589 replies to this topic

[Brickowski]

I absolutely love the idea of Penn State donating revenues to charity as a punishment here, but is that realistic? Is there a precedent where the NCAA has reached into the pocket of a State University and told them what to do with its proceeds? I deeply want this to happen, but I'm pretty confident you start reaching into Penn States wallet they will fight back hard. Probably in court............where I fear they could win.

The NCAA says you have a choice: either we ban your football program from NCAA competition for 10 years or you voluntarily agree to make the donations and you execute an appropriate release absolving the NCAA of any liability.

[maufman]

The NCAA says you have a choice: either we ban your football program from NCAA competition for 10 years or you voluntarily agree to make the donations and you execute an appropriate release absolving the NCAA of any liability.

PSU is a charity too.

It would be nice to think that draconian penalties would pinch the people who could have put a stop to this and didn't, but in the short run, the easiest thing to cut will be financial aid.

Besides, the NCAA doesn't have unlimited power here. Even assuming the jurisdictional hurdles are cleared, you're looking at scholarship reductions and bowl bans. I would rather do without that illusion of justice, to say nothing of the precedent of NCAA intervention in university business unrelated to enforcing rules governing athletic competition.

[pedros hairstylist]

This is why football has to go.

http://www.pennlive....t_river_default

[Brickowski]

PSU is a charity too.

It would be nice to think that draconian penalties would pinch the people who could have put a stop to this and didn't, but in the short run, the easiest thing to cut will be financial aid.

Besides, the NCAA doesn't have unlimited power here. Even assuming the jurisdictional hurdles are cleared, you're looking at scholarship reductions and bowl bans. I would rather do without that illusion of justice, to say nothing of the precedent of NCAA intervention in university business unrelated to enforcing rules governing athletic competition.

I do not know what legal power the NCAA has. It may depend on the document that universities sign when they join that association.

[Reverend]

I do not know what legal power the NCAA has. It may depend on the document that universities sign when they join that association.

This post says more than you intend. But yes, the NCAA's power is contractual power. But that power is complicated by the source from which said power comes, being the membership, which makes it very unlike what we think of as legal power (perhaps unfortunately for social contract aficionados).

[RingoOSU]

This is why football has to go.

http://www.pennlive....t_river_default

Sick sick people.

[maufman]

Excellent Patriot-News artlcle on the NCAA's enforcement options.

This article explains why the Big Ten won't kick out PSU, even assuming it could. (Hint: it's all about money.)

[Myt1]

This is like saying that people who bought Energizer batteries in their zeal to have their shitty, early-'80s electronics last a big longer were responsible for the Bhopal disaster.

He's on fiiiiiiire!

[Alternate34]

He's on fiiiiiiire!

It was funny and correct, but the larger social and cultural atmosphere did help foster this problem. Obviously you can't just raze the school to the ground, but when you have janitors who won't turn in a former assistant coach for something they compared to the Korean War, you have larger issues than a few people in the program conducting a cover up which the Freeh report recognized albeit briefly. Obviously you want to mitigate damage to innocent parties, but the particular reverence for football and particularly for personalities in the football program.

[Reverend]

This is why football has to go.

http://www.pennlive....t_river_default

Grampa, grampa! Tell us again the story of how you became a social activist!"

Edited by Reverend, 19 July 2012 - 01:18 PM.

[bankshot1]

With apologies to Neil Young and social activism in earlier times

Ten children and coach is cummin',
those kids were left on their own
This summer we hear the drumming,
kids raped at PSU

[pedros hairstylist]

How about apologies to anyone who read that?

[bankshot1]

I'm offended by kids being raped and kids getting shot
But thats me.

[soxfan121]

Andy Staples at SI.com on Nick Saban's suggestion and how to punish PSU.

Since the release of the Freeh Report last week, most calls for action have come from those who either want the football program shut down, the statue of Joe Paterno torn down* or both. People scream for the NCAA to hand down the Death Penalty. They want their pound of flesh, but they have yet to articulate why the benefits of such punishment would outweigh the consequences that would harm people who had nothing to do with the cover-up and offer no punitive action to the actual guilty parties.

