Penn State AD and Sandusky Charged

[Toe Nash]

On the question on whether to "punish" students by slapping NCAA sanctions on the school: it's not like the NCAA would be taking away students' ability to get an education or a college degree. Barring those kids in the football team - who should be allowed to transfer - it strikes me that students who would consider the NCAA sanctions to be a severe personal punishment are over invested in the role of ther school's football team to their identity.

This is true. I do feel kind of bad for people who own businesses around PSU that cater to football fans (or people who sell water to tailgaters or whatever) who are likely to lose money. But it is a college town so I'd think most of them would be able to stay around being that there's always 44,000 students there and lots of other events.

But beyond the players, you shouldn't go to a school because of their football team, so if you're too torn up by missing games (or losing the program entirely) you need to re-evaluate.

 

[TheYaz67]

...the NCAA's jurisdiction is questionable, at best.

Yeah, but you have to love the opening sentence of the NCAA's own "History" section on its website:

The NCAA was founded in 1906 to protect young people from the dangerous and exploitive athletics practices of the time.

 

[JayMags71]

The NCAA being involved is a bit like hoping the Homeowner's Association gets involved in disciplining the owners of 42 Evergreen Terrace for multiple murders that took place after quiet hours and left the yard a mess.

No. It's nothing like that. At all.

The football program should not "go away"; the football program can help keep this awful, horrible situation front & center and make the PSU community confront the failures of their leadership. Wishing the program would "go away" is the easy way out. Making PSU confront their failure might help some of them realize just how awful and horrible their leadership was.

Or, more likely, every game will devolve into the same cult siege mentality we saw the game after Paterno was shitcanned. Only worse, since it would be every damn home game. Taking away football forces them to re-evaluate the community's priorities.

 

[Reverend]

The NCAA should force PSU's football (and all athletic teams?) to donate all revenue for two years to survivor's groups, victim's rights groups and awareness campaigns so this NEVER happens again. PSU, as an institution, needs to feel what Spainer, et. al. feared - the loss of money and reputation. The current student/athletes are not responsible for this mess, no "competitive advantage" was gained...the NCAA's jurisdiction is questionable, at best. But the one thing they could do is force PSU's athletic department to forgo revenue for several seasons, in compensation for and recognition of past offenses.

Paterno is beyond punishment; Spainer, Curley & Schultz should go to jail for their actions (which have to include obstruction of justice, among other things) and be barred from ever working in higher education after their eventual release. And PSU should pay for their lack of institutional control with money. Make the PSU community fund Sexual Abuse Survivor's & Advocacy groups for several years. Make them post banners outside the stadium that read "Proceeds from today's game will be donated to XYZ. The PSU can never apologize enough for the failures of our past administration & leaders."

The football program should not "go away"; the football program can help keep this awful, horrible situation front & center and make the PSU community confront the failures of their leadership. Wishing the program would "go away" is the easy way out. Making PSU confront their failure might help some of them realize just how awful and horrible their leadership was.

I have not decided what I think with respect to a death penalty for PSU football, but I think while there is much here that is on point, it misses the larger point of what the point of the death penalty would be.

What this post describes is an attempt to make sure that this never happens at PSU again. The death penalty would be an attempt to make sure it doesn't happen at any program again. Convictions of Spanier, Curley and Schultz do not give other institutions and their BoTs the same kind of incentive to establish control of their programs. Fear of this battle station losing the program altogether and the backlash they would receive from alumni should that happen might.

As Myt1 said earlier, PSU is the key player here, as a holistic actor. PSU did wrong, and I think a micro focus on a few agents within the school may miss the macro structural context of how they were able to do so. To me, it's a bit analogous to the old outrage over the McDonald's Coffe Spilling case where people were outraged some woman got awarded $2M because she didn't "deserve" that, when the real point was how to create punitive structures that influence the behavior of large organizations--and even though she never got that much money, the award number was chosen because it represented two days of coffee sales for McDonald's (a minor slap on the wrist, really, but certainly not arbitrary).

How do you influence the behavior of institutions, of large organizations that can't be put in jail?

Also, while kiddie fucking is obviously more highly charged, I wouldn't even venture to guess how many universities are covering up sexual assaults.

 

[mauf]

Also, while kiddie fucking is obviously more highly charged, I wouldn't even venture to guess how many universities are covering up sexual assaults.

This is an excellent point. It's also a reason not to get our hopes up that the NCAA will drop the hammer.

