It’s sad, really, to see a mind ravaged. Families every day must deal with the horrible consequences of Alzheimer’s. And that “your brain on drugs” ad from the heyday of anti-drug advertising was an understatement when it comes to heroin addicts. And, of course, there’s the as-yet-unexplained, but almost perfunctory lobotomies undergone by the writing staff of ESPN.com.

Today’s apparent victim: Gene Wojciechowski, who chose to meet a deadline by writing a piece with the same amount of thought that my 18 month old nephew undergoes before he picks up the Oreo from the floor and stuffs it in his mouth. In the piece, which I’ll neither link nor quote, “Wojo,” claims that Kevin White, the former AD of Notre Dame, is now the former AD of Notre Dame because ND “neutered him.” And to fill out his minimum word requirement for the column, Wojie also bandies about the “Notre Dame is no longer Notre Dame because they fired Ty Willingham” meme along with the “trustees really run the operation at ND” bit. Who knew that the prefrontal cortex was so involved in fact-checking, actual investigation of stories, and the avoidance of pandering?

There are, naturally, some serious flaws in Wojo’s piece. First of all, the notion that Notre Dame “neutered” White is absurd, as White never once, in his entire time at Notre Dame, showed any balls. (Documented here.) White failed to handle the Bob Davie situation with any decisiveness. He appeared to have been “blessed” with the sexual organs of a papier-mâché doll during various negotiations with the BCS, the NCAA, or vendors, in handling scheduling decisions, and in dealing with the media. And even a ken-doll would probably strut near White’s locker, sans towel, quite proudly after the “hey, it wasn’t me!” near-tantrum he put on when Willingham was fired. Wojo said that White “fell on the blue and gold sword.” When? When he was busy saving his own face under the heat of the PR spotlight, making comments about getting things done “Sunday through Friday?”

Never mind the fact-checking Wojo could have done for the piece to actually provide some real context to the events surrounding White’s tenure and departure. Forget that he’s swooping into a position vacated by an admin that shut down an entire athletic program based on the accusations of one, and the over-zealous prosecution of another. Nice use of some clever statistics to show that Duke’s won just as many NCs in football as ND since 1989. Weird how Wojo forgot to mention ND’s comparable basketball NC success rate to Duke’s since 2001. Pretty funny, that notion that White will be “allowed to do his job” more at Duke than at ND while he’s busy not playing a meaningful role in the basketball program.

Hey, it’s the week after Memorial Day, and I’m sure Wojo found it just as tough to get back into the swing of things after all of those brats and beers as the next guy, but this was a remarkable feat of indolence, one for which so many of Wojo’s compatriots would stand up and applaud if they weren’t so damned lazy.

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