Coach Jim Tressel and Ohio State University: What to Make of Cover-Up and Non-Compliance
by TXStampede on Mar 8, 2011 9:04 PM CST
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Print"I've seen the positives of setting a goal and pushing a team to achieve it. I've also seen the destructive force of that kind of ruthless search and what it can do to the young people and the coaches who try to win at all costs." - Excerpt from Jim Tressel's latest book The Winner's Manual: For the Game of Life.
Nicely dovetailing the college recruiting post earlier today, a blockbuster breaking news story broke yesterday by Yahoo which busted wide open a possible cover-up of NCAA rules non-compliance which culminated tonight in a mea culpa by Ohio State Buckeye head football coach Jim Tressel. Can you believe that Tressel was covering for his players? That never, ever happens. Right? The five tOSU players who were vilified for "raising a little cash," including one-time Heisman hopeful Terrell Pryor, were run through the ringer at the end of last season. Tressel coerced those players into forgoing a possible run at the NFL draft and serving out their suspension, coming back for their senior seasons -- all for an opportunity to play one BCS game at the New Orleans Sugar Bowl.
According to ESPN's Joe Shad, "With the cover up, Coach Tressel committed a cardinal sin. All coaches know withholding information could lead to an NCAA violation. Tressel received an email (a tip) and he needed to take that information to someone who could assist with the disseminating the information correctly. What has happened is it is perceived as a cover-up, a failure to monitor, and a failure to promote an atmosphere of compliance."
A transcript of the Tressel press conference can be found at the mother-ship. Parsing of words not allowed. As for the evidence, you can read copies of the April emails here.
tOSU announced self-administered sanctions for Tressel of a two-game suspension beginning the 2011 season, a $250,000 fine, and a mandatory drivers education NCAA compliance seminar.
Questions:
1. What did you think of Tressel's comments during his on-air press conference?
2. Are the self-administered punishments enough for purposefully withholding information from the NCAA? Should the school cover any of the fine?
3. What did the tOSU AD, Gene Smith, know and when? Is he also culpable in this "Memorabiliagate".
4. Once the NCAA closes in and gathers all the evidence, should evacuation of 2010 wins be on the table?
What say you, BONizens?
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Does he have any Pryors?
Sorry, couldn’t help it. A quarter million dollar fine, not being able to coach, and the shame, seem like a fitting punishment. But if anything else turns up, then look out. Then I think nullification is necessary.
"Football doesn't build character. It eliminates the weak ones." DKR
Funny
How tressel could go about suspending his players and make a public announcement about it and not say anything about him knowing about it.
It’s bogus about his excuse of not “knowing” what to do with the information…. duh, maybe hand it over the tOSU compliance officer?
by jtdoes on Mar 8, 2011 9:17 PM CST via mobile reply actions
http://www.sportsbybrooks.com/documents-read-the-actual-jim-tressel-emails-29547
These emails are pretty damning…
Just saw the retweet and posted the link in the story. Thanks for pointing out. Adds a lot to the meme.
- follow me @ http:/twitter.com/TXStampede
Yeah, Wow.
Clearly, Tressel isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. His responses look impossibly moronic.
"Football doesn't build character. It eliminates the weak ones." DKR
Playing devil's advocate here
But, is it possible that those emails are not real? The first thing that was strange was the seemingly unprofessional email address (tressel.3), but I checked tOSU’s directory, and that is in fact Tressel’s email adresss. That said, the multiple exclamation points and the “Go Bucks!” sign offs seem a little more unprofessional than what I would normally expect from the head coach at one of the premier programs in the country. Thoughts?
"Poetic talent is really easy to fake when thy sentences doth no f***ing sense make." -Bo Burnham
And I never pegged "jt" as multiple exclamation point kind of guy.
"Football doesn't build character. It eliminates the weak ones." DKR
Its an aged old question
Who is worse the drug addict or the drug dealer?
We can now add this.
