Hlas: Next man in for Hawkeyes and everybody

Some sports phrases crop up that must immediately be beaten down, never to be seen or uttered again.

'Sense of urgency” is one. A team is behind by a touchdown, gets the ball at its own 20-yard line with 54 seconds left, and an analyst tells us it needs a sense of urgency.

No, it needs to hurry up and get the ball into the end zone before time expires.

'Next man in” has been part of the Iowa football lexicon for many years. Kirk Ferentz introduced that phrase here, but you don't hear him use it much anymore. Yet it still hovers, parroted by the media and public.

It's been put to use this week because Iowa defensive end-extraordinaire Drew Ott tore an ACL and must be replaced in the lineup. True freshman Parker Hesse is the next man in. My apologies for ending a sentence in a preposition.

Well, Iowa no more owns 'next man in” than it has a monopoly on seaweed.

'Next man in” is a favored saying of Notre Dame Coach Brian Kelly. 'It's the next man in,” Kelly told his team after the Irish won at Virginia in September, talking about a player who got injured in that game and was adequately replaced.

I don't know what he said after the Irish lost at Clemson two weeks ago. Previous man out?

'The Wisconsin football team lives by the next man in philosophy,” says an article on the UW football website written several years ago. 'If a player goes down due to injury, another Badger is expected to slide right in and pick up where the other left off.”

Why can't he be 20 percent less effective than the injured player? Get the other 10 players on the unit to play a mere 2 percent better than they had been, and you've compensated for the injury. Do the math, coaches.

If it isn't next man in, it's next man up. 'Next Man Up” became a pet phrase at Ohio State last season, especially when J.T. Barnett replaced injured Braxton Miller at quarterback, and then Cardale Jones replaced injured Barnett.

In fact, 'Next Man Up!” was the title of a commemorative book about the Buckeyes' national-championship season of 2014. If you want a 'Next Man Up” OSU T-shirt, they're easily available on the Internet. Call it 'Next Thing In (The Closet, Not To Be Worn Again.”)

Michigan State has had injury problems this season that make Iowa's look like a couple hangnails and a paper cut. Spartans Coach Mark Dantonio has talked about the importance of 'Next Man Up” a time or two. MSU men's basketball coach Tom Izzo had some fun with that last week.

'I told Mark, quit being macho. Quit using that phrase, ‘Next man up,' ” Izzo told the Lansing State Journal.

'That's what he's got to say to you guys. That's what he's got to say to the general public. Did you ever think if the next man up is replacing somebody, he's replacing a guy that was better than the next man up, or that guy would be the other guy.

'Oklahoma, Ohio State, Michigan, Nebraska, back when they had 100 guys on scholarship and they were three-deep at every position, ‘Next man up' was a good line.”

FBS teams have 85 scholarship players. Less than one-third are starters. When the day comes when there isn't a next man in, we'll have something to talk about. With a sense of urgency.