Navy sophomore safety De'Von Richardson (Navy photo)
The Washington Post is reporting that Navy safety De’Von Richardson was kicked out of the Naval Academy for academic reasons. The sophomore started the team’s last nine games after senior Emmett Merchant was injured. He made 55 tackles, and his lone interception of the year came against Notre Dame.
Losing Richardson is especially painful for Navy as it loses senior safety and team leader Wyatt Middleton to graduation.
Richardson’s best game came in Navy’s bowl loss to San Diego State, where he made a career-high seven tackles.
15 Comments
Wow. A minority athlete kicked out of the academy? There’s a first. Let the demonstrations and calls of racisim begin.
Really? That comment was not called for. We will never be able to stop racism if people like you make such comments.
Grades do matter, no good grades can’t play. Same thing in any school environment so its the player’s fault for not priortize him or herself.
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Stop the carping. The late “Doc” Blanchard, West Point grad, Heisman Trophy winner, who retired as a USAF Colonel, was found in mathematics and asked to leave the Point. He returned the next year after intensive math refresher classes and graduated. The carps on here are from folks who could not get into the front door of an academy.
Do not give up Mr. Richardson. Study hard and reapply. Go Navy!
By the way. George Patton was found on mathematics, flunked out, and had to reapply. I hope the readers know of his success. West Point mathematics is the most rigorous curriculum in the country. No other school compares.
Mike Johnson — spoken like a true elitist academy grad:
1. If you didn’t go to the academy, then you aren’t worthy on commenting on its problems!
2. Military academies are simply beyond comparison to other lesser institutions – regardless of whether or not actual data exists to support this view!
Chuck, if you’ve ever asked yourself “what’s wrong with America?”, you should bookmark this page and re-read your post the next time you want to know. Be careful not to overlook that your comment was the first and set the tone thereafter.
I am so much tired of folks, academy grads or not, who carp about the minority academy students. All four of the academies are tough. Many students, of all races, are found; some come back, but most do not. I pray that Mr Richardson will read and note the previous two examples of cadets who were found and came back. There are plenty more.
Also, I find it most insulting that some folks complain about minority students in the Prep Schools. West Point Prep has been around since the early 30s or late 20s. General “Slim Jim” Gavin, WP, entered the Point via the Prep School.
As for the “elitist” attitude, WP does not train students to be mathematicians in Plebe Math. The process is there to make you a problem solver and to test you. Math is the soul of West Point. Some really bright folks cannot get past Plebe Math. The math was not the problem; the process was. The process is what makes WP the best.
Well, the fault lies with our distinguished representatives in congress for appointing those individuals to the service academies when their only contribution is athletics. Ever wonder how so many football players get into elite schools like Georgia Tech, Stanford and others? Football abilities and poor academics. Then we complain the Asians and Indians are taking over our higher tech industry!!
The enemy and his bullets don’t care about color, college attended, or status in life. To overcome him requires characteristics that most do not want to pursue. One of those is perseverance. Another is teamwork. A wise woman once told me, “If you don’t have anything good to say about someone, keep your mouth shut”. God bless you Mom. Mr Richardson, heed the wise, ignore the ignorant, keep your head up, and press on.
It takes 4 years to “grow” a service academy graduate. We wasted two on someone who was recruited for athletic aptitude rather than academic.
Here’s a wacky thought: How about we shut down the sports programs, recruit cadets and midshipmen based on demonstrated aptitude for leadership and academics, and put the cost savings into something wild like … oh, another few seats at each academy, filled by people who are statistically more likely to pass?
I want a return on the investment of my tax dollar, and “go Navy beat Army” etc. isn’t it. Produce some officers who are ready to hack the coursework and take their places as junior leaders in the profession of arms. Don’t use athletic prowess as an excuse to offset a lack of academic aptitude. The taxpayers deserve better.
As a taxpayer, it’s somewhat refreshing to see a USNA player being expelled for academic vice moral deficiencies.
Let’s not forget that there were a whole string of USNA footballers accused of rape in the 2000s. And OBTW – they were all black.
Bill: In terms of ROI, hardly anyone looks at USNA that objectively!
USNA provides ~20% of active-duty officer corps – NROTC and OCS provide roughly equal or greater amount. And there’s no quantitative data that says a USNA grad is a better officer than one from another source.
Do we really need to keep the USNA open when there are plenty of less-expensive, equally effective ways to build and maintain our officer corps? This taxpayer wants to know.
Bill, find me a formula to figure out how to select applicants with 100% certainty that they will complete ANY four year school.
As for selecting those with leadership attributes, participation in high school athletics (ideally team captaincy) is one way to measure that.