With a whole host of Mountaineer news popping onto the scene in recent days, it felt like a Couch Burning Thoughts column was long overdue. Additionally, I may be difficult to contact once NCAA College Football 2010 comes out on Tuesday. A man has needs, you know.

Anyway, let's get right to the (Couch) Burning Thoughts...


- Let's hope Jonnie West has been working on his crossover.

Truck Bryant became the second Mountaineer point guard to be suspended indefinitely this summer, following accusations that he was involved in a hit-and-run automobile accident. The criminal complaint filed against Truck alleges that he collided with another woman's car in his silver Dodge Charger ( ) , then got out of the car, yelled at the woman, and fled from the scene. Police allegedly went to Truck's house, found his now severely damaged car, and have charged him with leaving the scene of an accident, failure to immediately report an accident, failing to maintain control of his vehicle, and failure of duty to give information and render aid, all misdemeanors.

Aside from the remarkable coincidence that a man named "Truck" might have a reckless disregard for traffic laws, the Mountaineers will be hamstrung in the backcourt if the suspensions of Truck and Joe Mazzulla are maintained into next season.




An approximate recreation of the alleged hit-and-run accident involving Truck Bryant.


- Sometimes there's something to be said for leaving a little mystery between ourselves and the players.

I recently gave in to the Dark Side and joined Facebook. I added Frank "the Tank" Young to my friends list the other day and have been thoroughly depressed that it hasn't lived up to what I'd hoped for. I hoped to get news and insight into the whereabouts of a Mountaineer standout so prominent in my memories of WVU basketball that he appears on the header of our very website. Instead I got stuff like this:

"Frank Young: Is ridin home listenin to dat cocaine musik 3"

As disappointed as I was that I wasn't getting more insight, the reason that I'm posting this is that I basically fell on the floor when I saw the following post on Frank's page:

"Frank Young: Is sayin u betta do you cuz he gon def do him!!!"

Now, the comment itself wasn't that great, but that which appeared beneath it was pure gold:

"Sparkle Davis likes this."

That's right! It's effin' SPARKLE DAVIS!!!



- And now, allow me to overhype the hell out of kids that may or may not play a down for the Mountaineers:

I'm not much of a recruiting guy. I totally understand that some people get way into recruiting and want to know every little thing about every kid that may or may not commit to WVU, including 40 times, SAT scores, and the results of psychological examinations done during the disposition stage of their juvenile delinquency proceedings. I get it.

But usually, I take interest in a football player only once he's actually contributing on the field for the Mountaineers. I can't stand star ratings that never bear out (seriously, how many stars did Pat White have as a QB or Steve Slaton have as a RB? How important can it be?), especially considering that whoever is doing the reporting just finds the site that gives their guy the most amount of stars.

So with that giant caveat, because it's summer and there's no real other news, here's a two highly-touted kids that the Mountaineers recently reeled in from the class of 2010, on behalf of those, like myself, that may not follow recruiting as closely as stock brokers follow the stock market. You know, just so we can sound like we know what we're talking about.


- Braylon Heard | ATH (RB/DB)

Hometown Youngstown, OH
High School Cardinal Mooney High School
Height 5'11"
Weight 175 lbs.

Turned down offers from Penn State, Pitt, Nebraska, NC State, Michigan State, and Cincinnati. The highlight reel on this guy makes him look like a slightly slower Bo Jackson. (Note- from me, this is a gigantic compliment. I consider Bo Jackson to be the greatest running back in football history.) Graded as a 77 by ESPN recruiting, but admittedly stacked in the category of "badassery". Observe:





- Barry Brunetti | QB

Hometown Memphis, TN
High School Memphis University School
Height 6'0"
Weight 205 lbs.

Highly sought-after QB prospect turned down offers from Tennessee, Penn State, Purdue, and others in giving WVU a verbal commitment. Ranked in the top ESPN Top 150 for 2010. The video quality sucks, but you can see an example of the kid's speed and arm, while feeling comfortable that between Brunetti and Gino Smith, WVU is going to have no problems with QB depth in the foreseeable future:




- Few things are guaranteed in life, but this is one: Gilbert Arenas is not fearing for his starting gig

Many Mountaineer fans were pleased to find that former WVU basketball player Alex Ruoff signed with the Washington Wizards as part of their summer league team. It now appears as well that Ruoff signed a contract to play in Belgium should he not receive a contract offer from the Wizards for next season.

I don't really have anything funny to add here, but considering that this story contains a mention of Belgium, that seems like a flimsy-enough excuse to re-post my all-time favorite picture:




Belgium wouldn't be so bad, Alex.


- And finally, for those of you who aren't already locked in for the exhilarating WVU/Liberty showdown...

A limited number of WVU football season tickets go on sale Monday. Most of the tickets still available will require a Mountaineer Athletic Club extortion donation (probably of at least 100 dollars per seat) in addition to the $325 price tag on each seat.

WVU has a 7 game home schedule this year featuring Liberty, ECU, Colorado, Marshall, UConn, Louisville, and Pitt.

If you want my honest opinion (and of course you do if you've read this far into the article), the required MAC donations are an absolute sham, and a big reason that many of the ordinary, old-school Mountaineer fans that used to attend games have been priced out of the stadium. Sure, you have to pay for quality and WVU fans have been blessed with teams that have been in contention for major national recognition in the past few years. And sure, as a result of that success, the market has led to increased ticket demand from folks all around the Mountain State that have popped out of the woodwork as closet WVU fans once the team began competing nationally again.

But count me among those that aren't that enthusiastic about laying down almost a grand for two tickets to a home schedule that will, in all likelihood, feature a grand total of two potentially competitive games (Pitt and Colorado), and those games will be played against teams that may not even be ranked in the top 25 when they come to Mountaineer Field.

Sure, students don't care- they get in the game for free. And many bigwigs don't care either, an extra thou here and there doesn't mean much. But if you want to know why Mountaineer Field isn't as loud as it used to be and why there's an inordinate number of fans that show up late and leave early, there's your reason.



Have a good weekend, everybody. Happy NCAA 2010 to all of you.