Tyrann Mathieu: What happens now?

Tyrann Mathieu was a gamechanger for the LSU Tigers. Ask Oregon. Ask Kentucky. Ask Arkansas. Ask West Virginia. Ask Georgia. And ask any team who purposefully threw away, kicked away, and punted away from LSU’s No. 7 in 2011, just to make sure that they didn’t get punished.

Well, they aren’t going to have that problem in 2011, because Tyrann Mathieu managed to get himself thrown off LSU’s football team – at least for the 2012 season and possibly longer. And the sad news was that it was for testing positive for drugs – the same things that had dropped him into Les Miles’ bad books in 2011 for a couple of games.

Now, Mathieu wants to ‘sit out’ the 2012 season and come back in 2013 and be a Tiger again. Why? The cards – which have never been too subtle in Mathieu’s case anyway – have been shown and he really doesn’t want to go and play at McNeese State or Prairie View A&M or Mountainside Hillock U.

LSU itself hasn’t said that Mathieu will be welcomed back, either. “If Tyrann chooses to return to LSU as a student he can do so. We are not speculating on anything beyond that,” an LSU spokesman told ESPN. We can just think that Coach Miles is absolutely furious right now, as he’s just fired one of his biggest playmakers.

He’ll just need Tharold Simon and Eric Reid (the latter who made THAT play against Alabama in the win at Tuscaloosa) to step up where Mathieu left off.

BOTTOM LINE: Let’s just say that NFL Scouts WERE worried about a short guy with attitude. Would it be better for Mathieu to simply forgo a year of eligibility, stay at LSU and come back next year as a scholarship athlete? We think so. It might also give him some chance to grow up.