COLLEGE FOOTBALL / DAILY REPORT : ORANGE BOWL : Talented but Troubled Moss Sits It Out

Depending on whom you believe, Randy Moss is either the second coming of Deion Sanders or Rocket Ismail. But instead of playing in the Orange Bowl between Notre Dame and Florida State on Monday night, he will be standing as he has all season on the sideline.

That is not the kind of freshman year Moss envisioned as a high school senior in Belle, W.Va. He believed he would be starting as a wide receiver opposite Derrick Mayes for Notre Dame. So did Irish Coach Lou Holtz.

But Notre Dame’s admissions office rejected Moss’ application after he entered as a third party into a racially motivated fight at his high school. Moss was charged with felony assault, which later was reduced to a misdemeanor. He still has time to serve next summer on a 30-day jail sentence.

Unable to get Moss into school, Holtz recommended that Moss sign with Florida State. Coach Bobby Bowden took him on the condition that Moss redshirt his freshman year.

“Lou Holtz told me that Randy Moss was the second-best player he’d ever seen, behind, I guess, Rocket,” Bowden said last week. “I didn’t believe he could be that good. But now that I have him, yeah. He fits into the Deion Sanders category.

“My concern was that he would come down here and get out of control again. I had to investigate it as much as I could. But after talking to his mother and people who knew him, I felt like he knew he couldn’t afford to get into any more trouble. I told him he’d already had his one mistake.”