The Sports Culture brings our attention to this excerpt from Notre Dame’s Media Conference yesterday. When a reporter did his job and asked ND coach Charlie Weis about the pictures of his young quarterback that originally appeared on this site last week, Weis responded in a focused fashion:

Q. I your thoughts on the pictures that appeared online earlier this week and what happens from here?
COACH WEIS: I’m going to answer that in two sentences. First of all, I think the obvious thing, on a serious note, I think it’s important that I don’t condone underage drinking. I think that’s important to say.
But that being said and no sarcastic moment really meant to be, but give me a break. Let’s move on on.

Holy, Touchdown Jesus! What a novel idea.

Weis took the proper “official” response about underage drinking and in the next breath said “Come on, this is stupid.” Clausen is a college kid – he’s probably going to drink before he turns 21. I’m even fairly certain there are statistics and studies that would back me up if I looked hard enough.

AJ at Deadspin chalked Weis’ response up to his general dickishness (Which I can see and hear if you read the responses with a different inflection.), but I like to think that the responses (more below) come from a place of, almost, common sense wherein he really thought “This is stupid. It’s a college kid drinking.”

Either way, the reporter attempted to press on:

Q. Well, let me ask you this –
COACH WEIS: Let’s move on.

Q. I’m going to ask you this question anyway. The players, let’s face it, they are underage and they pose for a picture in a situation that allegedly is questionable. They were in a position where they were allegedly drinking. Your thoughts on that?
COACH WEIS: Alleged by who?

Q. The website said they were participating in something called the Beer Olympics.
COACH WEIS: I said let’s give them a break and let’s move on. That’s as far as I’m going to say. I’m not going to take it any further than that.

Q. Not going to be any discipline?
COACH WEIS: Let’s move on on.

I hope I’m never forced to ask such stupid questions of someone. “What are your thoughts on a situation that allegedly is questionable?” Obviously, we can’t say that Jimmy Clausen was drinking. Take this line from the original post for example:

Over the weekend, a reader sent us these alleged photos of Notre Dame QB Jimmy Clausen partaking in something called the ‘Beer Olympics.’

*Air quotes* “Alleged” */Air quotes* TBL was very careful not to make anything sound like it so obviously (allegedly) was.

Besides the solo cups and pitchers with a beer-like liquid

Why can’t 20-year-old Jimmy Clausen enjoy the (alleged) Beer Olympics? This whole situation reminds me of an old quote:

The issue here is not whether we broke a few rules, or took a few liberties with our female party guests; we did. But you can’t hold a whole fraternity responsible for the behavior of a few sick, perverted individuals. For if you do, then shouldn’t we blame the whole fraternity system? And if the whole fraternity system is guilty, then isn’t this an indictment of our educational institutions in general? I put it to you, Greg! Isn’t this an indictment of our entire American society? Well, you can do what you want to us, but we’re not going to sit here and listen to you bad-mouth the United States of America! Gentlemen!

Whether or not these photos should have even been run in the first place is another debate that we’ll have the next time pictures of an athlete (allegedly) consuming alcohol find their way into our Inbox. For now, let’s just leave the Clausen pictures behind. It’s what Charlie Weis wants; I’m sure it’s what Jimmy Clausen wants; and I’m certain it’s what the idiot who called TBL a “scum sucking c***” wants.