Southern Illinois senior linebacker Cody Crider has done the math.

Three surgeries for a torn ACL.

Times six months of rehab for each injury.

That equals 18 months of his football career in which his main job was coming back from an injury.

“That’s a year-and-a-half doing nothing but rehab,” he said. “Having the passion for the game and the will power to get back on the field – that’s what drives you and motivates you. You don’t skip a rep (in rehab). There are some guys who tear their ACL once and never make it back because they didn’t rehab right.

Cody Crider

“You’ve got to take that part very serious,” he said.

Crider’s attention to those rehab details, especially after tearing his left ACL three times – most recently in 2018 — led to the best season of his career last fall.

While helping a resurgent defense lift SIU (7-5) to its first winning season since 2013, Crider had the second most tackles on the team with 90 and earned second-team All-Missouri Valley Football Conference honors.

That provided plenty of reason for Crider to apply for a sixth year of eligibility, which he was granted last month.

“It’s an opportunity to keep playing the game that I love,” he said. “We had a great season last year. It was definitely a building block for the program.”

Spencer Brown, who coaches SIU’s linebackers, said he learned immediately after the season that Crider was fully committed to 2020.

“I remember after that (North Dakota State) game finished up and we were hoping for the playoffs, he came in with a bright smile, saying ‘Coach, I’m not ready for it to be over with.’ Cody loves football. Motivating him is not too hard.”

Along with the all-conference honors, perhaps the biggest positive from Crider’s 2019 season was that he started 12 games for the first time in his career.

“The fact that we got him through a 12-game season was really exciting,” Brown said. “He asks the most questions. He puts in the most work watching film. And I know he’s going to be ready on game day.”

SIU head coach Nick Hill told the media before spring practice that Crider’s routine will be a bit different than most.

“We’ll probably hold off of Cody as a sixth-year player with those injuries,” he said. “He’ll be involved in a lot of the coaching and installs.”

Though the Salukis were passed over for the FCS playoffs last season, the team posted an impressive five-game winning streak in October and November that is serving as a springboard into current spring practices.

“We needed that after the last couple of years,” said Crider, who had never been part of a winning team in his SIU career. “It gave us some confidence. We knew we had the players to do it. We to to learn how to win and stick together as a team.”

The 2020 Salukis also will have to learn how to respond to the adversity of being left out of the FCS playoff field.

“I’ve still got a salty taste in my mouth,” Crider said. “I’ll never forget that day. We’ve got to work harder than we have before.”

Crider said the program has benefitted from a supportive, positive group of players and coaches. Yet that didn’t stop his teammates from commenting on their starting linebacker’s sixth season.

“A lot of people joked with me about it, calling me ‘Old Man,’” Crider said with a laugh. “I can count how many.”

A picture of the Chicago river.

I am a Midwestern guy all the way through to be honest. I would say there is nothing like living in the Midwest even if I get tired of the coldness of the winter months. Illinois is a good state, but we have problems ranging from violence to debt to population loss, which are problems many other states are suffering from as well.

In Illinois, over the last few years, there has been a lot of talk by Republicans living in the Central and Southern parts of the state that the state would be better off if Chicago and all of Cook County was its own state. I personally cannot understand why anyone would think getting rid of the only major city in the state would be a good idea, but the idea has a decent following.

There are people living in Central and Southern Illinois who actually believe the Republican nonsense that they are paying to keep Chicago running. They actually believe the lie that Chicago is running on their tax dollars despite the fact that Chicago is likely the only city in the state adding billions of the dollars to the state’s revenue. And for the record, Chicago is not receiving more money than it is putting in. 

The problem with many cities and small towns in the lower parts of Illinois is the small town politics. I have a friend who was born and raised in a small town in Illinois. He would always say the people in his town complained about there not being much in the town and many blame Cook County for the problem since they have the power in Springfield. Those so-called big city loving Cook County politicians do not care about the small, rural, Central and Southern parts of Illinois. They are only looking out for Chicago and its surrounding suburbs, which could be true for some Cook County politicians. 

My friend who grew up in a small town in Illinois said the town’s problem was because it was run like many small towns in Illinois. At one point Walmart wanted to build a location and I believe a distribution center in his town, but the local politicians voted down the plan. One reason is because his town was run like many small towns where the local store owners and one or two families controlled everything. A Walmart location could have put their small stores out of business or reduced their customers. So they chose to stop Walmart and other stores from coming to town while at the same time blaming the Cook County politicians in Springfield for not helping their town bring jobs to the community.