You know, yesterday I almost said that expecting the NCAA to come down hard on Penn State for this was like expecting OPEC to come down hard on Saudi Arabia for human rights violations. I didn't say that, though, because I thought it wasn't a good parallel -- yeah, OPEC and the NCAA are both cartels, but unlike OPEC and human rights, it's not like lots of NCAA member institutions are covering for sexual predators. But now that you mention it, a lot of them are.

Wow.

 

[ThePrideofShiner]

ESPN's Rick Reilly shredded Paterno in a column today. He also calls for the NCAA to issue the death penalty.

What a fool I was.

In 1986, I spent a week in State College, Pa., researching a 10-page Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year piece on Joe Paterno.

It was supposed to be a secret, but one night the phone in my hotel room rang. It was a Penn State professor, calling out of the blue.

"Are you here to take part in hagiography?" he said.

"What's hagiography?" I asked.

"The study of saints," he said. "You're going to be just like the rest, aren't you? You're going to make Paterno out to be a saint. You don't know him. He'll do anything to win. What you media are doing is dangerous."

Jealous egghead, I figured.

What an idiot I was.

I hope Penn State loses civil suits until the walls of the accounting office cave in. I hope that Spanier, Schultz and Curley go to prison for perjury. I hope the NCAA gives Penn State the death penalty it most richly deserves. The worst scandal in college football history deserves the worst penalty the NCAA can give. They gave it to SMU for winning without regard for morals. They should give it to Penn State for the same thing. The only difference is, at Penn State they didn't pay for it with Corvettes. They paid for it with lives.

http://espn.go.com/espn/story/_/id/8162972/joe-paterno-true-legacy

 

[JayMags71]

Well, Mauf and Rev's last two posts have sapped whatever faith I may have had in humanity. Although, that probably says more about me and my worldview. Ugh. I need a drink.

 

[axx]

Am I reading this right? They were debating about whether to report to police about the McQuery incident and Paterno convinced Spanier to drop it?

 

[amh03]

Am I reading this right? They were debating about whether to report to police about the McQuery incident and Paterno convinced Spanier to drop it?

Yes...that's what the Freeh report states.

From the Pittsburgh Trib:

As the Freeh report painfully points out, Paterno wasn’t a peripheral character in the circumstances that allowed Sandusky to continue preying on boys long after he should have been stopped. He wasn’t an out-of-touch old guy who didn’t know how to respond when confronted with the sordid allegations regarding his former defensive coordinator.

He was, as Freeh put it at the news conference announcing his findings, “an integral part of an active effort to conceal.” That nine-word avalanche effectively buried any chance of Paterno posthumously rehabilitating his tarnished reputation....

The worst appears to be this: Private emails and correspondence Freeh unearthed strongly suggest that Paterno successfully persuaded former university President Graham Spanier, former vice president of business and finance Gary Schultz and former athletic director Tim Curley not to report Sandusky to authorities in 2001.

http://triblive.com/news/2193925-74/paterno-freeh-university-former-statue-football-sandusky-continued-eric-findings

 

[Gagliano]

This is an excellent point. It's also a reason not to get our hopes up that the NCAA will drop the hammer.

Amd this is kind of hard for those of us who are detached from college sports to understand. A couple of years ago, a few football players at Ohio State got caught trading some memorabilia for tattoos downtown, and the NCAA was on the school like rabid racoons: http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/sports/2011/07/22/ncaa-ohio-state-violations.html

Compared to that, shouldn't the systematic cover-up of raping minors be handled pretty harshly?

 

[JayMags71]

I still can't believe that people involved in a coverup would use email.

Simple. They didn't believe they were participating in any so unseemly as a coverup. They believed they were doing important work: protecting the reputation of the football program, and, by extension, the university. Plus, they were doing the "humane" thing by not turning in a friend and colleague.

 

[axx]

Compared to that, shouldn't the systematic cover-up of raping minors be handled pretty harshly?

The difference between this and some of the other recent scandals is that players are not directly involved. If there was evidence that say a player was paid off to keep quiet they would be interested.

 

[uncannymanny]

Simple. They didn't believe they were participating in any so unseemly as a coverup. They believed they were doing important work: protecting the reputation of the football program, and, by extension, the university. Plus, they were doing the "humane" thing by not turning in a friend and colleague.

I see it more as it being the late 90's and early 2000's, combined with older, non-technical people. You really think these guys were aware that these things were stored on a server somewhere and infinitely recoverable? I doubt these emails were pulled off their laptops. These are the kind of people to which email/internet is "magic" for lack of a better term. Hell, people I've worked with who are far younger think these things disappear when you send them or delete them from your inbox. One of the emails shows they were quite aware of the impact of what would happen if people found out their actions (the "the only drawback..." or whatever one).

