Mike Leach will not be able to seek monetary damages in his wrongful termination suit against Texas Tech after the Supreme Court of Texas denied his appeal. Leach's lawsuit has bounced around just about every level of the courts in Texas, was filed on the grounds that he was denied due process, then wrongfully terminated following allegations of a mistreatment of a player, Adam James, that Leach firmly denies.

There are some misinterpretations of the rulings and missing information floating around that needs to be cleared up. Lets quickly run down what all this means for Leach and WSU.

What does this mean?

Well, not a whole lot, actually. Leach was challenging Texas' sovereign immunity. It was his assertion that sovereign immunity would render any contract with the state -- including those with a state university -- void, since the contracts couldn't be challenged in court. An appellate court threw out the lawsuit earlier, based on sovereign immunity, and Leach was appealing that decision with the Supreme Court. Friday's ruling means he may go forward with the lawsuit -- a provision in the appellate court ruling -- but may not seek damages. He can fight for the truth, but will get no money.

Is this surprising?

No. No it is not.

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Are you a huge fan of Friday Night Lights, the TV show, like I am? Are you also a fan of Mike Leach? Well good news! These two excellent stories may combine, if everything falls into place soon.

In fact, the script is basically done and Peter Berg, whose camera crews have been following Leach around for another project, is ready to do this thing. Take it away, MTV.

"Jason Katims, who was our super talented show-runner, is about done with the script," Berg said. "You never know. So much of these things become scheduling. Kyle [Chandler] is busy, Adrianne [Palicki] is busy, Taylor is busy, Connie Britton is busy, but if we can get everyone in the same room at the same time, we all want to do it. We're not done with 'Friday Night Lights.' "

[breathes into paper bag]

"[Katims] has come up with a really great storyline that parallels what happened to Mike Leach, one of my heroes, a coach at Texas Tech who was unjustly fired and unjustly accused of mistreating a player with a concussion, which was proven to not have been the case. He's now at Washington State getting ready for what I think will be a great redemption story," Berg explained. "It would be critical that we get Kyle and Connie [onboard for the film] - we anchored the show around them - and then bring in Riggins, Tyra, Lyla and all other characters as we could get them. But the idea is to really revolve it around the coach."

[backflips naked off a high dive]

There's a difference between this and the Mike Leach story in a documentary form -- the latter is what the cameras are for and the plan is to run that show on HBO. Instead, Berg is looking to continue the Friday Night Lights TV storyline, with all the major cast members in tact, by drawing upon Leach's story as a major part of the script.

We once again remind you Coach Taylor and Leach collided in an episode of Friday Night Lights, and it was amazing. Now imagine Coach Taylor becoming Leach. With Timmy Riggins, Lyla and the rest of the crew.

This is like all of my dreams rolled into one tidy movie. Texas Forever, y'all.

H/T Grantland

I have a few favorite moments from this past football season, but have been unable to sit and write them down since the season ended. Immediately after the Apple Cup, the attention turned to the coaching situation, with Paul Wulff losing his job and Mike Leach being hired in his place in a 24-hour span. Now that there's a bit of free time, I figured I'd share some of these, beginning with a story about a kicker.

There's an unwritten rule when it comes to practice about what's can be reported on and not, and we all honor it. Play-calling, strategy, installs and the like are all off-limit, limiting the actual information that comes out of practice to injuries, participation and depth chart items.

In this case, though, I think the statute of limitations has expired, and the sequence in question wasn't really about strategy anyway. Exercising caution, it's been something I've held onto for a long time, but considering the previous coaching staff is long gone, I think it's fair to share. It involves a special teams drill and was the funniest thing I saw all season.

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I actually just glossed over this in the police logs on Sunday, thinking long snapper Zach Koepp's arrest wasn't too big a deal. A long snapper getting arrested for obstructing a public servant isn't a huge problem in the scheme of it all, especially considering the events of last weekend. But an arrest is an arrest, and it's the offseason so we're all bored, looking for good stories..

This is a good story, believe it or not. The details here are important and really make the story go. From Christian Caple (emphasis mine):

Pullman Police spokesman Cmdr. Chris Tennant said police received a complaint of a person throwing rocks at the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity house at about 12:31 a.m. Sunday. Koepp was seen in the area when police responded, Tennant said, and fled on foot before slipping in the mud and hitting his head on a metal grate covering a gas meter.

If this isn't the most long snapper way to get arrested, I'm not sure what is (maybe long snapping rocks at windows, though we don't know if he was even involved in the rock throwing).

Koepp was checked out at the hospital and later released, with only a cut to show for the whole thing. He also missed the final two games of last season after suffering a concussion against Arizona State, so that seems important considering the way he was arrested. This whole story is ridiculous and hilarious, but not so much concerning.

It's likely Koepp will have some kind of extra conditioning or something to that affect as punishment for the arrest. Then again, slipping into a gas meter in the middle of a crowded greek row on a Saturday night is pretty good punishment in itself.