*As for the statue, it's a statue. It doesn't matter. It's up to the people at Penn State to decide what they want the world to know they cherish. If they want the world to know they cherish a man who enabled a child rapist, by all means, leave the statue standing. If they would prefer the world didn't believe they support the enabling of child rape, they should remove the statue. It's pretty simple, really.

Saban's response to a question about what should be done at PSU:

"This is a very, very criminal situation that probably reflects poorly on a lot of folks," Saban told a small group of reporters before speaking at Southeastern Conference media days. "It's probably too almost raw to really have a feeling that I can express. I think that what we all should probably be thinking a little bit more about is what do we want to be the outcome of this? Something that's a win-win type thing, for kids in the future, the people that are there now, the players that are there now.

"Maybe they ought to tax all the tickets that they sell on athletics and give the proceeds to some child abuse organization. Or something like that, rather than worrying about some punishment that is really going to have no positive affect on anything."

The Alabama coach didn't go into details of how a tax would be implemented. He stressed his comments had to do more with philosophy than a real recommendation.

"I probably shouldn't have said that. I'm just a regular old coach," Saban said. "I worry about what they do on third down. A lot of times we do the same thing with players. Everybody's always worried about what's the punishment? The way I try to always look at it is, what's the outcome? What outcome do we want? Sometimes I even say that to the player, what outcome do you want? Do you want to graduate from school? Do you want to play in the NFL some day? If that's the outcome that you want, this behavior is not becoming of that. So what do we need to do to make it better?"

[Grunherz54]

Apologies if this has been linked to before - I found it while reading a Penn State thread at DKOS:

https://twitter.com/...3/photo/1/large

[maufman]

Apologies if this has been linked to before - I found it while reading a Penn State thread at DKOS:

https://twitter.com/...3/photo/1/large

Pride goeth before a fall.

Stuff like this is why some of us always hated PSU football, and would be enjoying some damn good schadenfraude right now if this scandal weren't so heartbreaking and grotesque.

[RingoOSU]

The signature is what makes it.

[Corsi]

Am told that Penn State plans to take down the Paterno statue this weekend.

https://twitter.com/...331763457261568

[RingoOSU]

Good luck getting past the mob.

[bowiac]

How about the NCAA demands that they burn Paterno in effigy before every game or something. Actually shutting down the program seems nonsensical to me. Why? What deterrent effect are we trying to achieve?

[Philip Jeff Frye]

How about the NCAA demands that they burn Paterno in effigy before every game or something. Actually shutting down the program seems nonsensical to me. Why? What deterrent effect are we trying to achieve?

I would think that's obvious. We've had 120 years of college football coaches being bigger than university presidents and all kinds of corruption (both financial and moral) occurring as a result. Penn State's football team being executed sends a very powerful message that no program can be that powerful any more. The next university president facing this sort of dilemma will hopefully think "If I don't do the right thing here, we're the next Penn State" instead of "football is more important than stopping pedophilia." Obviously, the circumstances are going to be different the next time, but how does the normal "couple of years of probation, loss of a few scholarships, etc..." NCAA punishment say that this is anything other than business as usual for corrupt football powers?

And what happens to the next school that gets the same probation/scholarship penalty for recruiting violations? "Hey, we're just giving some kids a few bucks - we're not child molesters!" That's going to make the NCAA look completely ridiculous.

Edited by Philip Jeff Frye, 20 July 2012 - 12:15 PM.

[mt8thsw9th]

Actually shutting down the program seems nonsensical to me. Why? What deterrent effect are we trying to achieve?

Maybe they're trying to demonstrate that years of institutional coverup of heinous crimes will get a program shut down?

Edited by mt8thsw9th, 20 July 2012 - 12:13 PM.

[bowiac]

The next university president facing this sort of dilemma will hopefully think "If I don't do the right thing here, we're the next Penn State" instead of "football is more important than stopping pedophilia."

You think the next university president debating covering up a felony will be concerned with the possibility of NCAA sanctions if they get caught? Really? Graham Spanier is likely going to prison over this. You think NCAA sanctions rate on his list of regrets? Spanier is gone. The next university president isn't gonna care about their football program getting the death penalty.

