What Does Reggie Bush's Coach Think?

On Tuesday, football star Reggie Bush announced he would forfeit his 2005 Heisman Trophy after it came out that special treatment for the Helix High prep phenom turned into NCAA violations at USC.

Bush still has many friends, family members and former teammates living in San Diego, but so far none of them have really stepped up publicly to support him. In fact, his mother and stepfather, who are embroiled in the story along with him, have said nothing.
   
On Wednesday, Bush's high school coach Don Van Hook said his former player was misguided and ill-advised.

"I hope people understand Reggie really is a good person and he was a naive 19-year-old, 20-year-old person," Van Hook said.

Van Hook, who coached at Helix High School for 33 years, said that the NFL star just wants to move on.

In recent days Bush has taken the brunt of the blame for inappropriate relationships and gifts he accepted while at USC, including the use of a rent-free home for his parents in Spring Valley that was owned by a wanna-be sports agent (under the alleged assumption that Bush would become their future client).

"I really believe this wasn't an individual case for Reggie," Van Hook said. "I really believed his parents were ill-advised, and I think they were misguided, and I think they're part of the blame, too."

Van Hook said Bush respected and listened to his mother, Denise Griffin, a sheriff's deputy who works in the San Diego courts, and his stepfather, La Mar Griffin, but that they, too, may have been ill-advised.

"Parents need to be on top of that," Van Hook said. "If they get approached by someone outside the school where their sons or daughters are going to school, they need to turn it into the college."

Van Hook hopes that agents will one day be subject to penalties, too, and is disappointed it came down to this.

"It's just unfortunate, and I still ... he will always be the Heisman Trophy winner 2005," Van Hook said.

The New Orleans Saints star's family wasn't completely unprepared: A year earlier Helix quarterback Alex Smith accepted a full-ride to the University of Utah and the families had talked about it.
 

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