The fashionable thing to do here might be to wonder whether there is a mitigating circumstance whether, for example, Larry Cochell's heart trouble could somehow be related to his language problem.
The fashionable thing to do might be to wonder whether the disclosure of Cochell's impending heart surgery, to correct blockages in two arteries, could somehow cause people to feel differently about the man who, with such amazing casualness, threw down the N word twice, in separate conversations in attempts to praise a black player on his Oklahoma baseball team.
Fashionable. Just not applicable.
The fact is, Cochell already had a fine reputation in the game of college baseball, as a coach and as a person. Even after Cochell's words to ESPN broadcasters, spoken in off-camera conversations, were reported and taken to the university for reaction and caused his downfall, the family of the player smeared by their usage reiterated that Cochell had been wonderful to them and hoped that he would not be considered a racist.
Cochell had support, and still has it. He has a legacy of success as a coach, and the real-time approval of the people around the Oklahoma program that until last weekend was his approval up to and including the families of two black players on the team.
For those reasons and more, his medical problems will evoke sympathy and good wishes from the people who want him to be well and live long.
It's not the same as saying he can turn back time.
Cochell just can't say what he said, and that's nonnegotiable. Not in a public setting. Not in a public/private setting. Not on camera. Not off camera. Not on the record. Not off the record.
Cochell cannot say what he said. He can think it, since the Thought Police still have yet to figure out a way to pre-sense individual brain activity. But he can't say it.
He can't say it white. And he can't say it black. He can't say it to a friend, or to the kinds of guys such as college baseball broadcasters sitting with him during off-camera information sessions with whom he might feel a fraternal sort of bond.
And while the fallout of Cochell's use of the N word to distinguish a "good" black athlete from the other kind cost him his job and perhaps his career, it is also worth suggesting here that a black coach making the same kind of remark would have faced the same kind of public censure. Job loss? I don't know about that. But censure? Absolutely.
A stupid, racially insensitive comment isn't particular about the public figure who delivers it. No matter the circumstances. No matter the pathology.
And that, in a twisted little way, marks progress.
Cochell had built a lot of good will in his 39 years in the game. The father of the player to whom Cochell was referring with his remarks, a freshman named Joe Dunigan, not only said the family had forgiven Cochell but added, "He has treated us like family ... I hope people down there don't color him as a racist because he made a mistake."
Without knowing the man's complete oral history, it isn't such a stretch to imagine that this isn't the first time Cochell has used that kind of language to differentiate the hustling players from the slothful ones, to separate the clean-living players from the ones who seek trouble. Cochell can say he has never before used the phrase he used to describe Dunigan, but, you know, stuff like that doesn't just suddenly roll off the tongue.
That's for Cochell to deal with now, along with his own health and the question of his future. The Oklahoma program did the only thing it could: It dispatched the coach in order to move quickly, move efficiently and keep its program going, which is what universities and athletic departments have to do.
It also had to move quickly because it's Oklahoma, not California. It's Oklahoma, not New York. Neither the baseball program nor the university nor, really, the state could afford any idle time on a racial matter, because to do otherwise would be to invite the same kinds of casual stereotypes hickville, white-bread racist country that are so insidious and difficult to erase. And university president David Boren, as governor and former U.S. Senator, knows it all too well.
Could a black coach have gotten away with using the N word to describe a player in public? Several years ago, maybe. A few Chris Rock HBO specials ago, maybe. Here in 2005, not so much.
This isn't the high end of the evolutionary scale on racial issues, of course, and the black/white divide is as alive and well in American sports as in any other segment of society. But the society has begun to draw a few lines in the sand, on the sports side the same as any other side. The use of a racial pejorative is over the line no matter where it comes from. Small progress, maybe, but progress all the same.
None of which makes it any better to be Larry Cochell today, a man facing heart surgery and the loss of his identity with the business he has been in for 39 years. It is possible to pity the man, even give him sympathy and good wishes, without approving him. He said the one thing you absolutely can't say.
It's as black and white as that.
Mark Kreidler is a columnist for The Sacramento Bee and a regular contributor to ESPN.com. Reach him at mkreidler@sacbee.com.