Here we are, mere hours away from the NCAA carpet-bombing State College in what organization sources are describing as "unprecedented" to any news service that... seems to own a telephone?
That so many reporters are hearing the same foreboding message can only mean that the NCAA knows the punishment that will be announced at a 9am ET press conference is a big deal and they want to soften the landing.
So, what does "unprecedented" mean in this context? Are the penalties coming from NCAA president Mark Emmert unprecedented because they include components such as fines or athletic department-wide punishments? Or are they unprecedented because they are exceptionally harsh?
What's currently being reported is something along the lines of a multiple-year postseason ban, "crippling" scholarship losses, and at least a $30 million fine (hopefully, the NCAA will see fit to vacate this fall afternoon while they're at it). Not quite the "death penalty", but substantial.
And then there's this guy.
Penn State board of trustees members are in the dark, and they're salty. Newly elected trustee Anthony Lubrano told USA Today that, "Joe Paterno is not responsible for pedophilia in America" and that "Freeh reached an (erroneous) conclusion." Meanwhile, ESPN reported an anonymous trustee said, "Emmert has been given full reign by the pansy presidents (at other universities) to make his own decision."
I've honestly never been more conflicted about a sports story in my life.
The NCAA has never punished a school in which no NCAA bylaws were violated and the courts, through both criminal and civil tracks, are in the process of administering heavy penalties of their own. This is also a slippery slope for the NCAA. Do they get involved every time a member of an athletic department has knowledge of another member committing a crime? "Umm... Coach Fickell. We're going to need to talk to you about the night Coach Coombs was cranked up on Red Bull and doing 68 in a 65."
On the other hand, maybe you don't need precedent. Maybe you need a seismic event to serve as a deterrent from something like this ever happening again. After all, this isn't Craig James and Eric Dickerson getting Camaros. This is the violation of youth and the damaging of lives. And it could have been stopped.
Whatever happens, I can't take delight in the suffering of Penn State fans, despite a summer of sanctimony from some on their end during the Tressel saga. We're all fans and many of us are likely a little too heavily invested in college football and basketball games. Some will ask how Penn State fans could have elevated Paterno to such heights, but any similarly rabid fanbase would have done the same had they had a Joe Paterno leading their team.
I wouldn't wish this on anyone.
THE STATUE IS NO MORE. Quickly buried under the news of impending NCAA sanctions for Penn State was the fact that the statue of Joe Paterno that had graced the east side of Beaver Stadium for more than a decade has been removed.
Inglorious in its exit.Some onlookers cried, even sobbed. Others stood in stunned, somber silence.
And by 8:25 a.m., the 7-foot-tall, nearly 900-pound statue had been sequestered somewhere in Beaver Stadium.
"We are … Penn State" chants and shouts in support of Paterno followed, but they were merely shells of the chants heard at Paterno's statue on the night after he died.
After covering the statue with a packing blanket, workers carried the nearly 1,000-pound bronze statue to a storage room within the stadium.
The Paterno family issued a statement protesting the move, but what's done is done and this was clearly the right move, given what we know today.
In a way, this is a window into what De-Stalinization must have been like. That's not to compare the crimes or misdeeds of Joe Paterno and Joseph Stalin — Stalin's crimes are on another level altogether. The similarities lie in the elimination of a cult of personality that had dominated a way of life for people and the stunned, confused manner in which it unfolds in front of those who are being told that everything they believed and held firm may have been a lie.
THE MEYER BOUNCE? Jim Naveau of the The Lima News takes a look at Ohio State questions and answers ahead of Big Ten Media Days, set to begin Thursday in Chicago1. One of those questions is how much of a leap we can expect from the offense AB (After Bollman):
Two of the previous places Meyer was a head coach saw huge jumps in points scored in his first season.
The year before he was hired at Bowling Green, the Falcons averaged 15.8 points a game. In his first year, they scored 30.3 a game. It was the same thing at Utah, where the Utes averaged 46.2 points a game his first season after scoring 28.1 a game a year earlier. But Florida averaged three fewer points a game in his first season than they had for Ron Zook the year before.
Ron Zook's involvement in anything means your data will be, at best, wildly unpredictable, at worst, garbage, so yeah, Urban is essentially two for two. Expect points.
YOUR WEEKLY SULLINGER SUMMER LEAGUE UPDATE. Jared Sullinger played solid minutes in all four Celtics NBA Summer League games last week, helping the team to a split with wins against Atlanta and Chicago to start the week before closing with losses to Sacramento on Thursday and Milwaukee on Saturday.
Despite shooting an abysmal .256 from the field since the league shifted to Las Vegas, Sullinger averaged 10.8 points and 10.5 rebounds in just 28 minutes of action. Not bad for a guy with a bad back and the hops of Jay Burson.
OHIOAN JOHN SHERMAN WOULD BE PROUD. After four long years, EA surrendered to an antitrust lawsuit that was filed in response to the publisher signing exclusive deals with the NCAA among other sport governing bodies. If the settlement is approved, EA will be setting aside $27 million to make token payments to consumers that purchased qualifying games.
Oh, and gamers may soon be getting a better product:
It also stipulates that EA will not sign an exclusive license arrangement with the AFL for five years and will not renew its current agreement with the NCAA, which expires in 2014, for at least five years.
Looking beyond the fact that America's favorite non-profit is so hungry for cash that it entertains exclusive deals on digital products2, we're two years away from a viable competitor entering the space which should translate into better games across all franchises and quite possibly lower prices. Until 2019, when consumers may have to wage this battle again.
Kickstarter, anyone?
ETC. Posnanski's book tour is killed ... If you like to rock the signs of great roadways, you should check out our new shirt... The Switzer Statue, STILL HERE... Billy Donovan is putting together a nice little class... The Steve Spurrier Dance is mesmerizing... Terrelle Pryor's mentor, Ted Sarniak, passed away Friday at 68 ... Your next Wollaston Medal winner for discovering bacon rock... Bocce in Columbus Commons looks like a great way to spend a summer day... Intruder learns the hard way not to mess with the paraplegic Steven Seagal.
- 1 The 2012 B1G Media Days, where the coming college football playoffs and Urban Meyer's debut as Ohio State's coach will take backseats to 847 questions about Penn State.
- 2 Sure, go ahead and sign exclusive deals for things in the analog world. Only a madman would serve Coke and Pepsi at the site of a Final Four, after all.
