Diesel Gordon Exits UW Program Same Day as Tybo Rogers

Coach Jedd Fisch says their departures were not related.

The latest roster turnover for the University of Washington football program wasn't supposed to happen until next week, when the transfer portal opens again.

However, the Huskies on Tuesday not only lost the services of sophomore running back Tybo Rogers to his significant legal hurdles brought on by rapes charges, redshirt freshman safety Diesel Gordon departed the team, as well.

Rogers and Gordon were roommates.

Both were suspended last year in fall camp.

Yet new coach Jedd Fisch said Gordon's exit was not related to Rogers' well-publicized troubles with the law without elaborating.

"He's not here, as well," Fisch said of Gordon after Tuesday's practice. "I don't expect him back any time soon. We're still working through that."

At one time, previous coach Kalen DeBoer's Huskies had a half-dozen Texans on the roster last year. With Gordon, a 6-foot, 164-pound defensive back from Arlington out, the UW now has just two -- in 6-foot-5, 272-pound Anthony James, a redshirt freshman defensive tackle from Lavon, and incoming freshman safety Paul Mencke Jr., from Sibolo. And James has been idle with some sort of injury that has limited his spring participation.

Gordon came to the Huskies from Seguin High, a 6A Texas football program coached by his father, Joe Gordon, who was a defensive back himself, emerging as a first-team All-Big 12 cornerback for Kansas State in 1994 and spending brief stints in the NFL and NFL Europe. The older Gordon has been a junior-college, small-college and high-school coach, plus he spent time at Kansas State as its director of recruiting.

The younger Gordon wasn't heavily pursued, but DeBoer's staff liked that he was a coach's kid who hailed from the ever competitive Texas high school football ranks and signed him.

"I grew up watching Big 12 and SEC football," Gordon said last spring. "I'd never really seen even a Pac-12 game to be honest. ... It was shocking but after I came out here, and seen what was out here and got the good vibes I got, I just knew it was the right place."

Gordon explained he was named Diesel because it was his mother's maiden last name.

He was suspended last August in fall camp for breaking training rules that weren't spelled out and never appeared in a game for the Huskies during the season.

Gordon participated in the first couple of UW spring practices for Fisch's staff before leaving.

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