One of the biggest problems with Illinois in my opinion is the fact that our state does not have a second major city. In the Midwest, Missouri has St. Louis and Kansas City; Wisconsin has Milwaukee and Madison; Ohio has Cleveland and Cincinnati. I bet the average person outside of Illinois could not name another Illinois city outside of Chicago. Those who could probably would likely name a city in the Chicago suburbs or Champaign where the Illinois Fighting Illini plays.

The Central and Southern parts of Illinois want to blame Cook County for their problems when they should be asking why people do not want to live there. Chicago is the city that drives the Chicagoland area. People are attracted to major cities because of the employment opportunities, entertainment, night and social life. 

Central and Southern Illinois needs a major city that could bring in companies and tourism dollars. A major city in Central or Southern Illinois would help many of the surrounding suburbs while adding much-needed funds to the state’s budget, but more importantly, the major city would likely lead to an increase population and more representation in Springfield.

Now, when I say a major city, I am not saying the state of Illinois needs another top 10 or even top 20 populated city. We need a Milwaukee, St. Louis, Kansas City or Madison. A city that is nationally known and can be the engine that drives its surrounding suburbs. 

Our nearby neighbor, Milwaukee, is a city that is in the midst of a building boom. Many in Milwaukee will tell you that downtown Milwaukee today is much different from its downtown twenty or even ten years ago. Give credit to the local politicians in the city because they are finding a way to compete with other Midwest cities for conventions and national events. Hopefully, the city will focus some of that new growth in the low-income communities of the city, which is something many African American and other community leaders have lobbied for in recent months.

For those who would say Milwaukee has been a major city for decades and that is slightly true. I would say Milwaukee has been a lesser known Midwest city in the shadow of other Midwest cities like our city, Detroit, Minneapolis, St. Louis and even Kansas City. Today, Milwaukee is not on an even ground with our city or even Minneapolis or Detroit, but the city is now competing with St. Louis, Kansas City and Indianapolis. Central and Southern Illinois could learn something from Milwaukee.

You can listen to Tron’s podcast at https://anchor.fm/tron-griffin

A couple of years ago, I wrote an article published in Chicago Now titled, “Don’t let the presses stop,” featuring a young reporter, David Giuliani, who stood up to a local Mayor. You can read the article here.

Hired as a watchdog by the Daily Journal, David is a thorough investigative journalist, a good writer, and fearless. He brought a level of sophistication to a small community newspaper that signaled the paper was serious about its role as the Fourth Estate.

David brought an ethical code that should be the envy of every newsroom. He dedicates his work to root out corruption without regard to party affiliation or local friendships. He strives to keep his personal and political bias out of his articles. David has the enthusiasm of youthful idealism. His dedication to principles ran up against the reality of a community whose political traditions are not winning any ethics awards.

It’s challenging to change a community’s culture, and that is what David was attempting to do. He brought light to dark places, and it upset a lot of people.

Allow me to make a general statement about newspapers endorsing political candidates. I loathe the idea. First, show me how people’s minds are changed because a bunch of people sitting around an editorial board meeting decides they like Frank better than they do Mary? Who are these people making moral judgments?

Newspaper endorsements, whether from the Washington Post or the Daily Journal, are arrogant and filled with an air of self-importance to be borderline narcissistic behavior. That is my objection to them, and it is a moral objection.

A community depends on a newspaper for facts and information.

Newspapers are not the Holy Grail of virtue signaling, yet that is the role too many papers try to play. Perhaps that has more to do with the decline of newspapers than the internet. Just maybe newspapers who have principles and don’t play favorites flourish? The public isn’t stupid, and they see through the scam.

The State of Illinois has one of the most aggressive anti-pay-to-play laws in the nation. Pay-to-play is the practice where government contractors kickback money to politicians who approve their contracts.

In the Tweet above, David alleges that he caught Kankakee County Board Chairman, Andrew Wheeler getting a contribution from a Springfield lobbyist who Wheeler hired to represent Kankakee County, then pressured the County Board to approve the contract. His management killed the story, and David alleges it is because the General Manager wants to make the County Board Chairman look good.

David resigned from the Journal and is tweeting about what he sees as ethical breeches at his former employer. The allegations erode the trust the public should have for the local newspaper. It is one thing to give endorsements on the editorial pages. It is quite another to cover up stories.

A local newspaper should not be a tool of propaganda for corrupt politicians and an enabler of corrupt practices, yet that is precisely what David’s allegations chronicle. How is the community supposed to trust anything they see in the paper with this going on?

It leaves the impression that there is no watchdog for the community.

If the ethics of Journalism have any meaning whatsoever, management perverting them is not in the best interest of the news organization. People don’t want to read propaganda. Readers don’t like coverups, and the public repudiates treating them like dummies.

The premise of my article two years ago is that even a lousy newspaper is better than no paper at all. Now, I’m not so sure. If it covers up corruption as David alleges, then what use is it?