Arkansas players have a problem with authority

To call John Pelphrey's second season at Arkansas a nightmare would have be putting it kindly. After making it to the second round of the NCAA tournament in 2007, Pelphrey and his squad hit the proverbial wall in 2008 -- losing 14 conference games after starting the season 12-1 with key non-conference wins over Texas and Oklahoma.

The Razorbacks' conference collapse last year was bad, but it pales in comparison to the news that broke last night. Pelphrey, apparently tired from all the offseason drama, laid the wood to his team, suspending five players for various incidents that occurred after the 2008-09 season.

The biggest name on the suspension list was top returning scorer Courtney Fortson (14.8 ppg/5 ast) who, along with Stefan Welsh (another starter), were suspended indefinitely from the team. Marcus Britt (a critical bench player) was suspended for the first six games of the season, while freshman Glenn Bryant will miss the first two games. Walk-on Nick Mason won't be allowed to return until the after the fall semester.

Mason, Bryant and Britt got caught up in an alleged rape case after the season, after an Arkansas student claimed she'd been raped by three unnamed basketball players. While the charges were dropped, Pelphrey did make it clear he would punish all three for breaking the team's code of conduct.

I can understand why the three players were given suspensions of various lengths. What I can't understand, however, is why Fortson and Welsh were given indefinite suspensions.

Fortson made some inappropriate comments on his Twitter account regarding the alleged rape. And while I can understand suspending him for a game or two over the comments, I'm not sure his actions warranted a suspension. While I've yet to hear of anything else regarding Fortson, you'd have to assume that something else transpired during the offseason that brought Pelphrey to this decision.

Like Fortson, Stefan Welsh's punishment remains shrouded in mystery. Arkansas' sports information director remains mum on the subject, only giving bits and pieces of information about why both players were given an indefinite leave of absence from the team.

You have to imagine there's more to this story. I'll take a stab in the dark and say we'll get the rest of the story in the coming days. For now, it looks like Arkansas is stuck with a nine player roster for the season opener against Alcorn State.

Suspensions can affect a team in one of two ways: it can bring a team together, or it can tear them apart. Judging by the names on the suspension list, most would assume it'd be the latter for Arkansas.