Josh Benner

Category: Sports

  • Stop making excuses for Tressel

    The NCAA was aware of the rules violations of five Ohio State football players and affirmed five game suspensions for them earlier this year.

    Then things got much worse. It came to light Tressel knew about the violations and lied, and now there are reports that even more players had done the same thing.

    Pryor and everyone else who got this started should just be kicked off the team! Right?

    No. That’s crazy. If we do find out that there were additional violations by Pryor of which the NCAA was unaware, then that may be justified. But the NCAA has already decided what the appropriate penalty is for these guys based on what they did. A week ago, most Buckeye fans would have been happy with the penalty they received, but now that the situation seems so much worse than we had originally thought, those guys deserve to be punished to a greater degree?

    I just don’t see how that logically follows and that this is a knee jerk reaction.

    Well…. Tressel had to resign for what they did. If he can’t coach, they shouldn’t be able to play.

    Actions of the players were definitely the original sin in this debacle of a situation, but the scale to which people were breaking rules and high profile players were breaking rules with Tressel fully aware and lying to the university and to the NCAA on multiple occasions and running a program over which he had lost control was one in which he could no longer reasonably remain as the head coach.

    The players are isolated entities in themselves. They broke the rules and that was wrong, but those who had already been caught have received their punishments for the rules they had broken individually.

    The fact that this was rampant in the program with Tressel at the helm doomed him.

    But some make the mistake of viewing Tressel as a martyr or the one who took the fall. If it is ever found that university president Gordon Gee or athletic director Gene Smith knew this was going on, they too will be forced out.

    Tressel built a program around integrity with a philosophy of teachable moments through the game. When he found himself in a situation where he could have (and should have) done the right thing, he lied and misled again and again.

    Even now as he resigns. It’s not because he suddenly became honorable. It’s because the university was tipped off by Sports Illustrated  that another shoe was about to drop, and you can be sure that they told him to take himself out like how the Nazis took down Erwin Rommel.

    People are making too many excuses for Tressel. It’s not because of some tattoos that he no longer gets to be coach. It’s because he lied and withheld information. There is no excuse for that. This program was never going to seriously regain credibility with him at the top.

    Throughout Tressel’s career, players had issues with rules. While I know that no program is perfect, when there is proof that he lied and it was rampant, how many more chances were we going to give him?

    In a couple of years when someone else got in trouble, was that going to be the time he was fired? It was going to be an inevitability.

    While I don’t think these players should be kicked off of the team unless more information about them comes to light, I do think Luke Fickell needs to lay down the law that from this day forward, any player caught selling personal items will be thrown off of the team.

    Earlier in this post, I said that the punishment for players should not suddenly be made more severe because more information is coming out about more rules violations from other players. But I do think that Tressel should be out.  Am I not guilty of the very thing about which I am complaining? No. Because I don’t think Tressel should have resigned over these latest details about the scandal. He should have resigned in March when it initially broke that he knew and lied, just to protect start football players.

    jrb

  • Reaction to resignation of Tressel

    For Ohio State football fans, this morning’s news that Jim Tressel has resigned as football coach is the Buckeye Nation’s, “You remember where you were when you found out…” moment. While I was surprised to find out this morning of his resignation, ultimately this is someting which I believe was inevitable. And while I said that Tressel should have resigned months ago, this is something that I cannot celebrate. It’s just the conclusion that had to occur.

    After the initial news of this scandal, and the heat that came on the program, the digging was going to continue. To think that Tressel was ever going to legitimately get this program back under control and restore the sense of pride which Ohio State fans expect was always just wishful thinking.

    For the good of the program, there was no other way. Even though I think his handling of this situation lacked integrity, I still think he’s a good guy. These events cannot diminish the wonderful impact that he has had on so many young football players, and the great joy which all Ohio State fans have experienced in watching his team’s success over the last decade.