 

[Ananias]

Yeah, but you have to love the opening sentence of the NCAA's own "History" section on its website:

Agreed. If the NCAA finds itself impotent in this case, than it has ceased to be what it was originally designed to be.

 

[Gagliano]

The difference between this and some of the other recent scandals is that players are not directly involved. If there was evidence that say a player was paid off to keep quiet they would be interested.

Yes, and that's what I mean about being detached and on the outside looking in and not gettng the logic. The NCAA came down on Ohio State hard because a few few players sold jerseys. It didn't even involve anything that happened on the field and didn't affect a game outcome one iota. The Penn State scandal also involved the program directly (it even happened in their own showers, not off campus), was condoned by the coach and staff, and didn't affect game outcomes.

It's a very strange culture.

 

[axx]

Yes, and that's what I mean about being detached and on the outside looking in and not gettng the logic. The NCAA came down on Ohio State hard because a few few players sold jerseys. It didn't even involve anything that happened on the field and didn't affect a game outcome one iota. The Penn State scandal also involved the program directly (it even happened in their own showers, not off campus), was condoned by the coach and staff, and didn't affect game outcomes.

It's a very strange culture.

Like most non-profits, the NCAA has lots of highly paid execs who like the idea of working for a non-profit. Allowing players to violate amateur status is a direct threat to the NCAA keeping it's non-profit status. That's it really.

 

[johnmd20]

Little column by the NY Times. There are a lot of columns on the Times right now, but I'm linking this for the money shot quote. This pretty much sums up the idiocy of the Penn State fans.

Paterno Statue

Burgan said he felt Paterno committed “no wrongdoing in the Sandusky situation.” The Freeh report’s assertion that Paterno had been aware of accusations of Sandusky in 1998 did not change Burgan’s mind.

“No, no not at all,” Burgan said. “Because you don’t know what Paterno knew and when he knew it. And now that he’s gone, nobody will know. Whatever facts Louis Freeh has, or thinks he has, that’s up to him.
“I mean, if there’s e-mails that come out, if there’s evidence, I’m a criminal justice major from Penn State, so I’d like to see it. I’d like to see the evidence and then I’ll make a determination at that time. But as it stands right now, we’ve always supported Joe Paterno.”

"If there is evidence, I will believe. If only a person affiliated with the FBI got involved and worked for the past 7 months to see who did know what and when and released these findings in a report. I guess I would consider that evidence. But, of course, that didn't happen. Ergo, JOE IS INNOCENT. I'm a Criminal Justice major, I KNOW THINGS ABOUT THE LAW."

Penn State sucks and this guy is horrendous for allowing himself to be quoted for that column because he wanted to leave flowers at Joe's statue because Joe was innocent until "evidence" came out.

 

[sfip]

Little column by the NY Times. There are a lot of columns on the Times right now, but I'm linking this for the money shot quote. This pretty much sums up the idiocy of the Penn State fans.

The sweeping generalization of Penn State fans has been every bit the idiocy. I give credit to those in this thread who recognize that.

 

[riboflav]

The sweeping generalization of Penn State fans has been every bit the idiocy. I give credit to those in this thread who recognize that.

How can someone still be a fan of Penn St.?

 

[JBill]

How can someone still be a fan of Penn St.?

I agree with sfip, if you check out the blogs and message boards, the fact that Paterno knew about 1998 seems to have changed a lot of people's minds about Paterno's culpability. They were waiting for more proof, and they got it. Yeah you have the idiots who will never think Paterno did wrong, but I don't think it's a very large percentage of the fanbase anymore.

 

[canderson]

Anyone see today's NY Times? Paterno began negotiating a contract amendment the same month he learned about the AG investigation. The kicker(s): His contract wasn't about to expire and he and Spanier never told the BoT about their agreement. The only told BoT Chairman Steve Garban and BoT Vice Chairman John Surma. (I have a feeling you will hear those Anne's much more as time goes on).

In January 2011, Joe Paterno learned prosecutors were investigating his longtime assistant coach Jerry Sandusky for sexually assaulting young boys. Soon, Mr. Paterno had testified before a grand jury, and the rough outlines of what would become a giant scandal had been published in a local newspaper.

That same month, Mr. Paterno, the football coach at Penn State, began negotiating with his superiors to amend his contract, with the timing something of a surprise because the contract was not set to expire until the end of 2012, according to university documents and people with knowledge of the discussions. By August, Mr. Paterno and the university’s president, both of whom were by then embroiled in the Sandusky investigation, had reached an agreement.

