Not all new rules golden in college football; Bill Walton ready for a comeback

By kerry eggers

The Portland Tribune, Aug 15, 2008, Updated Oct 30, 2009

ANDREW D. BERNSTEIN / GETTY IMAGES

Bill Walton and wife Lori enjoyed NBA All-Star weekend this year, but Walton has spent the last 4 1/2 months going through grueling rehabilitation from back problems. Now he's ready to resume his broadcasting duties.

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Look for a number of rule changes this fall in college football — some small, some fairly major.

Two of the changes have to do with timing:

• The clock will stop on all out-of-bounds plays, but the referee will now restart it as soon as the ball is ready to be put in play. In the final two minutes of each half, the clock will start on the snap, as in the past.

“I’m not sure I like the rule,” Oregon State coach Mike Riley says. “It’s going to shorten the game, for sure.”

Remember the rule change in which the play clock started as soon as the official set the ball after a change of possession? It created some panicky situations for offenses and was abolished after a year.

• After a play is blown dead, the offense will have 40 seconds to snap the ball — same as NFL rules. Previously, the team had 25 seconds after officials signaled the ball ready for play. There will still be a 25-second clock after change of possession.

“I’ve studied it, and I don’t think it will have much impact,” Riley says. “Before, it was an an official’s discretion when to start the clock. I think it will work out to be similar to the old rule.”

Other changes, with Riley’s comments:

• All facemask penalties will be 15 yards: “Good change. It was a tough judgment call, whether five or 15 yards.”

• No more sideline warnings. Referees can assess a five-yard penalty without warning: “Officials may like this one. I’m afraid it might get called too often.”

• A coach who is successful with a first replay challenge gets another, with a limit of two per game: “Sounds good. Before, once you used your one challenge, you were done regardless (of whether it was successful). Now, you can get two (successful challenges) per game.”

• A horse-collar tackle will result in a 15-yard penalty: “I proposed that one. You can break a leg on a play like that.”

Riley says the Pac-10 will emphasize prohibition of helmet-to-helmet hits this season.

“They showed video of what they’re going to call at our league meetings,” Riley says. “I’m for any rule that helps out with safety. It’s going to be a hard one to call, though. Some real common sense has to be applied. If a ballcarrier ducks his head into a tackler, should that be a penalty on the tackler?”

• Bill Walton says he is back on the road to good health after a disastrous last year.

The former Trail Blazer center says he expects to return his ABC and ESPN broadcasting duties during the 2008-09 season after recovering from debillitating back and hip issues that put him out of commission for 4 1/2 months.

“I got off a plane one day and could not move,” says Walton, 55. The problem was bulging disks, pinched nerves and spinal stenosis.

Walton says he has undergone a rigorous non-invasive physical therapy program, including yoga, accupuncture, massage, exercise biking and “active release technique.”

“I’d start at 5:30 in the morning and didn’t finish until 8 p.m.,” he says. “I’d collapse on the floor and couldn’t move for the first six weeks.”

Walton’s oldest son, Adam, 32, lives near Bill’s home in San Diego and often visited him “to try to keep my spirits up,” the Hall of Famer says.

“One day I told Adam how much I appreciated him coming over,” Walton says. “He said, ‘Dad, this has been cool. I can’t ever remember you being home during the NBA playoffs before.’ "

Walton’s mental outlook is solid.

“There’s nothing more important in life than health and family,” he says. “These days I have both.”

• You think you know NFL football better than Brandon Roy? You’ll get your chance to prove it.

The Blazers’ all-star guard is helping promote rotohog.com’s fantasy league and will appear at a debut event next Thursday in West Hollywood, Calif.

“Anybody who signs up will be playing against Brandon Roy this fall,” says Chris Austin, rotohog’s director of marketing.

Why Roy as the company’s front man?

“He’s a class guy, and we’re big fans,” Austin says. “He’s the leader of a team that could be something special the next few years. He’s the star of a playoff-bound team on the rise, and it seems like a good fit for the brand.”

Rotohog’s partner, LG Electronics, is launching a new television set called “The Edge.” The winner of the eight-week league will win a new 50-inch LG plasma.

• Former Blazer Darrall Imhoff and ex-NFL great Gail Cogdill have gone together to purchase an abandoned gold-mining site in Grainville, Ida.

Imhoff, 69, and Cogdill, 71, spent $400,000 for the 40-acre plot where gold mining ended in the 1940s.

“We’ve looked at it for some time,” Imhoff says. “With gold $300 an ounce 12 years ago, it didn’t pencil out. Now that it’s over $900 an ounce, it does pencil out.”

Imhoff says about 150,000 tons of dump ore sit outside the site, which has five tunnels into the side of a hill. Imhoff and Cogdill will hire a local crew and begin a mining operation Imhoff says will take three to five years to complete.

The former Blazer center, who lives in Eugene and works for the U.S. Basketball Academy, is thinking big.

“We’ll make somewhere between $10 million and $100 million,” he says. “If it’s $10 million, great. If it’s $100 million, fantastic.”

• Another worthy fundraising golf event at The Reserve Vineyards and Golf Club: Wayne Faligowski’s High Five Foundation.

The long-time KOIN (6) reporter hopes to bring back the “High Five Challenge” — the College Bowl-like knowledge competition between high school teams — this fall. The Thursday-Friday event at the Reserve — featuring a number of ex-Blazers and other local sporting figures — will provide money for the event that was televised from 1993 to 2006, before sponsorship dried up.

“We’re serious about getting back on the air this year,” says Faligowski, 66, whose standard line about High Five is this: “Most of the news reported about high school students, other than sports, is negative. Five percent of the troublemakers get 95 percent of the media attention. I want to reverse that.”

The High Five Foundation is a good step.