We'll preface this all by saying most of it was expected or hinted at ahead of time. However, because there is a bit of football news out there, we might as well take care of it all at once. Consider this a news dump, where we throw everything at you on a Friday and expect you to process it all at once.

Some of this was covered in Mark's post on Thursday, which can you find here. Let's do this, bullet point style.

• Wade Jacobsen has applied for a medical hardship. File this one under "not surprising" and assume it will be a rubber-stamp. Far as we know, he'll be fine and should be awarded an additional year with the quickness.
• Jeff Tuel also applied for a medical hardship. That he filed is not surprising. If he actually is awarded a hardship, it will be a bit surprising. Unlike Jacobsen, Tuel has a bit of a battle on his hands: He played in the second half of the season, thus rendering him technically ineligible to receive a hardship. Then again, it's the NCAA, so who knows!
• Louis Bland is done with football. We've expected this for quite some time and Leach made it official earlier this week. Bland was never able to get his knee back in working order, forcing him to hang up the cleats. It's not a surprise and expecting him to drop in out of nowhere and suddenly be a significant contributor this coming season was always unrealistic. This is the third scholarship player to leave thus far, and WSU is working its way down to the 85-scholarship limit, which will need to be met by the time all the incoming freshman enroll.
• Christian talked to Mike Breske. You should read it! More on this after the jump.

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There is just something about Spring. Rejuvenation, rebirth, everything is blooming and quarterbacks are competing for the starting job. In an interview with Howie Stalwick, Mike Leach covered a lot of topics including who would start at quarterback next season.

Asked if Tuel is the clear-up No. 1 quarterback, Leach said, "I look for him and Halliday to battle it out in the spring."

It's no surprise quarterback will be up for competition, every position is up for competition, especially with a new coaching staff. What surprises me most is Connor Halliday would be ready to compete for the starting job in the spring. It's been roughly two and a half months since Halliday lacerated his liver against Utah. Some initial reports had the recovery lasting into April. The fact Leach expects him to compete for the starting job is at worst a sign Halliday is healing well.

If the starting position is indeed decided during spring ball, I would fully expect Tuel to win the job. While recovering from his injury, Halliday missed valuable development time and will at best be rusty once spring ball starts. Tuel was already the favorite, but a spring competition only stacks the deck in his favor. Then again, I wouldn't want to battle anything out against this guy.

A few other notes from the article.

• Tuel and Wade Jacobson will appeal to the NCAA for an additional season of eligibility.
• Injured linebacker Louis Bland has decided to no longer play football.
• Starting with the end of fall camp and throughout the season, WSU will close practices to fans and media.

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While some college coaching staffs have received a lot of attention recently, Mike Leach put together his staff in relative anonymity. There was some buzz about defensive coordinator, but a lot of what has been written about Leach's staff has been written by our own Brian Floyd. On a national media level, Leach's staff hires have barely drawn a mention. That changed a bit today as CoachingSearch.com, who broke the Jason Loscalzo as strength coach news, took a look at Leach's staff.

One part in particular stood out to me.

The defensive side of the ball, however, is a little bit different. Leach has never coached together with any of the four assistants including defensive coordinator Mike Breske.

I don't know why I never realized that before, I'm assuming I just never looked at the staff broken up into offense and defense. As they add in the video below, none of the four defensive coaches have ever worked together. I don't know how important, if at all, coaching familiarity is, but this is an interesting experiment. If it turns out none of the defensive coaches get along and they brawl on the sidelines, my money is on Joe Salave'a.

Mike Leach finalizes Washington State coaching staff (via CoachingSearchTV)

It's that time of year for college football players. Last season is over and done with, their bodies have recovered and it's now time to go through the wringer. It's a bad time of year, with nothing but darkness, cold weather, and a punishing beginning and end to the day.

At Washington State, players are doing Mike Leach's Midnight Maneuvers, which is basically the same as the typical early-morning offseason workout, just done in the middle of the night. Then they go to bed, wake up, lift and do it all over again. For football programs, winter is the time to build the base. For Leach and Washington State, it's a time to hammer home the key points of the new regime, as well.

Michael Felder played his college ball at UNC and knows a thing or two about winter conditioning (he also knows just about everything there is to know about bad TV and is a must-follow on Twitter at @InTheBleachers). His winter conditioning primer, if you will, is absolutely a must-read. A few highlights:

Winter is also a bitch. Plain and simple, that's what it is; a bitch.

Then you're back up again. Back to diving out. More seat rolls. Then he'll mix it up and get you doing monkey rolls. Please don't screw this up.

It's their first step towards being champions. Their first step towards a bowl game. Their first step in the next season's fire. The boys are out there getting after it, wish them luck.

Oh, and they still have to go to weightlifting, that never stops.

Just go read the whole thing. Watch the video of Georgia's mat drills at the top. I laughed, I cried, I applauded Felder's work. Every college football fan should check it out for an inside look at what the offseason is really like.