Disaster iN COLumBus

tornadoes in oklahoma, alabama and missouri. hundreds dead. Flooding all along the mississippi…Louisiana handed another RAW deal… and on this beautiful monday in Ohio, another implausible disaster….

TRESSEL RESIGNS!

no one will die, no one will have to live in shelters, or wait in line for potable water, BUT for Ohio State fans this latest disaster CERTAINLY hurts the most.

What do I think? Well, for starters, in 5 or 10 years or whenever the NCAA is finally reduced to the scrap and manure that it deserves to be, Tressel will be viewed as an innocent victim in the f*cked up system of college football, and college sports today. In any other aspect of society where people use their skills to make so much money, they would DEMAND their fair cut of the profits. To extrapolate the situation here, in the bluntest terms, Tressel was fired because some of his biggest star athletes, who came from poor backgrounds, sold memorabilia they earned themselves. Tressel covered it up, yes, but to protect his own players. Should a coach be held more accountable to the NCAA and compliance departments than to his own players? I think not, and you wouldnt expect that from a coach at ANY OTHER LEVEL. The bottom line is these athletes dont get paid, but make MILLIONS of dollars not only for their universities, but for TV networks and corporate sponsors. Problems similar to the OSU controversies of late will only increase in frequency until the clear hypocrisy in college sports is righted. When the time comes where the athletes who risk their lives to entertain us get the compensation they deserve, people will look back at the Tressel resignation (read: firing) and say “wow, that guy got screwed.”

Tressel was meant to be the OSU coach until he was in a wheelchair, hell, until he was in a hospital bed with an IV in his arm on the sideline beating the SH!T out of michigan for the 30th time. But thanks to the NCAA and Gordon Gee, and the idealistic, fantasy vision of college football, Tressel is unfairly disgraced and ripped from the legacy that was rightly his.

Goodbye, Coach Tressel, And Good Luck

Shocking news on this Memorial Day — the Ohio State University announced this morning that it has accepted the resignation of head football coach Jim Tressel.

This news is immensely sad.  Coach Tressel not only has been a highly successful coach, but also seems to be a good person who has done a lot for local charities and organizations.  It is tragic — in the Greek sense of the term — that Coach Tressel must leave a position that he seemed born to fill, under a cloud of suspicion and the steady drip, drip, drip of troubling news about NCAA investigations and other issues involving the Ohio State football program and its players.  The scuttlebutt is that the University strongly encouraged Coach Tressel to resign, which just makes the story that much sadder.

I don’t know the truth about the Ohio State football program’s compliance with NCAA rules and regulations under Coach Tressel’s stewardship.  When the results of the ongoing investigation are announced, there will be plenty of time for contemplation and consideration of those issues.  No one person is, or should be, bigger than the institution.  But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t feel saddened by the story of a man brought low, whose legacy will forever be tarnished by a scandal and his own apparent lapses in judgment.

I wish Coach Tressel and his family peace, and good luck.

Coach Tressel Responds To Buckeye Bebe

White the rest of Buckeye Nation waits, Aunt Bebe — aka “Buckeye Bebe” — does what she does best.  She has written to Ohio State head football coach Jim Tressel, sending him her best wishes and complete, heartfelt support.

And now, Coach Tressel has responded.  In a note she sent to Kish and me this week, she reported that Coach Tressel sent her a card and wrote:  “Bebe, you are the best.  We will grow from this adversity.  God bless you and yours.  Sincerely, Jim Tressel.”  Aunt Bebe adds:  “P.S.  He had my day!”  I have to believe that Buckeye Bebe’s unflinching encouragement and backing has helped to make Coach Tressel’s day, too.

Say what you will about Coach Tressel and his conduct in connection with this latest incident, but can we all agree that, at heart, he is a good man?  His attention to small gestures, like writing a personal note to a huge fan, his tremendous community involvement, and his support for countless charitable causes says a lot about his character and his class.

Questions In Columbus

Last night the NCAA denied the appeals of the five Ohio State players who violated NCAA rules by selling memorabilia and accepting discounts on tattoos.  Those players — Mike Adams, Daniel (Boom) Herron, DeVier Posey, Terrelle Pryor, and Solomon Thomas — therefore will serve their full five-game suspension at the start of the 2011 season.  Shortly after the NCAA announcement, Ohio State’s head football coach Jim Tressel declared that he had decided to voluntarily increase his suspension to five games as well.  The University has accepted his request and is notifying the NCAA; no doubt it will be a while before the NCAA announces whether it is satisfied with Coach Tressel’s enhanced punishment.

