Bobby Petrino pulled this kid's scholarship for a terrible reason

Published Feb. 6, 2015 5:00 p.m. ET

foxsports

Lousiville coach Bobby Petrino doesn't have the most trustworthy history.

He's been known to bail on jobs midseason and lie about more serious off-field issues.

The man has said time and again he wants to change -- and everyone would like to see that happen -- but it's no surprise that he has clumsily gone back on his word once again.

Three-star running back recruit Matt Colburn had been committed to Louisville since last June, but two days before National Signing Day he received a call from a Louisville assistant saying his scholarship offer was being pulled.

Not because of anything he did, mind you, but because Petrino suddenly decided the Cardinals needed to give Colburn's scholarship to a defensive back since they were losing too many this year (as if Louisville didn't know three DBs would be going to the draft weeks ago).

"It's been about eight months now that I've been committed, and I feel kind of short-changed because I got this (commitment and recruitment) taken care of even before the season started so I wouldn't have to worry about this anymore," Colburn said. "But I guess that's just the way it is sometimes."

For Colburn's trouble, Louisville told him he could grayshirt, which means he "earned" the opportunity to delay his enrollment until a year from now and be part of the 2016 recruiting class, even though he's graduating high school and, as South Carolina's Mr. Football this year, didn't expect to sit out a year before beginning his college career.

Colburn's high school coach, Tom Knotts, is so furious with Petrino that he has reportedly banned him from recruiting Dutch Fork High School.

"It's not right. Louisville is only going to hurt themselves doing this," Knotts said. "Everybody knows not just what a good player Matt is but what a good person he is. That is not the way to do business and if that's the way to do business, we don't want to deal with them.

"He (Petrino) won't be able to recruit my school anymore and I imagine there will be some other coaches that will say the same thing. Trust factor is just not there. They've known about these three DBs wanting to go to the NFL for weeks now. To use that as an excuse doesn't hold water with me."

Hopefully Colburn finds a better fit for him to play college ball in 2015. Knotts said a number of schools including Wake Forest, Navy and Charleston Southern are interesting in signing him. But Louisville bailing out on him two days before Signing Day put him in a bind since he shut down recruiting from other schools when he gave his commitment to Louisville.