    I don’t feel sorry for Tressel. Today’s news is the result of bad decision’s he made. He lied to the NCAA on multiple occasions. And he lived a lie every single day that he was aware that he had players who had broken the rules, while he carried on with a program with the facade that they were obiding the NCAA’s guidelines when he was fully aware that they were not.

    While I don’t feel sorry for Tressel, one person who I do have mixed emotions over is Luke Fickell. Not in the fact that he’s interim coach. There is no one better suited for that roll at this time. Fickell being a former Buckeye football player, and a Columbus native (from my hometown of Westerville), who started 50 games as a defensive linemen from 1993-96, culminating in his final career game where he played with a torn pectoral muscle in the 1997 Rose Bowl win over Arizona State.

    I would assume Fickell has dreamed about becoming the Ohio State football coach for a very long time. And now he has it under the worst of circumstances. He has be the interim head coach in a program that is struggling with constant questioning and speculation of who Ohio State will pursue to be the permanent head coach. Meyer? Stoops? Gruden? Pelini? The list continues.

    When Ohio State does bring a new coach, will it be a possibility for Fickell to remain on the staff? Even if he’s interviewed for the position and not selected? I would say no. It’s the end of May, he’s become the head coach, but now he may very well have less than one full year to be the top man before being forced out.

    It will be interesting to see. For many Buckeye fans, this is a horrible day. The program is going to be all right. Tressel could have left now, or he would have been forced out later as the program kept declining as he continued to lose control. I say now is a better time than in the future, because with him leaving now, the rebuilding process can start and there is one less distraction.

    O..H..

    jrb

  • OSU football scandal deepens

    No one likes a snitch. At the very least, this is what the movie Goodfellas taught us.

    Last night, it was reported in the Ohio State University newspaper that former Buckeye wide receiver Roy Small admitted to selling personal effects including as Big Ten Championship rings while he was a student at Ohio State, which is a violation of NCAA rules.

    When it rains it pours.

    In the article, Small talks about how numerous players were doing the same things as him, as well as getting discounts on cars, and while they were aware of the NCAA rules, he claims that they did not care.

    This is just another installment in a saga of rules violations for the Ohio State football program that dates back to the end of last football season. But why would Small talk now?

    I really hate it when former college athletes start running their mouths after they have left the program. With the issues already sounding the Ohio State football program, this just makes things look worse, and to what ends?

    Ray Small broke the rules and he got away with it. He will never be punished for what he did. But now, a couple of years removed from being in the program, he takes it upon himself to say that he and numerous other players were all selling items and breaking rules. Why? All that this does is hurts the people who are currently in the program.

    Just so he can get a couple of minutes in the lime light that he was never going to get on the football field because he was a mediocre wide receiver who didn’t know how to field punts and who could be considered a poor man’s Devier Posey, he has to turn into a rat and bring more scrutiny on the program.

    If Jim Tressel would have resigned from the beginning, I think this story would carry significantly less weight. Ever since it has come to light that Tressel had been aware of players selling memorabilia and getting discounts which were in violation of NCAA rules, I believe that he should have resigned. I do not have anything against Tressel, certainly I know he’s a great coach, but with remaining as coach, the credibility of the football program is getting pounded.

    jrb

  • Tressel should resign

    I’ve put a lot of thought into this, and I believe that Jim Tressel should have resigned last night. His actions and Ohio State’s handling of this are an embarrasment. He lied, he broke the rules, he went against the honor to which he holds his own players, he failed to adequately own up to his mistakes yesterday, he failed to apologize for what he did. I’ve never been embarrassed to be an Ohio State fan before this event. This is unacceptable. He didn’t break the rules once, he broke them every day by knowing the right thing to do and refusing to do it. He lied about it multiple times, and lied as recently as yesterday when he said he hadn’t known to whom to go and implying that he was bound by confidentiality (neither of which being true.)

    jrb

  • Things I won’t watch this year: Heisman and NCAA title game

    The NCAA is the most legalistic entity that man has ever created, with the possible exception of the Sanhedrin. The fact that Cameron Newton is eligible is unconscionable. It was no surprise this weekend when Newton was awarded the Heisman Trophy, but i did not watch. Just as I will not be watching him play in the national championship game next month. Why? Because I’m not in the mood to watch auburn win knowing that the title will likely be stripped away from them in the future. If that happens, it is as if this game will have never happened, so what is the point of waisting my time now to see something that will have not have officially ever existed in the future?