If he's gonna be deterred from a coverup, it's gonna be by the threat of being fired, going to prison, and generally having his life in tatters.

[bowiac]

Maybe they're trying to demonstrate that years of institutional coverup of heinous crimes will get a program shut down?

Which does what? Years over coverups of heinous crimes will get you fired, ruin your reputation, and send you to jail. You think the threat of shutting down a football program these guys are no longer affiliated with is gonna matter?

[Philip Jeff Frye]

You think the next university president debating covering up a felony will be concerned with the possibility of NCAA sanctions if they get caught? Really? Graham Spanier is likely going to prison over this. You think NCAA sanctions rate on his list of regrets? Spanier is gone. The next university president isn't gonna care about their football program getting the death penalty.

If he's gonna be deterred from a coverup, it's gonna be by the threat of being fired, going to prison, and generally having his life in tatters.

You don't think universities are involved in covering up felonies involving their sports programs all the time today? Maybe not serial child rapists, but there's plenty of sexual abuse on campus, drug dealing, theft, etc... that are part of almost all big time programs these days that football. You don't think all sorts of universities are involved in sweeping this stuff under the rug right now?

Paterno and his enablers probably covered up all sorts of stuff over the years, they just didn't realize that people would care more about Sandusky's sins than some running back committing date rape. The death penalty would help send a message saying that this kind of stuff should not be tolerated any more.

Of course, I have little belief that a lot of this stuff won't still happen, but at least a real punishment would be a step in the right direction.

[bowiac]

Quite the contrary, I think they're sweeping it up under the rug left and right. I just think the deterrent for them is criminal sanctions, not the threat that after they're fired/put in jail, the football program is going to suffer. It's very "Apart from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the show?"

[maufman]

You don't think universities are involved in covering up felonies involving their sports programs all the time today? Maybe not serial child rapists, but there's plenty of sexual abuse on campus, drug dealing, theft, etc... that are part of almost all big time programs these days that football. You don't think all sorts of universities are involved in sweeping this stuff under the rug right now?

Paterno and his enablers probably covered up all sorts of stuff over the years, they just didn't realize that people would care more about Sandusky's sins than some running back committing date rape. The death penalty would help send a message saying that this kind of stuff should not be tolerated any more.

Of course, I have little belief that a lot of this stuff won't still happen, but at least a real punishment would be a step in the right direction.

You seem to welcome a dramatic expansion of NCAA authority, from its current focus on enforcing rules relating to amateurism (loosely speaking) to a focus on policing all aspects of university administration, at least so long as there's some sort of connection to collegiate athletics. (I think that's a fair reading of your post, but I'm putting words in your mouth, so apologies if I didn't get it quite right.)

I do not welcome such an expansive role for the NCAA. I suspect almost everyone reading this thread would much sooner make a $1,000 donation to their alma mater, or even a random university, than give that money to the NCAA. There's a good reason for that. Fundamentally, the NCAA is the enforcement arm of a cartel that allows its members to exploit football and basketball players to reap insane profits. The NCAA also incidentally regulates other sorts of intercollegiate athletic competition that costs tons of money that would be better spent on the member institutions' core missions. The NCAA emphatically is not an arbiter of moral standards or institutional best practices. Bending NCAA rules to punish PSU would be emotionally satisfying for a lot of people (including me), but the precedent so set will not be salutary moving forward.

If you want to stop future PSUs from happening, you need to change the culture of all universities, or at least the ones with big-time sports programs. Punishing PSU won't achieve that. No course of action is certain to achieve that, but thoroughgoing reforms that make PSU a model institution in this regard going forward offer the best hope for progress. Such reforms will require PSU to be at least a semi-willing participant in the process, making either a voluntary process in accordance with the Freeh report's recommendations or (preferably) a consent order in connection with the DoE's ongoing investigation of Clery Act violations a better way forward than NCAA sanctions.

[canderson]

The statue isn't coming down this weekend (at least as of yet), the BoT has yet to vote to remove it.

