A little late on reaction to the Freeh Report findings, and by now most of you probably have your own opinions on what should happen at Penn State in the wake of such damning revelations and confirmations.
I hear people calling for them to tear down statues, demanding that the NCAA slap them with the death penalty and all kinds of other stuff. Stuff that, from this corner, seems to some degree irrelevant.
All those crazy Penn State fans who made fools of themselves last fall were too preoccupied with their team's 8-1 start to see reality staring them in the face. As obsessive followers of sports, we're all a bit too obsessed with numbers and that seems to be the case with folks who are bent on removing wins from Joe Paterno's resume.
Eh...
There's vigorous debate about how to punish the school and the scoundrels who enabled a monster on the loose in State College. Here's an idea: Ask the victims.
The most tragic aspect of this whole disaster is that none of the people in power, from Paterno to the athletics director to the president and plenty of people in between, never bothered to consult the victims. They were too preoccupied with protecting their own reputations and not jeopardizing the pursuit of winning football games.
Will it make things easier for the victims if the NCAA brings sanctions upon the football program and athletics department? Doubt it.
Taking away wins, or punishing a program with a "death penalty," seems distracted.
Here's what seems right: The victims bringing the school to its knees with wave after wave of civil suits. The victims pillaging the Paterno estate with more lawsuits. The victims seeing that the dirtbags who are still living (Graham Spanier, Gary Schultz, Tim Curley) go to jail.
On the topic of statues, maybe the victims would consider it nice to construct a few new ones: Of Paterno and all these other scoundrels wearing handcuffs.
A few links:
-- Mike Slive was exceptionally eloquent and on-point yesterday in giving his take on the Penn State disaster and how to avoid ones like it.
Because we shouldn't delude ourselves into thinking that such horrific things couldn't take place on other college campuses where the football program occupies exalted (and thus protected) status.
“Last week’s headlines remind us that we must be ever vigilant on all issues of integrity, and that our primary mission is to educate and protect young people,” Slive said at the opening of SEC Media Days. “There must be an effective system of checks and balances within the administrative structure to protect all who come in contact with it, especially those who cannot protect themselves. No one program, no one person, no matter how popular, no matter how successful, can be allowed to derail the soul of an institution.”
-- Looks like Steve Spurrier offended some "media boys" when he made this observation:
"Good to be with you media guys again, and girls," he said. "Told my wife as I was leaving, I said, 'You know what? I've been to this thing 20 years now.' But you guys have been here 30, 40 years, some of you. They don't fire media people."
Of course there are plenty of scribes, including this one, who don't take kindly to such words in light of massive layoffs in the newspaper industry.
As a former newspaper guy, I'm certainly sympathetic to the folks who are out of jobs or in danger of being out of jobs. But in terms of media in general, it's not as though there's a shortage of people asking questions or writing articles or criticizing coaches.
There were eleven-hundred credential requests to cover SEC media days this year. So while you can certainly understand some hurt feelings among those in the newspaper industry, you can also somewhat understand where Spurrier was coming from given the expanding masses of jackals he addresses each year.
-- In Atlanta, The Chessmaster gives some insight into Georgia Tech's defense.
-- And in Morgantown, Oliver Luck explores the next frontier in revenue generation: Party decks!
LW
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