Texas A&M coach Kevin Sumlin claims he fought to appeal a suspension to eventual Heisman winning quarterback Johnny Manziel, which would have prevented him from playing in his historic redshirt-freshman season. Manziel confirmed in an interview with Texas Monthly that he faced a season-long ban after an arrest in which he was part of a bar fight and found with a fake ID.
"They banned me from athletics and from my scholarships," Manziel said, according to Texas Monthly. "I had worked hard, and done everything Coach Sumlin asked me to do, and then they told me I couldn't play anymore."
Michelle Manziel, mother of the Texas A&M quarterback, also played a major role in the appeal of her son's suspension. "We were shocked. If they're going to do that, we're fixing to have to transfer him to a junior college to get him to play," she told Texas Monthly.
The details of the penalty Manziel faced remain unreleased. Sumlin wrote the NCAA a letter supporting Manziel's appeal of the suspension arguing that the strict punishment outweighed the offense.
"A lot has been said about discipline, but he went through all that, which is a little bit more than people think," Sumlin said, according to NewsOK.com. "That's not a public deal, it's just what I ask him to do. He did all those things, and his parents were involved in all of that. So for him to go through that, then go through camp and those types of things and earn the job, that's what's brought him to where he is now."
Manziel's suspension would eventually be overturned and he was forced to attend a six-hour class as part of his agreement. He won the Aggies' starting job a day after his ruling and led A&M to an 11-2 season.
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