[BigSoxFan]

The statue isn't coming down this weekend (at least as of yet), the BoT has yet to vote to remove it.

I thought I read that it was entirely Rodney Erickson's call? Is that still true?

[canderson]

Not totally sure. The BoT is said to be the deciding voice, but Erickson is a smarmy guy so he very well might have worked out a deal to make the decision himself.

It'll be moved, it's just a matter of when and where.

[DrewDawg]

If it takes this much effing discussion at PSU to tear down a damn statue there's no wonder they really couldn't figure out what to do with a child molester running around.

I imagine it takes the BoT 3 hours to decide what to order for lunch.

[riboflav]

If it takes this much effing discussion at PSU to tear down a damn statue there's no wonder they really couldn't figure out what to do with a child molester running around.

I imagine it takes the BoT 3 hours to decide what to order for lunch.

It's because they don't really want to. Not wanting to... has been an endemic problem at PSU for some time now.

[Average Reds]

If it takes this much effing discussion at PSU to tear down a damn statue there's no wonder they really couldn't figure out what to do with a child molester running around.

I imagine it takes the BoT 3 hours to decide what to order for lunch.

Here's the thing about this - I actually understand why this is a decision that they might want to make when passions have cooled.

At a minimum, I could see waiting to understand what happens to the program before making a final decision on the statue. Because the two decisions are linked in my mind. If the program survives relatively unscathed (and I would argue that anything short of the death penalty means that the program escaped unscathed) then I would tear down the statue because it would be a grotesque reminder of the twisted values that caused the leaders of the university to cover up the activities of a child predator.

However, if the program is dealt a devastating blow by the NCAA or the institution itself, I'd love to see the statue remain as an ironic reminder of the fact that the man they revere as a leader, educator and coach is also the man responsible for raining so much destruction down upon the university and town he cared about so much.

[Old Fart Tree]

No, you don't have to consider those people and businesses. That's life. You have a business built solely upon football home games, then you have a shitty business. Every small business owner that depends on tourism, the weather, or piggybacking off of some other entity that they don't control takes the risk of losing business if things change dramatically. If they don't want to be dependent on outside sources to survive, then they come up with a better business model. Nobody is owed success.

This.

I think they should absolutely kill the program for 3-to-5 years, tear down the statue, and pay reparations. It'll never happen though.

[canderson]

The BoT has given Erickson the authority to decide on the state. He has talked to tons of people about it, including Sue Paterno, former players, administrators, "enemies," etc. Erickson hasn't decided yet but should very soon.

My favorite thing I read this morning is from Franco Harris, who tod media the statue should stay because to him there's no proof Paterno tried to cover up Sandusky.

[bowiac]

You need to consider those people and businesses insofar as there's no real upside to shutting down the program, and there is a downside.

Nobody is owed a success, but shutting down the program doesn't deter anything, and just amounts to closing the barn door after the horse has left the stable.

[Average Reds]

You need to consider those people and businesses insofar as there's no real upside to shutting down the program, and there is a downside.

Nobody is owed a success, but shutting down the program doesn't deter anything, and just amounts to closing the barn door after the horse has left the stable.

You've made it clear that this is what you believe, but your belief does not make it so.

I get that criminal penalties can be an effective deterrent, but the reality is that these penalties are both abstract and very hard to prove - to the point where they were clearly not a deterrent to Spanier and the other leaders at Penn State.

Having the program shut down is a much more effective deterrent, because the NCAA isn't a judicial body and they aren't bound by the legal protections of our court system. If the NCAA decides that this sort of misconduct can now place entire athletic programs at risk, I think you'll see universities make significant changes to the way they handle allegations of sexual abuse by coaches, players, etc.

[singaporesoxfan]

My favorite thing I read this morning is from Franco Harris, who tod media the statue should stay because to him there's no proof Paterno tried to cover up Sandusky.

As a backup plan, if the statue is toppled, Franco Harris will wait near the statue and scoop it up before it hits the ground.