Tressel is sleazy. Leverages these kids to stay in school for their transgressions and makes them sit 1/3 of the season. When he gets popped, takes two games and a minor bump to his pocket book. Man up and sit 5 games.
"I live in the tower with Coach Brown." -Bevo
Wanna know why it's a two-game suspension?
Games One and Two are at the Horseshoe against Akron and Toledo.
Game Three is at Miami. (And not Miami of Ohio, either.)
Why did I know this was going to be the answer even before I looked up their schedule for this season?
To be filled in later.
by Hopkins Horn on Mar 9, 2011 8:46 AM CST via mobile up reply actions
Here's the interesting thing to me
All keeping in mind that I don’t particularly blame players for selling their own memorabilia considering the money the institutions make essentially doing the same thing.
How is it that the players get five-game suspensions for doing it, but Tressel, who should know better as an adult in a position of tremendous responsibility, only gets two games? Isn’t he more to blame for this than the players? Given that Ohio State could now be in serious trouble with the NCAA, shouldn’t he be punished more severely?
Would be interested in knowing what everyone else thinks about this.
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by Wescott Eberts (GoBR) on Mar 8, 2011 9:55 PM CST reply actions
You can argue that being fined 250,000 is pretty severe (I will not), but to be fair his crime is not reporting it. He didn’t actually receive any benefit from the players accepting the free tattoos/cash. However, I think the NCAA set a clear precedent with Dez Bryant. I thought it was really harsh at the time, but the NCAA should be consistent in its punishment. Especially being an “adult in a position of tremendous responsibility.”
So...
These actions are self-administered, so that means that the NCAA can still come in and instill harsher penalties, correct? Just want some clarification
Yes
The NCAA can choose to accept or deny the self imposed penalties, but chances are, they would not be in effect until well after the self imposed sanctions were carried out.
To add to this response
the universities will often impose a punishment as an act of good faith before the NCAA get seriously involved in the hopes that the self-imposed punishment will be less harsh than the NCAA and that the punishment will act as a sign that there is no room for allegations of lack of institutional control, which can bring down the heavy hammer.
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www.burntorangenation.com
by Wescott Eberts (GoBR) on Mar 8, 2011 10:53 PM CST up reply actions
Ok,
I’m not sure how much precedent there is for these types of situations, but how far do these self-administered sanctions go towards pacifying the NCAA? Does the NCAA usually just allow the schools to punish themselves, or do they dole out punishment as they see ift?
Usually the NCAA declares its own sanctions.
They based on their own investigation and assess that of the member school to see how thoroughly they did the job. Sometimes they accept the institution’s sanctions, sometime they add to them. Rarely do they revise things downward.
The extenuation circumstance.
I want to speak to the situation, the investigation.
Tressel, so it seems, was handcuffed by the lawyer revealing the details to him.
He should have been able to seek counsel (the school’s) and should have notified his college president and the head of NCAA enforcement. He should have been able to contact FBI and DoJ for clarification and made them aware of consequences of silence in this particular case.
Was the investigation that big and widespread or did it just concern the individual and a few others? What drugs, what scale? Was it so important, was this one guy so critical, that such an investigation could con-volute a whole football season, because more than just Ohio State was affected by those players and those games? From start to finish with the BCS bowls, the season was a charade.
Was the lawyer involved breaking ethical standards by revealing this to Tressel? Was the lawyer and Tressel actually trying to find a way to cover this up and get away with it? Obviously they never thought these emails would go public.
On one level, this seems like a great extenuating circumstance for Tressel, caught in a web out of his control, so it seems.
Obviously they never thought these emails would go public.
Then Tressel was either very dense or just stupid. If you work for a public institution, you cannot expect that your emails can or will remain private correspondence.
This is shocking, considering it is Tressel. He was one of the few coaches that, on the surface, seemed above board.
What we have here is a failure to execute.
by dimecoverage on Mar 9, 2011 10:50 AM CST up reply actions
If you build a house of cards.....
it’s when not if!
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