Yes, the football program screwed up big time, but killing the program punishes the wrong people. The players, students and even local businesses would all take a hit, either in morale or in their wallet.
What the NCAA and Penn State should do is conduct a thorough investigation to find out who knew what was going on and dismiss those people. People talk, and I’d be surprised if no other assistant or high level authority figure had any idea what was happening with Sandusky.
The football program and Penn State overall are already going to take a hit in terms of reputation, money and recruitment of good players. It’ll take years to come back from this.
I don’t think killing the program is appropriate but it’s definitely been wounded.
If say what i guess will happen… Penn State will hire an AD of a pristeen reputation and then hire Urban Meyer and clean out the entire football staff… allowing Meyer to hire whomever he wishes…
Who exactly would be present to be punished?? Everyone with any guilt is fire/resigned gone from the University…
I think the NCAA should plan to do something, but wait and see what PSU does first.
PSU should release any players from their scholarships, and with the NCAA/B1G’s approval, allow for immediate transfer with no wait to any other school. They should put in a self-imposed bowl ban and B1G-CG ban for at least 2 years. They should remove all coaches and staff and start clean in that regard. Beyond that, it’s hard to say what number of any scholarship losses is correct. As has been discussed with Miami, if you ban PSU from tv, then that means their opponents, in effect, get a tv ban, too, so I don’t think that should happen. Last (for now), they should put a focus on recruiting the best students they can. The NCAA doesn’t have the strictest requirements (17 ACT, 2.5 GPA in high school, or so, is it?); PSU should at a minimum make sure no players get waivers from whatever standards the general student body receives. If PSU has a minimum of 22 and 3.0, then all football players should reach that. They’d probably do well to go above that, too.
Meyer didn’t exactly run a pristine program at UF.
But again I restate.. If those things.. entirely plausible were to occur.. Or say Al Golden from the U comes in.. Who would you be punishing..
And look.. allowing the players to transfer with no penalties.. obviously none of you people have played sports.. that’s just fucked up.. Yes.. i want to waste a scholarship on a guy who’ll need one of his two years left to get up to speed on my program.. Why would i use that scholarship on some HS senior who i can redshirt and have him play four years for me??
After the pro Paterno rioting, you could argue the students do deserve the Univ. getting the death penalty.
I look forward to the lawsuits and seeing JoePa on the stand explaining himself. Actually, the university will likely try to settle every case out of court to avoid just that scenario, so they will pay and pay. Forget about the football program, the university has likely received the death penalty. In a few years time, it will pretty much be a community college.
The school’s going to get punished, officially or unofficially, no matter what. Meyer, Golden, or whoever else it is that comes in knows it and will have to deal with penalties, but 1) they know that potential is there going in, and 2) would surely be given as much time as needed to get things turned around. If they miss a bowl game a few years in a row and don’t beat Michigan or OSU several years in a row, they’ll have a pass. I would guess that pass would last for at least 4 years, probably longer.
Your second part isn’t clear to me. What are you talking about bringing in HS seniors who can then transfer out anywhere w/o penalty after a year? I was talking about current players. Or are you suggesting that other schools won’t want guys transferring in because they’ll only have 1 or 2 years and won’t be able to get up to speed on their new program? That hasn’t seemed to be a problem for Russel Wilson at Wisconsin.
Russell Wilson is an anomaly dude. The backup tight end is going to have a totally different set of circumstances. Plus… a lot of these dudes actually go to class and want their degree to say Penn State. Losing your friends… your network… the sameness of your schedule.
Entirely reasonable to bring in a new coach a new staff and rebuild things. The fans will give it whatever it needs and this sick tragedy can hopefully fade away…
Name change State Penn Pederasts.
Typically when the NCAA punishes a program, the people who were most responsible - coaches, athletic directors, agents and things - can quit and walk away while the program loses scholarships and money and the players miss bowl games or whatever. The football program is of little consequence in the grand scheme of things, obviously, and it’s hard to argue that this is not far worse than the corruption at SMU. It doesn’t affect football playing in the literal sense but it involves all the leadership of the program. But I’m not seeing what is to be gained by shutting down the team. So far the people who are most responsible have been fired or placed on leave ahead of being fired, two are being prosecuted, and others will either be prosecuted or sued (as will the school, I’m sure). There will probably be further criminal investigations. There should be a very thorough independent investigation to make sure anyone else who knew about the abuses is also fired from the school.