Mr. Paterno was to be paid $3 million at the end of the 2011 season if he agreed it would be his last. Interest-free loans totaling $350,000 that the university had made to Mr. Paterno over the years would be forgiven as part of the retirement package. He would also have the use of the university’s private plane and a luxury box at Beaver Stadium for him and his family to use over the next 25 years.

The perks:
- A $3 million “career bonus.”
- The use of a Beaver Stadium suite by Paterno’s family for 25 years.
- A $900,000 share of television and radio revenue from the 2011 season.
- About $500,000 in other bonuses and salary payments due from last season.
- Paterno's wife Sue will receive a monthly payment of $1,000 for the rest of her life, on-campus parking privileges and access to the Lasch football building to use specialized hydrotherapy equipment.
- Forgiveness of two loans totaling $350,000

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/14/sports/ncaafootball/joe-paterno-got-richer-contract-amid-jerry-sandusky-inquiry.html?_r=1&hp

 

[bowiac]

How can someone still be a fan of Penn St.?

I don't think this would really impact my fandom. But then again, I also think NCAA sanctions are pretty silly here. This was a criminal manner. Let it play out there.

 

[The Napkin]

Apparently they're going to renovate the showers where Sandusky did his raping. I guess they figure if they couldn't figuratively whitewash it they'd literally whitewash it.

 

[pedros hairstylist]

I agree that not everyone at PSU is a mouth-breathing idiot like the kid JohnMD quoted, but you can't call the sweeping generalizations "equal"to the idiocy. Yea, it's dumb, but It's not even close. The fact of the matter is that the most vocal PSU supporters are those wailing about a Paterno witchunt and how unfair the whole scandal is to them and their community. None of them are out front wailing about how children were raped for decades right under their noses. If there are PSU people who are appalled and angry about what happened, then why are they so silent?

 

[mauf]

Anyone see today's NY Times? Paterno began negotiating a contract amendment the same month he learned about the AG investigation. The kicker(s): His contract wasn't about to expire and he and Spanier never told the BoT about their agreement. The only told BoT Chairman Steve Garban and BoT Vice Chairman John Surma. (I have a feeling you will hear those Anne's much more as time goes on).





The perks:
- A $3 million "career bonus."
- The use of a Beaver Stadium suite by Paterno's family for 25 years.
- A $900,000 share of television and radio revenue from the 2011 season.
- About $500,000 in other bonuses and salary payments due from last season.
- Paterno's wife Sue will receive a monthly payment of $1,000 for the rest of her life, on-campus parking privileges and access to the Lasch football building to use specialized hydrotherapy equipment.
- Forgiveness of two loans totaling $350,000

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/14/sports/ncaafootball/joe-paterno-got-richer-contract-amid-jerry-sandusky-inquiry.html?_r=1&hp

Given the dollars that big-time college football coaches pull in, and the relatively modest compensation Paterno earned over the years, the only part of this that raises an eyebrow for me is that only two of the Trustees were in the loop.

Is Surma still the acting chair of the BoT? I know he's a big donor and is probably politically connected (he's the Chairman and CEO of U.S. Steel), but it seems like PSU needs someone in that role who can devote close to full-time attention to it at the moment.

 

[mauf]

More detail from the NY Times article canderson linked.

Mr. Paterno quickly issued a statement saying, in effect, that the board need not act, that he would resign at the end of the season. Neither he nor the university revealed that he had effectively agreed to do so already, in return for an expensive financial package.

The board fired him anyway, a decision that caused rioting and led to an angry and often very personal backlash against the trustees, but it agreed to honor his contract. It was then that the full board came to find out what the university was obligated to pay Mr. Paterno.

Over the ensuing months, as revelations about the role Mr. Paterno and other university officials played in the scandal mounted, a schism developed among the board members, according to several people with knowledge of the events. There were some who argued that it was unseemly to pay the remainder of the money and other perks owed to Mr. Paterno.... Others worried about the hostility they would face if they tried to strip Mr. Paterno, still beloved in many quarters of the campus, of money that he was contractually owed....

With rumblings that the Paterno family was thinking of suing the board of trustees for defamation, the board dispatched its lawyer to negotiate the final payments. All the board wanted in return was a release protecting the university from such a lawsuit.

The Paternos refused. Mr. Sollers said in his statement that “the retention of their legal rights in a case of this magnitude and complexity is customary and appropriate.”

The board of trustees ultimately agreed to make good on the full package anyhow, and in April paid what was owed to the Paternos.

"Customary and appropriate" my ass. Giving Paterno a cent more than he was unambiguously owed by contract without securing a release was inexcusable.