The Columbus Dispatch story linked above quotes Coach Tressel as saying in a statement:  “Throughout this entire situation my players and I have committed ourselves to facing our mistakes and growing from them; we can only successfully do that together.  Like my players, I am very sorry for the mistakes I made. I request of the university that my sanctions now include five games so that the players and I can handle this adversity together.”

I’m not sure what to make of this latest development.  Many in Buckeye Nation will see this as a noble gesture by Coach Tressel, who is standing in solidarity with his players and sharing in their punishment.  In my view, however, this latest decision is strange on several levels.  Why announce a two-game suspension of Coach Tressel only 10 days ago, endure a hailstorm of criticism from the national media, and then voluntarily increase the suspension to five games after the hubbub had died down?  It makes it look like Ohio State’s earlier announcement was simply testing the waters.  Are the players’ sins of commission and Coach Tressel’s apparent sin of omission really equivalent?  And what about the players who didn’t violate the rules?  Why should they be voluntarily deprived of their head coach for three games?  Ironically, one of the reasons Ohio State cited in allowing the five suspended players to compete in the Sugar Bowl was that it would be unfair to punish the graduating seniors by depriving them of the chance to play in the bowl game as a complete team.

I remain convinced that we have not heard everything there is to hear about this story.  Lingering questions remain to be answered.

“Buckeye Bebe” Weighs In On Coach Tressel

Ohio State head football coach Jim Tressel has no bigger fan than Bebe Webner — aka “Buckeye Bebe.” She writes him regularly, is on his Christmas card list, and even suggested a play that Ohio State used to beat Michigan.

Buckeye Bebe

With everyone in Ohio talking about Coach Tressel’s NCAA violation, it was not surprising that the Akron Beacon Journal would ask Aunt Bebe for her thoughts.  Her comments are reported here.  Characteristically, she has written to Coach Tressel telling him to hang in there and to remind him that he has a lot of supporters.

I think if you read between the lines, however, you will see that Aunt Bebe feels the same two reactions that I’ve seen from virtually every Ohio State fan I’ve encountered — surprise and disappointment.  We who have been impressed and pleased by the quality of Jim Tressel’s stewardship of the Ohio State program are surprised at the poor judgment he showed on this occasion, and we are disappointed because we hold the University and all of its representatives to high standards — high standards that Coach Tressel willingly shouldered.  People who aren’t from Ohio and who view Ohio State as a mindless football factory might scoff at this, but Ohioans know that it is true.  We are proud of The Ohio State University and want it to stand for quality, fairness, and scrupulous compliance with the rules.

That doesn’t mean people won’t forgive Coach Tressel for this transgression.  He’s done too much good for the University, for countless charities, and for the hundreds of student athletes he has coached to let one mistake ruin his legacy — but there is no doubt that his legacy has been tarnished by this incident.  That is why this has been such a sad period for Ohio State fans.

Coach Tressel, E-Mails, And NCAA Violations

Tonight’s disclosure about Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel is disappointing news, indeed, for Ohio State fans.  Tressel failed to promptly report information about potential NCAA violations to institutional officials.  As a result, Ohio State has self-reported an NCAA violation, has suspended Coach Tressel for two games, has fined him $250,000, and will issue a public reprimand and require Coach Tressel to make a public apology.  The NCAA, of course, may impose additional sanctions or require additional actions.

I’ve read the Ohio State letter self-reporting the violations and listened to parts of tonight’s press conference about the matter, in which OSU Athletic Director Gene Smith, Coach Tressel, and OSU President E. Gordon Gee spoke.  I have some questions about what happened, but I’d prefer to reserve judgment until more information comes out.  I think a big part of the puzzle will be the e-mails between Coach Tressel and the attorney who advised Tressel of the potential NCAA violations — and who apparently requested confidentiality because the information was obtained in the context of a federal drug trafficking investigation.  How were the e-mails phrased?  Did their contents reasonably suggest that Coach Tressel should be concerned about the safety of the unnamed players who allegedly were involved?

Sometimes I think we expect public figures — and in Ohio, the head football coach at Ohio State obviously is a public figure — to make snap judgments that stand up to the most rigorous 20-20 hindsight examination.  In life, it rarely works out that way.  For all of Ohio State’s focus on NCAA rules compliance, I doubt that Coach Tressel or anyone else has received training on what to do if they receive an email from an attorney reporting on potential rules violation information obtained during a federal criminal investigation, when the attorney requests strict confidentiality.  Let’s at least wait until more information becomes available before we reach ultimate conclusions on the propriety of Coach Tressel’s conduct.