Woke All-Star Pat Forde's Anger At Kelvin Sampson In 2008 Is Now Very Amusing

Woke warrior Pat Forde, who lost to Karen Rovell in the regional finals of the Woke All-Star Challenge, is getting some attention Tuesday for a 2008 column he wrote on Kelvin Sampson, who woke up this morning as a Final Four head coach at Houston. Back in 2008 when he still worked for ESPN, Forde was absolutely furious at Sampson, as his reign at Indiana was over after being forced out. Pat was specifically fired up over Sampson using a telephone to contact prospects.

"If he ever coaches again in college, it will be a shock," Forde declared.

Yes, there was a five-year show-cause penalty slapped on Sampson which forced him to head to the NBA for a six-year stint as an assistant. He eventually returned to the NCAA ranks in 2014 and is 167-63 since Forde wrote that line in 2008.

Forde wasn't the only one out there chasing coaches and schools over violations. Many blue checkmarks made their careers off this stuff, but it's funny to look back at just how outraged Pat was then versus his shift in tone when he filed a column to Sports Illustrated early this morning as Sampson walked off the court and into a Final Four.

"The rules Sampson and his staff broke were picayune in hindsight and are no longer on the books: impermissible recruiting phone calls," Forde wrote Tuesday morning. Ouch. Blue checkmarks spent those years around 2008 incredibly hungry to dig up NCAA violations that could be turned into books, future job prospects and prime spots on 30 for 30s. There are plenty of selections on Amazon for 'NCAA Scandal' books.

Now Pat's left painfully writing a redemption column for Sampson. Forde spent the first half of his column waxing on about Sampson being a slimeball only to spend the last half praising the coaching job done by the guy who was never supposed to coach at the NCAA level again.

"If any single season stands out as Sampson’s coaching masterpiece, this is it," Forde wrote. Ouch. Poor Pat. Imagine the f-bombs coming out of his brain as that line left his fingertips.

"On the day they rebooted once more in Bloomington, Kelvin Sampson rose again 50 miles north," he concluded.