On another note, I guess we understand why Paterno moved to announce his retirement at the end of the season before the BoT had a chance to fire him. It seemed politically tone-deaf (though I'm not convinced he had any better options), but it certainly strengthened his case that he was entitled to the $3mm payout.

 

[Reverend]

This is an excellent point. It's also a reason not to get our hopes up that the NCAA will drop the hammer.

You know, yesterday I almost said that expecting the NCAA to come down hard on Penn State for this was like expecting OPEC to come down hard on Saudi Arabia for human rights violations. I didn't say that, though, because I thought it wasn't a good parallel -- yeah, OPEC and the NCAA are both cartels, but unlike OPEC and human rights, it's not like lots of NCAA member institutions are covering for sexual predators. But now that you mention it, a lot of them are.

Wow.

This is a very excellent formulation, I think. It sounds like hyperbole... absurdity... and then.

It takes something like this to get the public to think.

Well, Mauf and Rev's last two posts have sapped whatever faith I may have had in humanity. Although, that probably says more about me and my worldview. Ugh. I need a drink.

A couple of years ago, a girl at St. Mary's, the women's across the street from Notre Dame, accused a Notre Dame football player of rape. She was so nervous that she started wearing all ND gear all the time. She killed herself.

Amd this is kind of hard for those of us who are detached from college sports to understand. A couple of years ago, a few football players at Ohio State got caught trading some memorabilia for tattoos downtown, and the NCAA was on the school like rabid racoons: http://www.dispatch....violations.html

Compared to that, shouldn't the systematic cover-up of raping minors be handled pretty harshly?

Tear it all down. Scorched earth. Fuck steroids in baseball. What's Pat Fitzgerald doing?


Now to get that drink JayMags mentioned...

 

[OnBase]

I agree that not everyone at PSU is a mouth-breathing idiot like the kid JohnMD quoted, but you can't call the sweeping generalizations "equal"to the idiocy. Yea, it's dumb, but It's not even close. The fact of the matter is that the most vocal PSU supporters are those wailing about a Paterno witchunt and how unfair the whole scandal is to them and their community. None of them are out front wailing about how children were raped for decades right under their noses. If there are PSU people who are appalled and angry about what happened, then why are they so silent?

Thank you for reminding us who this is about. Raping a child is right up there with murder one in my book and so far Rick Reilly's piece (somebody already linked it above) is the only one that comes close to sufficient outrage. The NYTimes story made me ill.

 

[Reverend]

The sweeping generalization of Penn State fans has been every bit the idiocy. I give credit to those in this thread who recognize that.

Is it never appropriate to judge people by the company they keep?

Looking over the thread, Sprowl's posts seem to be the only ones that really engage how screwed up it is that the President and Vice President of the university were involved.

As crazy as this may sound, I don't think the real gravitas of this has really set in for a lot of people yet.

 

[terrynever]

How can someone still be a fan of Penn St.?

This is my question, too. First attended PSU in 1966. Covered football for the student paper and then a State College rag for eight years. Made friends there who still live in town. After much thought over the past 15 months, I have come to the conclusion that the football program is dead to me. I will retain my memories and friends.

It makes sense to ban the program for 3-5 years though I suspect the NCAA will wait a year before acting. Kill it, then start the program over again from scratch in five years.

As for Joe, his big mistake was many years in coming. Nobody should stay 60 years in the same job. He outlived the contemporaries who used to keep his power-seeking tendencies in line. Curley was a walk-on deep reserve in the 1970s who idolized Joe. In 20 years, he became AD, over promoted and arriving in the late 1990s, just in time to carry out Joe's worst instincts.

Age, arrogance and absolute power changed Joe over the years until he lost sight of the young man he once was, the guy who wanted to make a difference in young people's lives. The great irony is, Joe only protected his players. In his mind, everyone else -- media especially -- were enemies. A lot of us knew it would end badly for Joe. None of us saw this nightmare coming.

 

[wibi]

Funny but very tasteless picture I saw browsing the internet earlier today

Spoiler

 

[Gagliano]

The sweeping generalization of Penn State fans has been every bit the idiocy. I give credit to those in this thread who recognize that.

Well, not everyone lives within ten miles of Penn State, so we can only go by what we hear and read. So, I just pulled up google and typed in "Joe Paterno Statue", and got this little blurb from the first hit:

The words on the wall, once inspiring, are now just sad, even disturbing.
“They ask me what I'd like written about me when I'm gone. I hope they write I made Penn State a better place, not just that I was a good football coach.”
The quote forms a backdrop for the bronze statue of Joe Paterno that towers outside the stadium where the coach built a storied football program.

