The California cool reputation that Pete Carroll projects 24/7 took a bizarre beating last week.

Bizarre, because the public flogging of Southern California's football coach was self-inflicted.

A laid back, piano-playing connoisseur of fine wines with NFL head coaching experience on his resume, Carroll has long sold blue-chip recruits on his hip, SoCal cool approach to the college game and his NFL connections.

So it was shocking to watch Carroll lose his cool during a Thursday press conference. USC arranged the gathering so junior quarterback Mark Sanchez could announce he was leaving the Trojans a season early to enter the 2009 NFL Draft.

"The Prince of L.A.," as Carroll was recently described on the CBS program "60 Minutes," once reigned over Oklahoma and coach Bob Stoops for 60 embarrassing minutes. Carroll's Trojans hung a 55-19 whipping on the Sooners in the 2004 BCS national championship game.

But after his antics at Sanchez's press conference, Carroll demonstrated he doesn't belong on the same field as Stoops when it comes to handling a player who decides to ignore his coach's advice and leave early for the NFL.

A day before Carroll tossed Sanchez under the bus, Stoops was beaming at an OU press conference when Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Sam Bradford announced he would play for the Sooners in 2009 instead of chasing the millions that await him when he turns pro.

Stoops had good reason to be in high spirits. Tight end Jermaine Gresham and offensive tackle Trent Williams made it a hat (helmet) trick when they also elected to delay the start of their lucrative NFL careers until 2010.

Just a year earlier, however, Stoops experienced a situation similar to Carroll's. After making a strong pitch to All-American Curtis Lofton on why he should play his senior season at OU, Stoops was shocked when the linebacker opted to ignore him.

Stoops was also shook up. He understood the dramatic impact OU would feel with the loss of the Big 12's Defensive Player of the Year. Already deprived of depth at linebacker, the Sooners had no one with the experience and talent to man the middle and quarterback the defense in the spectacular fashion Lofton had performed in 2007.

Wide receiver Malcolm Kelly announced two days before Lofton that he was also leaving. Stoops' world was rocked again later that week when cornerback Reggie Smith surprised everyone when he joined the crowd and bolted early for the big NFL bucks.

But it was Lofton's decision that totally stunned Stoops. And yet the OU coach reacted calmly, praising Lofton and saying, "Curtis made a lot of big plays during his time here. We wish him all the best in the NFL."

Stoops also released statements supporting Kelly and Smith with similar wishes of good fortune in the next phase of their careers.

The normally glib, cheerful, chatty Carroll wasn't as gracious as Stoops when he bid goodbye to Sanchez. He refused to sit at the same table with the quarterback, who had led the Trojans to a 12-1 record and a Rose Bowl over Penn State, thus helping justify Carroll's $4.5 million per-year salary.

Or, as Los Angles Times columnist Bill Plaschke wrote, Carroll scorned Sanchez and "publicly treated him like a traitor."

An agitated Carroll, who had argued with Sanchez over the move well past midnight Wednesday, said, "We didn't see this decision the same. Mark is going against the grain in this decision, we know that, he knows that. We have compelling information working against the choice going this way."

Stoops had compelling facts and figures that countered those money-hungry agents who told Lofton he'd be a top 15 pick. Lofton didn't go until the second round to Atlanta, where he became an instant starter, while OU struggled mightily at middle linebacker after Ryan Reynolds was lost for the season with a knee injury in the season's fifth game.

Reynolds' injury validated Stoops' concerns about Lofton's departure. Texas rallied to a 10-point win over the Sooners when Reynolds was injured early in the third quarter.

But, more importantly, it wasn't just wins Stoops was worried about when Lofton, Kelly and Smith left. He has always maintained that it's much more difficult for a player to get his degree once he's left school.

That wasn't Carroll's concern with Sanchez, who is on track to graduate in May. So the coach's peevish behavior suggests he wanted Sanchez to stay at USC for one reason — to help him win more games and make more money.

And, unlike Lofton, it's not like Sanchez left the cupboard bare. USC has at least four heavily recruited quarterbacks, including Arkansas transfer Mitch Mustain, who possess the abilities to make a seamless transition into Sanchez's spot.

Carroll, who failed in the NFL with the Jets and Patriots, is one of the top five college coaches and a good man. As the "60 Minutes" piece demonstrated, he's so concerned about gang violence that he often goes unannounced and alone into the most crime-infested neighborhoods of L.A., to talk with gang members about settling their differences peacefully.

So Carroll's obviously cares about today's youth. But he didn't send that message Thursday, when he lost his cool and may have lost some future blue-chip prospects in the process.Read Dave Sittler's blog at
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