No runoffs please

There is a lot of current chatter on the Inside Sparta Basketball MB about the pros and cons surrounding running off players who haven't performed well this season.

Each poster is obviously entitled to his/her opinion and to state such (thankfully) but something is missing from the debate thus far: please consider the moral aspect to this practice.

Student athletes have been invited to attend San Jose State University via an athletic scholarship.

They have accepted.

Granted, each awardee is aware that athletic scholarships are issued annually to both holdovers and newcomers and no promise is made for a full four years. Plus, some of those on this particular Spartan team were brought in by the previous coaching administration.

But it was and is an SJSU school representative doing the issuing.

However, we also can't forget that coaches are simply retained or fired based upon wins versus losses -- graduation rates and other such cheap ornamental talking points be damned.

All this is a business.

However, San Jose State University representatives entered the living rooms of these prospects and promised their parents/elders to take care of the kids being wooed. Such a commitment shouldn't be offered lightly.

Yes, coaches do lie. They over-promise. That's the salesman aspect of the job (and, for the record, so do prospects, their families and handlers). Coaches may not even be considering at the time of recruitment that dumping player X will ever need to happen but they should.

As a fan, I would rather endure losses if need be than force out a student athlete whose potential and promise was miscalculated. For the record, this requires absolutely zero nobility in stating such because it isn't my job possibly on the line.

The high road is taken because it's the right thing to do. It's not easy and there's not a lot of company or visceral reward to be found. 

And yes, there are those players who mess up academically and/or socially and have their 'ships pulled. There are some who don't commit to becoming better basketball players. Like with just about everything in life there are exceptions. Just don't do it to those giving their all just because it isn't enough.