You know what would change my mind about Penn State? When I type "Joe Paterno Statue" into google and the first hit describes how the townspeople drove onto campus with a skidder and threw a chain around that statue and dragged it to the dump after every had a chance to piss on it. I mean, seriously, what the fuck is wrong with Penn State? It's like Pleasantville in reverse.

 

[curly2]

Bill James thinks the Freeh report exonerated Paterno:

http://deadspin.com/5925694/someone-actually-thinks-the-freeh-report-exonerated-joe-paterno-and-its-bill-james

I watched Matt Millen just embarrass himself on ESPN on Thursday (and last year when the scandal broke), and thought as awful at it is, it's slightly understandable how he feels, giving his time with Paterno and how he's not all that bright -- as his Lions tenure proved.

With the current PSU students and alumni, I thought all the support was awful but again slightly understandable given all their time in the Happy Valley culture.

But what Bill James said is just un-fucking-believable.

 

[Foulkey Reese]

This scandal has ruined both Bill James and Joe Posnanski for me. That really, really sucks.

 

[berniecarbo1]

If this doesn't epitomize the "big fish little pond" acronym we all heard when we were kids, nothing does. They lived in a little cocoon in the middle of the PA hills and were gods, all of them, even the pedophile. And they all thought they were beyond reproach...all of them. It wasn't realtiy and never would it ever be. But for football, Penn State would have been a middle of the road state related university with a mid range academic record...good but not great university. Football put it on the map and kept it there for 40 years. And football has ultimately caused it to be devalued in every sense of the word.

I give Bill O'Brien credit for doing a great job in recruitment. Having said that I know $$$ talks and none of my recommendations will be followed but if I was King of State College for a day I would do the following in an effort to rehab the university and start healing this horrible mess:

1. Take down all references to Paterno, including the name on the library, the statue, and street names there, the works.

2. Self impose USC level sanctions on the program (sorry Billy O'Brien) such cut scholarships by 1/3 for 3 years, do not accept bowl bids, including the playoff, for three years and other than mandated TV appearances by the Big 10, no TV for the next 3 years.

3. all non monetary items in Paterno's "retirement", refuse to honor it. If necessary, you pay the value of those perks to the family. I know that sounds nuts but do you really want Sue Paterno hanging around the football offices, or the family sitting in a suite evey saturday at Beaver Stadium?? No, you don't. So, yup, buy them off and send them on their way.

4. Start the process of openly settling the child abuse claims...now. Not only offer $$ but also any and all counseling they need, free college tuiton for them and their children...do the right thing.

5. Perhaps leave the Big 10. Go independant in football for a few years, slowly scaling the program back to a manageable level. maybe petiton the BE for admission in all olympic sports...and then decide what to do about football. maybe join the BE, maybe look to set up an Eastern 10 conference with the old BE football schools and Maryland and Miami, IDK, but look at what the hell the program did, both good and bad for PSU.

6. Ramp up the academics and make the school comparable to UVA or Michigan ( a public Ivy). It has some good programs, make them great. Make everyone proud of Penn State again.

People can be proud of PSU if it stands up, moves forward and does something like what I have laid out here. There can be good for all in this, long term. But I fear that the small town mentality of State College is something that will have to be completley eradicated before we will see any real change at Penn State.

 

[Double Jeopardy]

I watched Matt Millen just embarrass himself on ESPN on Thursday (and last year when the scandal broke), and thought as awful at it is, it's slightly understandable how he feels, giving his time with Paterno and how he's not all that bright -- as his Lions tenure proved.

With the current PSU students and alumni, I thought all the support was awful but again slightly understandable given all their time in the Happy Valley culture.

But what Bill James said is just un-fucking-believable.

Bill James appeared on ESPN Radio to add to his previous comments: http://hardballtalk....aterno-defense/

Given the cover-up by the archdiocese and child sex abuse by a former club house manager, I am shocked as well as disgusted by his comments.

Is he playing the super-contrarian out of some desperate need to be the smartest person in the room?

 

[axx]

Looking over the thread, Sprowl's posts seem to be the only ones that really engage how screwed up it is that the President and Vice President of the university were involved.

It's because of the media. They only care about the Paterno angle and could care less that the Pres and VP of the school were involved with the decision not to tell the authorities.

 

[pedros hairstylist]

It's because everyone knows Paterno had more power at PSU than all of them. He was among the most powerful person in the god-forsaken state of Pennsylvania, by many accounts.

