of everything.
Of course, Beamer and the Gamecocks will absolutely miss Sellers if he can’t play against Mizzou, but some things are bigger than one game.
When it comes to brain health and recovering from a concussion, Sellers has a whole life after football worth sitting out this game for.
