Oregon’s new coaching staff has been on the job for less than two months and already come under scrutiny for their handling of the program.
Three Ducks players ended up in the hospital as a result of the tough workouts the program had last week. They have since been released from the hospital. The man behind the workouts is new Oregon strength and conditioning coach, Irele Oderinde, who was suspended a month without pay as part of the fallout. The thinking is that the new Ducks coaches pushed the players too hard, but that’s not what head coach Willie Taggart thinks.
Taggart says the public portrayal of Oderinde is wrong.
“I trust him,” Taggart said of Oderinde, in comments to CSN Northwest. “I love what he did with our football team at South Florida and I know what he could do with our guys here. But now a good guy, a good strength coach is being portrayed as somebody just whipping our kids’ butts and that’s wrong.”
Oderinde has been supported by Ducks players as well as his former players at South Florida despite his suspension.
Taggart also says he believes some of the players pushed themselves to try and impress the new coaches.
“These guys were tough guys and wanted to show the coaches,” Taggart told CSN Northwest. “That’s probably what was part of the problem. They didn’t want to be the guy that quit. There were other guys that quit and they didn’t want to so they probably pushed themselves to a limit that they shouldn’t have.”
Oregon is now focusing on making sure players don’t push themselves past their limits, which could endanger them.