[soxfan121]

Responding to Average Reds:
While I completely disagree, I am wondering why you are stopping with the football program. I think your argument makes more sense if you want Penn State University "shut down". As you said, the potential criminal penalties did nothing to dissuade Spainer - the President of the University - from his actions. And frankly, focusing on just the football program seems like an action designed to penalize Joe Paterno, who, unfortunately, is beyond earthly punishments.

The PSU problem started in the football program but it became a problem for the entire University. So focusing a punishment on just the football program seems to ignore the scope and depth of the problem.

I think the US Department of Education, through the Clery Act, will dispense an appropriate punishment to Penn State University. That punishment will have the ripple effect you desire, in that other universities will know and understand the potential consequences for covering up crimes (not just sexual abuse, although that should be at the forefront).

Fixating on the NCAA & the football program is emotionally satisfying but ultimately inadequate. This is bigger than the NCAA or the football program and wishing for the NCAA - the equivalent of the educational system's dog-catching office - to be the ultimate arbiter ignores the scope and depth of the problem at PSU. Spainer, Curley & Schultz need to be criminally prosecuted and sent to PMITA prison; PSU, as a full university needs to be held accountable. And the punishments need to be progressive, not regressive. Shutting down the football program is the simplest, and least effective, way to punish PSU. Using the football program to "make good" out of the tragedy is the best way to have something positive emerge from this shitstorm.

Edited by soxfan121, 21 July 2012 - 01:25 PM.

[Rocco Graziosa]

You seem to welcome a dramatic expansion of NCAA authority, from its current focus on enforcing rules relating to amateurism (loosely speaking) to a focus on policing all aspects of university administration, at least so long as there's some sort of connection to collegiate athletics. (I think that's a fair reading of your post, but I'm putting words in your mouth, so apologies if I didn't get it quite right.)

I do not welcome such an expansive role for the NCAA. I suspect almost everyone reading this thread would much sooner make a $1,000 donation to their alma mater, or even a random university, than give that money to the NCAA. There's a good reason for that. Fundamentally, the NCAA is the enforcement arm of a cartel that allows its members to exploit football and basketball players to reap insane profits. The NCAA also incidentally regulates other sorts of intercollegiate athletic competition that costs tons of money that would be better spent on the member institutions' core missions. The NCAA emphatically is not an arbiter of moral standards or institutional best practices. Bending NCAA rules to punish PSU would be emotionally satisfying for a lot of people (including me), but the precedent so set will not be salutary moving forward.

If you want to stop future PSUs from happening, you need to change the culture of all universities, or at least the ones with big-time sports programs. Punishing PSU won't achieve that. No course of action is certain to achieve that, but thoroughgoing reforms that make PSU a model institution in this regard going forward offer the best hope for progress. Such reforms will require PSU to be at least a semi-willing participant in the process, making either a voluntary process in accordance with the Freeh report's recommendations or (preferably) a consent order in connection with the DoE's ongoing investigation of Clery Act violations a better way forward than NCAA sanctions.

Wow, some good stuff there. Definitely food for thought, especially the bolded.

Edited by Rocco Graziosa, 21 July 2012 - 01:58 PM.

[bowiac]

Having the program shut down is a much more effective deterrent, because the NCAA isn't a judicial body and they aren't bound by the legal protections of our court system. If the NCAA decides that this sort of misconduct can now place entire athletic programs at risk, I think you'll see universities make significant changes to the way they handle allegations of sexual abuse by coaches, players, etc.

What will those changes be? As mentioned, the president of the university is in all likelihood going to prison. He's already been fired. What else is left?

Do you really think Graham Spanier feels he got off easy so far? "Phew. At least the Football team is still around. I wonder what my prison cell is gonna be like?"

[LeftyTG]

What will those changes be? As mentioned, the president of the university is in all likelihood going to prison. He's already been fired. What else is left?

Do you really think Graham Spanier feels he got off easy so far? "Phew. At least the Football team is still around. I wonder what my prison cell is gonna be like?"

I think it should be pointed out that Spanier hasn't been indicted or charged with a crime. That can certainly change, but I keep reading posts expressing a high degree of confidence that Spanier will go to jail, as if it was a mere formality. I don't share that feeling of near certainty. Perjury is a bitch to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.

