I don't know why Lane Kiffin is even talking about this -- hopefully he was asked the question by some media member -- but the man has said that junior Eric Berry can run through the T solo on Senior Day Saturday against Vanderbilt. Normally, that privilege is reserved for seniors. Kiffin does say that he doesn't believe Berry would want to do that, so I'm guessing the loaded question did in fact come from someone with a camera and/or digital recorder.
The whole thing makes me uncomfortable. I'm a huge Eric Berry fan. Who isn't around here? Shoot, he's like Tim Tebow in that he has fans who root for other teams and those who don't follow football at all. But should he get a solo run through the T on Senior Day as a junior?
There's no question that if Berry decides to hang up the college cleats and head off early into the NFL sunset that he'll be drafted. But what about next year and the years after that when juniors of the future are either just considering going pro or thinking that they can, and then find out they can't. We'd want them if they changed their mind or learned they wouldn't go as high as they'd wished. But would they then run solo through the T again the next year? Would the whole idea of having juniors do it dilute the meaning of the tradition for seniors?
Juniors in this dilemma probably have an NFL career ahead of them. Is that enough to compensate for missing the senior tradition? For the seniors without moneybags in their futures, should they get something that's special?
Yet Berry's almost certainly leaving, and we know it. Shouldn't we have a chance to say goodbye? To devote a mere 30 seconds to acknowledging that this will likely be his last home game in orange?
What do y'all think? Should junior Eric Berry be permitted to run through the T by himself like the seniors on Saturday? Why or why not?