 

[natpastime162]

Well, not everyone lives within ten miles of Penn State, so we can only go by what we hear and read. So, I just pulled up google and typed in "Joe Paterno Statue", and got this little blurb from the first hit:



You know what would change my mind about Penn State? When I type "Joe Paterno Statue" into google and the first hit describes how the townspeople drove onto campus with a skidder and threw a chain around that statue and dragged it to the dump after every had a chance to piss on it. I mean, seriously, what the fuck is wrong with Penn State? It's like Pleasantville in reverse.

Web optimization would be a proper and sincere act of contrition? The statue needs to come down. I don't really care how it happens or what they do with it. Oh, and 10 miles from State College is the fucking sticks.

If this doesn't epitomize the "big fish little pond" acronym we all heard when we were kids, nothing does. They lived in a little cocoon in the middle of the PA hills and were gods, all of them, even the pedophile. And they all thought they were beyond reproach...all of them. It wasn't realtiy and never would it ever be. But for football, Penn State would have been a middle of the road state related university with a mid range academic record...good but not great university. Football put it on the map and kept it there for 40 years. And football has ultimately caused it to be devalued in every sense of the word.

You could say that about a number of state related universities.

It's because everyone knows Paterno had more power at PSU than all of them. He was among the most powerful person in the god-forsaken state of Pennsylvania, by many accounts.

I can't believe it, but I'm starting to agree with you. Paterno was the face of the university and is going to be the focus of this scandal moving forward regardless of the other guilty parties.

 

[mauf]

It's because everyone knows Paterno had more power at PSU than all of them. He was among the most powerful person in the god-forsaken state of Pennsylvania, by many accounts.

It's simpler than that. Unless you went to PSU or lived in State College, Paterno is the only one of these clowns you had heard of a year ago.

If this scandal involved the PSU baseball team, it would've been a one-day story (at most) outside Pennsylvania.

 

[Reverend]

It's simpler than that. Unless you went to PSU or lived in State College, Paterno is the only one of these clowns you had heard of a year ago.

If this scandal involved the PSU baseball team, it would've been a one-day story (at most) outside Pennsylvania.

Now chew on just how fucked that is for awhile.

 

[PBDWake]

It's simpler than that. Unless you went to PSU or lived in State College, Paterno is the only one of these clowns you had heard of a year ago.

If this scandal involved the PSU baseball team, it would've been a one-day story (at most) outside Pennsylvania.

I can't tell if you mean "Nobody would really care if it were a baseball team story", or if you mean what I'm talking about next.

If the scandal involved the PSU baseball team, Sandusky's probably fired after 98, it probably gets reported, and isn't a scandal at all for the University beyond "Oh, an assistant coach was leading a double life". Nobody would have blamed Penn State as an institution for the initial abuse, because that'd be stupid (although there may have been civil legal culpability), just like the weight of criticism for Penn State now starts post-98 investigation, not with any of Sandusky's molesting kids prior to.

 

[Ananias]

This scandal has ruined both Bill James and Joe Posnanski for me. That really, really sucks.

Eh, Bill James does neat things with numbers. He was super duper wrong about Pete Rose too. I've never found him to be particularly insightful when it comes to topics that don't revolve around statistics. If you look at his defense of Paterno, it's weirdly centered around specific numbers (6 statements of non-criminal behavior, 4 investigating agencies, the mathematical reality of not being able to fire someone more than one (1) time). James is known for being able to look at a forest and see the individual trees. Apparently it doesn't work the other way. And as For Joe Posnanski, he doesn't seem to even understand why people make noise at a baseball game. To put it slightly less flippantly, his expertise seem to lie within the foul poles/goalposts. People can be really good at writing about certain things and still somehow be really out of touch with other parts of what it means to be human (see Lovecraft).

 

[Ananias]

I don't think this would really impact my fandom. But then again, I also think NCAA sanctions are pretty silly here. This was a criminal manner. Let it play out there.

I might be missing a legal avenue, but it seems to me that NCAA sanctions ($$$) would do a lot more to scare PSU and other schools into their policing their own culture then anything the DOJ could do.

 

[SumnerH]

And as For Joe Posnanski, he doesn't seem to even understand why people make noise at a baseball game. To put it slightly less flippantly, his expertise seem to lie within the foul poles/goalposts. People can be really good at writing about certain things and still somehow be really out of touch with other parts of what it means to be human (see Lovecraft).

I couldn't possibly disagree more.

