Morris criticism doesn't compute, but there it is

CHICAGO -- Kirk Ferentz sat at a round table and answered questions for two hours on Thursday.

It was the second day of Big Ten media days at the Chicago Hilton. Coming off a 4-8 season, some of the questions were uncomfortable, some were big picture and there were questions about the challenges Iowa faces year in, year out that are unique to the Hawkeyes.

Ferentz had answers for all of them, but one question did give him some pause.

"I don't get that," Ferentz said. "I've gotten some feedback on that, but I just don't get that."

The question was on harsh criticism that has gone senior linebacker James Morris' way. Whatever form it takes -- social media, blogosphere, the electronic gamut -- Morris has been criticized from the moment he jumped into the starting lineup as a true freshman.

There's the perception that Morris is a "golden child," handed a starting spot because he readily echoed the Ferentz ethos or because his dad, Greg Morris, is the equipment manager. His quality of play has been in the crosshairs. He's been the internet whipping boy for a defense that caved in too many times during a season that was a 4-8 smoldering crater.

Morris is a local, coming from Solon where he was the piston for a team that won three Class 2A state football championships. That brought magnification. He rushed for more than 6,000 yards and some 110 TDs in a sparkling career. That helped put expectations in the clouds and snowy peaks.

Ferentz expressed bewilderment.

"James Morris is going to play for a long time when he gets out of college," Ferentz said. "He's an excellent player, he's a great athlete. The things he does where the fans can't see or media can't see, he's over the top. He's in an elite category."

Morris was asked about the criticism. He took a deep breath and dove in.

"I really don't like addressing this, but I'll address it this one time," he said Thursday. "I think players are ultimately judged by their records and I think that's fair.

"I'm not going to sit here and say I'm this or I'm that. In my opinion, you line me up next to the good players or great players or guys I should be more 'like,' you go down the numbers and look at the production, I think there are more similarities than there are differences."

Morris has 293 career tackles going into the season. Wisconsin's Chris Borland, a preseason all-Big Ten pick at linebacker and, like Morris, a three-year starter, has 308 career tackles. There's a disparity in tackles for loss. Borland has 41.5 to 15 for Morris. What is that? Is it because they're asked to do different things in their respective defenses? That's a more nuanced question.

"Then, look at how I would perform athletically, in a 40-yard dash -- and I hate talking about this stuff -- but in those things, I think I would perform more similarly than differently," said Morris, who, by the way, ran a 4.59-second 40 during his freshman year, the last time Iowa measured his 40. "People say it's a lack of production. Is it? I don't know."

Morris isn't an excuse-maker. He not only wants the buck to stop with him, he wants the buck to dress in the locker next to him. That was his only hesitation with this line of questions.

"It's almost sounding like an excuse at this point, so I would rather this be the last time I talk about it, I think people are judged by their records," he said. "If we had 9-3, 10-2, 8-4, then maybe we'd be having a different conversation right now. We could play that game, I don't want to play that game. I would much rather be judged by what I put out on the field."

Along the lines of would-be excuses, last season he was asked about injuries several times and always shot a look that said, "Not going there." As it turns out, he suffered a pulled groin in August camp that plagued him the entire season.

He hated admitting to that, too. Morris didn't like the criticism question, but he wasn't afraid of the answer.

"I love our fans, but there are going to be a small percentage of fans who are disgruntled in every fan base," he said. "They're going to a little louder when you're 4-8. I don't take that stuff personally. It doesn't keep me up at night. I understand where it's coming from. I want to win games just as bad as they want to win games.

"The criticism doesn't bother me because I know where it's coming from. I know it's not a personal place. People feel we should be something that we weren't last year, so they try to solve problems. If he had done this, or if he had done that. That's fine, that's what fans do.

"I think if you want to have the good fans that we have, because we have great fans, we really do, you have to be able to take some of that. That's just part of the job. I really have no problem with it. I think some of that stuff gets overplayed. I have no ill will for critics. I accept it. It keeps me honest, but at the end of the day, maybe when it gets to an extreme point, people need to take a step back and say, OK, what's going on here?"

Morris laughed at the notion he was handed a spot in the starting lineup because his dad works for Iowa football.

"I don't think my dad has that kind of clout," Morris said.