Bye week gives team much-needed break to heal, relax

Weeks like these aren't any fun. There's no anticipation, no hot sports opinions, no breaking stories, no tailgating. Oh yeah, there's no football game either.

Bye weeks serve no purpose for fans, but football isn't played by the fans. It's played by athletes who ache and bruise just as easily as anyone else, and since football is arguably the most physical sport around, the players need an occasional bye week.

"There's a couple of people dinged up," offensive guard Kasey Studdard said. "We need to get them ready for Missouri."

Among those dinged up are Selvin Young, Jordan Shipley and Nic Redwine. Young began the season as the starting running back before tweaking his ankle against Louisiana-Lafayette and aggravating it again against Ohio State. Redwine was carried off the field during the Rice game, and his status for Missouri is still unknown, while the news on Shipley continues to jump between good and bad.

Those injuries are the most notable, but three games of hard hitting take a toll on every player, mentally, as well as physically. Mack Brown is giving his players this weekend off to relax and prepare for the conference schedule ahead.

Sounds like good timing.

This season marks the first time in the Brown era that the Longhorns have divided the non-conference and conference schedules with a bye week. They should think about doing it more often. It makes sense.

The most important part of the year is league play. Big 12 teams face each other annually, yet the Longhorns have never finished the Big 12 conference season undefeated. Maybe this is good karma.

While Louisiana-Lafayette and Rice proved to be nothing more than speed bumps in the non-conference schedule, preparing for Ohio State likely took a good amount of the Longhorns preseason camp. There's another fairly big game looming Oct. 8, but every game in conference is important for a team that hasn't won a Big 12 title since 1996 ­- and even then with a 6-2 conference record.

"I think it's a real good time, because we've had three tough games, and we get a little break before we start conference play," Studdard said. "Once you start conference, it's all downhill."

An extra week for coaches to look at tape and prepare a game plan for Missouri and Oklahoma is never a bad thing. Besides, Brown will never hear the end of it if the 1-2 Sooners find a way to pull out their sixth consecutive victory over the Longhorns in Dallas.

If there was a better time for the Longhorns' bye week, it might be the week before Oklahoma, although that game doesn't mean as much if they happened to drop the first conference tilt.

The players need the rest as well. Many of them said it's their first chance to go home since preseason camp began, while others are looking forward to doing anything besides football for a few days. Hunting, fishing and bowling were among the activities mentioned.

"I don't know what I'll be doing yet," offensive tackle Justin Blalock said, "but I'll be out of here."

Bye weeks are necessary, and there's no better time than now. But it still isn't any fun.

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