One of Posnanski's greatest gifts is capturing the human emotion and feeling of a game or situation. Hell, page one of this thread has one of his great articles that's almost all about the noise fans make at a baseball game--his recap of Lester's no-hitter:

There are not many places in the world that are quieter than the losing clubhouse after a no-hitter. Everyone speaks in whispers. Televisions are dark. The stereo is mute. Kansas City’s Billy Butler, the 22-year-old kid from Florida who loves nothing more than talking and swinging bats at incoming fastballs, shakes his head.

“He didn’t make any mistakes,” he murmurs.

And to the next question: “He didn’t make any mistakes,” he murmurs again.

...

From there — from a fight for his life — to here, Monday, raw night, packed stadium, harsh wind, everyone’s hearts in their throats. He threw 130 pitches, the last his fastest of the night, maybe the fastest of his life, a 96-mph fastball, high and away and rising. Kansas City’s Alberto Callaspo waved the bat helplessly.

That’s when the loudest sound that 37,000 or so people can make detonated, a World Series-clinching sound, a Secretariat thundering down the stretch sound, a birdie putt to win the Masters sound. Catcher Jason Varitek charged the mound to jump on Lester. Red Sox players rushed in from all directions. Fans all over the park unfolded their cell phones and called someone — anyone — to say they were here. They are still here. Outside the losing clubhouse, a half hour after the last pitch, they’re still talking into cell phones, still hugging and laughing and asking each other, “Can you believe it?”

Inside here, the Royals’ clubhouse, it is quieter than a bank vault.

His article after Adenhart's death was also all about the emotions of fans; I'll quote part of it here, but go read the whole thing:

And the sad story hits hard. I can remember the way people huddled together outside of Arrowhead Stadium after Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Derrick Thomas died in a Miami Hospital room. I can remember the feeling of mourning in my high school in North Carolina when the brilliant young basketball player Len Bias died. I can still feel the dull and hollow sorrow that lingered in Cleveland after a terrific young relief pitcher, Steve Olin, died in a boat accident on Little Lake Nellie. I can remember my neighbor crying after the brilliant young outfielder Lyman Bostock was killed, and I can remember my father leaning out the kitchen window to tell us that, in a choked up voice, that the great Yankees catcher Thurman Munson had died in a plane crash.

I guess it's because we cannot help but think what we missed and what we lost. Those are the feelings of loss, but maybe it's easier to grasp those feelings when it's an athlete who dies. They are young and strong and gifted. They are, in a sense, youth. And then they are gone. There's too much to feel.

 

[Ananias]

I couldn't possibly disagree more.

One of Posnanski's greatest gifts is capturing the human emotion and feeling of a game or situation. Hell, page one of this thread has one of his great articles that's almost all about the noise fans make at a baseball game--his recap of Lester's no-hitter:


His article after Adenhart's death was also all about the emotions of fans; I'll quote part of it here, but go read the whole thing:

we'll agree to disagree (btw, the noise thing was a reference to his latest blog post http://joeposnanski....7/boo-boos.html ). I see a lot of mechanics of good writings in the excerpts you provided but nothing that any professional columnist isn't expected to be able to turn out on a weekly basis. I really don't like his Adenhart piece -- I feel it unquestionally admires the implicit celebrity-athlete-centric attitude that causes things like the PSU culture in the first place. There's nothing particularly introspective or insightful in the human interest side of his writing, just a string of ancedotes and metaphors that are supposed to feel warm and heartfelt without actually saying anything that hasn't been said before. But that's just my opinion. As a rule, I tend to think writing mushy things about sports is almost always corny and hackneyed.

 

[Gagliano]

Web optimization would be a proper and sincere act of contrition? The statue needs to come down. I don't really care how it happens or what they do with it. Oh, and 10 miles from State College is the fucking sticks.

No, I'm not talking about web optimization. And of course it needs to come down, and the how and when really does matter. I was responding to this post:

The sweeping generalization of Penn State fans has been every bit the idiocy. I give credit to those in this thread who recognize that.

I don't have time to go to Penn State and get to know everyone so I don't have to generalize. All I have to go by is what I see in the news, and what I see isn't good. And during the next six months, if the statue comes down only after a bunch of kicking and screaming and Penn State fans are still making idiots of themselves, well, that's an ongoing part of their collective legacy, like it or not. If there really is a significant number of decent people there, if certainly doesn't jive with that statue still being there, especially with the inscription behind it. I can't even think of a parallel to it.

 

[MarcSullivaFan]

The fact that these imbeciles are acting like impudent children with respect to the statute is convincing me that someone needs to bring the hammer down. Yes, the statute represents the "good" Paterno did, which is exactly why it needs to come down.

 

[Freddy Linn]

 

[BroodsSexton]

I'm not much for photoshop, but there have to be others who have noted the similarities: