Jay Hayes: Notre Dame Tackle Benched After Criticizing Coaches On Twitter
Jay Hayes learned the hard way to keep his thoughts on Notre Dame’s coaches to himself — and especially off of Twitter.
The sophomore tackle has been battling injury and will likely have to redshirt this season, something he isn’t very happy about. On Tuesday, Hayes took to Twitter to let the world know that he doesn’t agree with the Fighting Irish coaching staff’s decision to keep him out this year.
The tweet was deleted, but not before it was picked up by fans and sports journalists, including those at CBS Sports.
#NotreDame DT Jay Hayes: no stranger to Twitter controversy. Doesn’t seem pleased with lack of playing time. pic.twitter.com/xDlvKRe9uE
— Tyler James (@TJamesNDI) September 23, 2015
Now, Jay Hayes is paying for it. He sat out of Saturday’s win over UMass, and was the target of coach Brian Kelly’s anger.
“There has to be responsibility as it relates to social media, and you have to think before you hit send,” Kelly said Thursday night, via Irish247. “What you have to do is you have to knock on my door instead of hitting the send button, and these are good lessons to be learned… If he has a job at Google and he talks about his boss that way, you’re probably not going to have a job the next day. So you try to use it as life lessons.”
“You don’t say, ‘Hey, I’m going to take Twitter away from you.’ You just tell him look, you need to make a better decision next time or it’s going to impact you when you leave here at Notre Dame.”
But Kelly said he talked to Hayes, and said the sophomore understood his mistake. Kelly said the team still has faith in Hayes and that he will be part of the program for the long-term. But Kelly also said the sophomore tackle is “still in the development phase,” and hopes he learned a “good life lesson” from the benching.
Jay Hayes certainly has a lot of potential to live up to. As a four-star recruit, he ranked in the top 25 for defensive tackles in the class of 2014, and in the top 250 overall. He played in just three games last season, making two tackles.
It seemed that Hayes may have an opening this year after an injury to starter Jarrod Jones, but Hayes himself has been battling injuries and has yet to play for the Fighting Irish.
Coach Brian Kelly has yet to say if Jay Hayes will suit up for Notre Dame at any point this season.
[Picture by Streeter Lecka / Getty Images]
