Smith apologizes to everyone, apparently legal issues aren't issues in Knoxville...

Jacques Smith in Orange/File

We still say that someone is missing the point with this story. We reported yesterday about 18-year old Tennessee defensive end Jacques Smith getting in trouble with the law for beating up someone at a Knoxville area club early Sunday morning.

According to a follow up story published today, Smith apologized to "teammates; victim says 'I just want to move on from it'.

His coach, Derek Dooley says the assault charge will have no bearing on Smith's status for Saturday's game. Smith's arraignment hearing is November the 10th.

More from the Knoxville News-Sentinel RIGHT HERE

Okay, we get that he's sorry he beat the guy up. Although the victim is not sure yet whether he accepts the apology.

We however have questions. One that NOBODY has asked. Was Smith drinking? Why...and more importantly how...as an 18-YEAR OLD was he able to be in the bar at 2am? Was he drunk at the time of the incident? Why...and how did the Knoxville police department manage to butcher the original press release on the incident, listing the wrong location and the wrong name of the victim? Why has none of the Knoxville media asked ANY of these questions?

The coach says that he doesn't need to enforce a curfew...ok...what about the underage drinking? Yeah, we get that college kids and teenagers do it, but that doesn't make it legal.

The message that we get is that if you are a good football player in Knoxville, you can pretty much do whatever you want. But that fact, isn't a surprise.

Vols DE Jaques Smith arrested Sunday...team now has more arrests than SEC wins

Jacques Smith #55/Courtesy: volsquest.com

Whooops! We guess that when University of Tennessee fans think things couldn't get much worse....they do.

Freshman Defensive End Jaques Smith was charged early Sunday morning with simple assault after an incident at a place called the RT Warehouse.

Smith it seems got into a bit of a tussle with another patron over a girl around 2am. He hit the victim in the head, then kicked and punched him. The one good thing, apparently, Smith's teammates pulled him off of the guy.

Read more from the incredibly biased Knoxville News-Sentinel RIGHT HERE

Here's why we call the News-Sentinel biased. Read the story. While talking early in the story about the incident, they leave out...a lot of details. One...what was the freshman (not 21) Smith doing in the bar? Two, was he drinking? Three, what were he and his teammates doing at said bar at 2am? Third paragraph "And though the matter isn't believed to be all that serious"...really? We are betting its serious to the 21-year old who got beat up....

Not to say that kids have to be perfect, but...there are more than a couple of questions here. According to the "Paper's Story"...it's just a little thing and meaningless in the grand scheme of things for the "Improving" Vols football team.

Oh, why is coach Derek Dooley saying this isn' a "Cultural Issue"? Of course it isn't. It's a college kid fighting over a girl in a bar he shouldn't have been at in the first place. That's all...nothing more, nothing less!

This kind of pisses us off. The whole trend of college town newspapers having sections named for the team, reeks of bias. Sure, we get the whole "More coverage" aspect of it. But if this story is indicative of the reporting, it doesn't smell very good.