Steve Spurrier is Gonna Be Pissed: Newspaper Changes Mind, Will Let Columnist Cover South Carolina

Steve Spurrier’s bully act in South Carolina is over, it appears.

After the ol’ ball coach was successful in getting The State columnist Ron Morris to stop writing about his Gamecocks, Spurrier was exposed by media guy Jim Romenesko this week, and the paper wisely reversed its position. Here’s the paper’s internal email that Romesnko obtained Thursday:

"Colleagues, I assume you are familiar with articles and talk about The State, Steve Spurrier and Ron Morris. Please know this today: Ron Morris and other columnists at The State are free to pursue topics and stories as guided by their curiosity, their news judgment, their obligation to readers and our standards for quality journalism. No subject or individual is off limits for examination. Relationships can be difficult between news makers and journalists, especially those who write analysis, commentary and opinion. You all understand why. Around here, much has been said and written about Spurrier and Ron — in blogs, on the web, on talk shows and in other publications. . As with any relationship, it sometimes helps to step back and allow conditions to cool. In recent months, we asked Ron to draw upon his considerable sports knowledge and experience to produce highly readable, relevant columns and enterprise features.The work has been outstanding and has given sports fans much to enjoy and to think about. During this time, we asked Ron to focus first on coverage other than the USC football program. Moving forward, all topics — including USC football — are in play. As always, this is a newspaper committed to accuracy, fairness and holding accountable the news makers and institutions that serve our community and our state."

The Gamecocks are home to Vanderbilt Saturday at 7 pm. The game is on ESPN. Can you imagine if Morris shows up and South Carolina loses? The latter probably won’t happen, but either way, I hope the postgame press conference is televised, because I can only imagine how pissed Spurrier would be to not only see Morris, but to have to answer a question from him.