Right now PSU says they won’t fire McQueary, but I think that has to do with their concern that they would be violating whistleblower laws if they did. I doubt he’s going to back next year even if they don’t fire him.
Based on the information currently available, I voted no. The football program was the backdrop for the crimes, not the reason for them or the beneficiary from them, which are generally the circumstances when the death penalty is warranted for a program.
That said, I tend to side with Barry Switzer on this when he says that everyone on that coaching staff had to know what was happening.
As for McQueary, I’m hearing rumors that he’s kept his job because PSU is trying to control his testimony, not because they’re worried about violating whistleblower laws. That’s unsubstantiated at this point, of course.
I choose not to vote in the poll because this is too close on the heels of the stink at Auburn last year. Too many knee-jerk reactions from “fans” and critics and ESPN hacks calling for drastic measures on something that time has shown was a tempest in a teacup. This one is far from trivial and may become the thing that lets SMU breathe a little easier about not being the dirtiest program on record.
Throw in the other scandals since last year, and I predict we ain’t seen nothing yet. There’s little doubt that PSU is a dirty operation and the folks already being punished and likely to be prosecuted can take some of the heat for that.
The students’ reactions and support of their school (no matter what) is evidence that there are other places outside the SEC where “team spirit” can get crazy at times.
If I were to vote, I’d have too hard a time selecting an option that I would feel good about an hour later.
Out of curiosity, what percentage of the coaches and staff employed by the football department were involved in this scandal? What does the scandal have to do with the act of playing football?
If your employer’s vice-president commits a murder, and his administrative assistant covers it up, shall we liquidate the company and fire everyone?
So you’re keen on punishing an entire loosely associated group based on the actions of less than 5% of that group, then?
So if your kid goes out and robs a bank, we’d best lock up your entire family.
I saw it; I just don’t think it’s sufficient.
The entire reason for the coverup was the special status that NCAA football enjoys on campuses like Penn State. Imagine if a graduate assistant in the English Department witnessed a tenured professor sodomizing a ten-year-old boy in a classroom. Do you honestly think the university would cover that up the way they have this?
Paterno and McQueary can be (charitably) considered people who didn’t believe that a man they had known and respected for a long time would do something like that (I don’t buy that for a second, but it’s not the most ridiculous thing that’s been written about them this week). Once news got to the upper administration of the school, though, the football program was treated differently than any other division of the university would have been. The motivation for that special treatment was to maintain PSU Football’s position as an NCAA institution. That impacts the school’s recruiting, fundraising, and position in the community, but it ultimately depends on the school’s status with the NCAA.
For the better part of a decade, Paterno, McQueary, Curley, and Schulz have gone to bed every night knowing that a ten year old boy was raped in their locker room, and woken up every morning and put the interests of Penn State Football ahead of justice for that boy. Yes, the legal system has to deal with them, and it will, but that decade-long coverup was for the benefit of PSU football. The NCAA, which is happy to wield enormous influence over its member schools, has to make it clear that PSU football does not benefit from it in any way, shape, or form.
If they don’t do that, they send the message that PSU’s mistake was getting caught.
Former PSU student checking in here: I don’t know about English, but I would not be the least surprised to hear about similar things happening in Business, Law, or in the Administration building.
Or they do it, and send the message that screwing over hundreds of people, staff and students alike, for PR purposes is more important than actually punishing the guilty party.
Sandusky had been retired from the football program for years at the time he was caught by McQueary. The coverup was for the benefit of the old boys network, not the benefit of the team or program.
That underplays it a little. He was forced to retire two or three years earlier after after it was discovered that he’d showered naked with a young boy. After the was caught raping a child, he still an office on campus and run of the place, but he was told not to bring children to campus anymore.
nods Not disputing he’s a scumbag, I’d happily kill him myself. I’m just saying it has nothing to do with football and everything to do with old rich guys protecting old rich guys.