[wade boggs chicken dinner]

Nobody is owed a success, but shutting down the program doesn't deter anything, and just amounts to closing the barn door after the horse has left the stable.

Maybe I'm just being idealistic, but it seems to me that the real problem is not that people committed felonies but that the football program was so "overarching" (for lack of a better word) that at least a dozen people didn't do what they ought to have done.

To me, the issue is this: Sandusky was allowed to continue to sexually abuse kids not because a couple of people committed felonies but because the football program was so important to the school that it simply was allowed to act without constraints.

To me, the biggest message the NCAA can say is that institutions better put in place the appropriate institutional controls on their sports programs to make sure that decisions like the ones that Spanier (et al) made can't happen.

Maybe that means that a sports coach doesn't get the ability to determine when he leaves his job. Maybe it means that the govenring board hires attorneys who know that they are representing the institution and not one individual in the institution. Maybe it means that sports programs get audited regularly even if they are raking in tens of millions of dollars for the university.

Do you think that if Sandusky was a baseball coach that he would have been allowed to continue what he was doing? Of course not, and that is the problem that needs to be addressed.

Edited by wade boggs chicken dinner, 21 July 2012 - 09:48 PM.

[singaporesoxfan]

What will those changes be? As mentioned, the president of the university is in all likelihood going to prison. He's already been fired. What else is left?

Do you really think Graham Spanier feels he got off easy so far? "Phew. At least the Football team is still around. I wonder what my prison cell is gonna be like?"

Yes, but Spanier knew all of the potential consequences and yet went on to do what he did. You seem to be suggesting that consequences should only fall on individuals, while I think that there should be some way of indicating that a college football team should not be ever as important as it became in Penn State. I don't know if the death penalty is the right answer, but it should be something more than just the civil liability lawsuits that the university will face.

[MiracleOfO2704]

Well, one problem is taken care of. The statue is going.

http://espn.go.com/c...rsity-crew-site

[RedOctober3829]

Emmert to announce "unprecedented" penalties against Penn State tomorrow at 9 am.

http://www.cbsnews.c...nst-penn-state/

Edited by RedOctober3829, 22 July 2012 - 08:20 AM.

[bsj]

Emmert to announce "unprecedented" penalties against Penn State tomorrow at 9 am.

http://www.cbsnews.c...nst-penn-state/

Apparently, it is NOT the "death penalty", but that the penalty is on par with or potentially worse. A very long stretch of bowl ineligibility and a large number of scholarships lost.

[axx]

Wow. Didn't think they would actually do anything significant directly at the football team. May as well give the entire athletic department the death penalty then.

Wonder if BOB quits.

[mabrowndog]

Well, one problem is taken care of. The statue is going.

http://espn.go.com/c...rsity-crew-site

And it's gone

Workers lifted the statue off its base and used a forklift to move it into Beaver Stadium as the 100 to 150 students watching chanted, "We are Penn State."

Construction vehicles and police arrived shortly after dawn Sunday, barricading the street and sidewalks near the statue, erecting a chain-link fence then concealing the statue with a blue tarp.

Penn State President Rod Erickson said he decided to have the statue removed and put into storage because it "has become a source of division and an obstacle to healing."

"I believe that, were it to remain, the statue will be a recurring wound to the multitude of individuals across the nation and beyond who have been the victims of child abuse," Erickson said in a statement released at 7 a.m. Sunday.

He said Paterno's name will remain on the campus library because it "symbolizes the substantial and lasting contributions to the academic life and educational excellence that the Paterno family has made to Penn State University."

Glad it's out of visibility, but Erickson's "let's put it in storage" approach is a cop-out and a clear placation of the vigilantly ignorant Paterno supporters. Then again, he's between a rock and a hard place so perhaps this was the best approach. I mean, it's not like that statue will be put back in public view any time in the next half-century, if ever.

Edited by mabrowndog, 22 July 2012 - 09:37 AM.

[RedOctober3829]

I hope they suspend play this season then reduce scholarships plus bowl ban for years.