    Did Newton have the best season of any player in the country? Absolutely. But in the same season when Reggie Bush became the first Heisman winner to return the award ever as a result of being ruled ineligible for the 2005 season, giving the Heisman to someone who has a high likelihood of later being ruled ineligible is highly irresponsible.

    But that’s not fair to Cam.

    Fair? Fair? This entire situation is completely unfair to the fans. College football is not a perfect mirror of the civil society, and I think organizations should be looked at from a more utilitarian view. In the NCAA, if an athlete’s family receives funds, the athlete is ineligible. Regardless of if the athlete knows.

    If Cam’s father, Cecil Newton took funds, Cam is ineligible. But that’s not fair either. No, it’s not fair, but it’s not worth the entire sport taking another major credibility hit for the sake of waiting until we know beyond the shadow of a doubt that he broke the rules when we do know that they attempted to break the rules.

    That’s the price you pay for trying to break the rules.

    The NCAA knows the Cecil Newton solicited money from Mississippi State. Mississippi State was originally Cameron Newton’s top choice after he left Florida, and his father wanted to get a six figure sum of money. Mississippi State wouldn’t pay.

    It’s interesting. It’s interesting that Mississippi State was Cam’s top choice but they wouldn’t pay, however Cam went to Auburn. If Cam’s father didn’t receive money after he solicited money from Mississippi State, but Mississippi State was Cam’s top choice, why is Cam at Auburn?

    Let’s recap:
    top choice: Mississippi State.
    Then your dad tries to get money from Mississippi State.
    Mississippi State says “no.”
    Newton goes to Auburn.
    If Mississippi State was your top choice and wouldn’t pay you, why wouldn’t you still go there?
    Could it be that Auburn boosters were willing to pay?

    I know Cam doesn’t know about what’s going on. But he also transferred away from Florida before the university could have an expulsion hearing for academic dishonesty. Newton said that he had transferred, not because of the fact he faced expulsion but because Tim Tebow was coming back.

    Interestingly he transferred before Tebow ever said he was returning for his senior year.

    The feel good part of the Cameron Newton story has, for a long time, been a story about a bond between father and son and how Cameron has said on multiple occasions that he had given his father the reigns of selecting where he would play football. However this weekend, Newton cont stayed he had decided himself.

    There was the stolen laptop.

    There is a history of times when we know he has lied, where he has done things that are shady, where we KNOW that his dad tried to get money, and where a church of which his father is pastor seemed to magically receive a donation in order to keep its doors open.

    But everything is on the up and up.

    It is not Worth further diminishing the NCAA for the sake of being “fair.”

    The NCAA has strict rules about families taking money and the rules are in place regardless of if the athlete knows. As I’ve said before on my website, this is the way it has to be. Otherwise, the athletes could play dumb, or even legitimately be unaware, but in either situation, the family’s could take bribes. As a result, the rules must be very strict and enforced across the board.

    If the NCAA keeps throwing away its credibility, it is going to get progressively harder to get back. If Cameron Newton and his father truly are innocent, I think the fact that they attempted to break the rules is enough to make him ineligible. Their original sin was when Cecil Newton initially attempted to break the rules. That action, and their previous histories give a lot of circumstances that bring their honesty into question and it is because of all of the controversy which they have brought upon themselves, that people should not have cast Heisman votes for Newton and why he should not be playing for a national championship.

    John Stewart Mill would be proud of me.

    jrb

    sources: some of the points in this article, I have heard made by local Columbus radio show host Scott Torgerson.