Around the Big Ten

[UMStan White]

"Attorneys for the man Erickson replaced, former Penn State president Graham Spanier, say the Freeh report "contained numerous inaccuracies and reached conclusions that are not supported by the data."

"Mr. Freeh unfairly offered up Dr. Spanier and others to those insisting upon a finding of culpability at the highest level of the university," attorneys Elizabeth Ainslie and Peter Vaira said in a statement.

A spokesman for Freeh did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The attorneys say Spanier is looking forward to the opportunity to "set the record straight." '


So much for PSU "getting it". It's clear that the schooll will never impose sufficent sanctions.They disute the findings of the commission that THEY created.

[Mike]

I would think Spanier hired his own attorneys that are independent of PSU. Both sides will try to downplay the Freeh report, though.

[Tony G]

Spanier is not now in PSU's employe. Don't expect him to do what's best for the school.

[Jeff Buchanan]

To be fair, Spanier had nothing to do with commissioning Freeh. That was done by the BOT. OTH, this could be the start of an orchestrated PSU defense using surrogates

Nevertheless, I agree that PSU has already demonstrated they are reluctant to face the facts and are going into the fortress mode. Frankly, in the face of what appears to be a very nicely done investigation by someone thoroughly qualified to do it and without any bias, people don't like what they are hearing and are acting predictably.

TBH, this is why we have the courts. Why we have juries and judges to determine guilt and meet out penalties. Humans invariably do not like to be held accountble when it is painful to do so. The more I think of the circumstances as they unfold, the more I think the NCAA, if they choose to act, is stepping into a cauldron of controversy and into new territory where I think it is pretty clear they should not be. Could the courts enjoin PSU to act; for example removing symbols or memoriam of Paterno. Directing mechanisms of restitution for the victims as I proposed up thread. Disbanding the football program? I don't know the answer to that but I would suppose the state courts have more athority to punish PSU in some meaningful and logical way than the NCAA could ever manage to bring about.

From Emmert's strong comments though, it already looks like the NCAA feels like it has an obligation to act. Frankly, though, given their impotence in the face of much less serious issues, I just can't imagine thier involvement would be productive in any way and much more likely to be harmful in the long run.

[hack]

Well this is precisely their chance to step in and look tough after taking so much criticism. That could be a hidden motivation. I agree though that the NCAA's oversight ends at NCAA rules and their observance.

[Wild Hoss]

It sounds like Emmert is determined to do something, even though it doesn't sound like he has any jurisdictional cause for doing so. I guess they'll find one.

************************************************** ************

In a PBS interview Monday night, NCAA President Mark Emmert said he doesn't want to "take anything off the table" if the NCAA determines penalties against Penn State are warranted.


Emmert said he's "never seen anything as egregious as this in terms of just overall conduct and behavior inside a university." He added, "What the appropriate penalties are, if there are determinations of violations, we'll have to decide."


The last time the NCAA shut down a football program with the so-called "death penalty" was in the 1980s, when SMU was forced to drop the sport because of extra benefits violations. After the NCAA suspended the SMU program for a year, the school decided not to play in 1988, either, as it tried to regroup.

"This is completely different than an impermissible benefits scandal like (what) happened at SMU, or anything else we've dealt with. This is as systemic a cultural problem as it is a football problem. There have been people that said this wasn't a football scandal," Emmert said.


"Well, it was more than a football scandal, much more than a football scandal. It was that but much more. And we'll have to figure out exactly what the right penalties are. I don't know that past precedent makes particularly good sense in this case, because it's really an unprecedented problem."

[Mike]

I say make them hire and employ Rich Rodriguez for 3 years and let all the players transfer without penalty. That would scare any program straight.

[Tony G]

"This is completely different than an impermissible benefits scandal like (what) happened at SMU, or anything else we've dealt with. This is as systemic a cultural problem as it is a football problem.

He's professing a lack of understanding of the SMU case or at least over-simplifying it in a major way.

SMU was as systemic a failure as was possible of an organization. The repeated chances the school had to come clean and still continued to violate the rules, and the number of people and breadth of the scandal were more widespread at SMU. The consequences here are far more horrific than anything that happened at SMU.

It sure sounds like the NCAA is coming in on this. I think it winds up with a bigger can of worms and a far more intrusive NCAA adjudicating morality instead of maintaining a fair and competitive national program.

[hack]

Are you saying that SMU was more of a concerted and sustained effort by many, as opposed to PSU being less of a widespread failure on the part of the institution but far more consequential? If so, I agree. You need more people and more of a coordinated effort to do what SMU did than PSU's elite circle covering up what few were witness to. Not sure how it really applies to the discussion though.

Also agree with second paragraph.

[Tony G]

Hack, When I think of a systemic failure I think of it widespread cultural role. This was 3 guys caving to the one lowest in the theoretical chain of command.

[entropy]

More than 3 guys... The school looked the other way

[UMStan White]

Spanner remains a tenured professor at Penn State. he's still a PSU employee. What some people seem to be missing is that the cover-up was done to protect the image of the football program more than the image of the University. The Freeh report found rampant interference by JoPa when it came to dealing with problems within the program such as seeking special handling of violations of the school's code of conduct bt football players. the special treatment given to Sandusky was no different. The other point some people miss is that the University knowingly let Sandusky use it's facilities to carry on his crimes for over a decade. The NCAA is right when it says there is no precedence for dealing with this issue, but that is of little relevance when de idling what to do here. there is a direct link between the official conduct of the University and the football program. the Freeh reports conclusions that top administrators and the head of the football programs not o ly knew what was going on but also made a conscious choice to look the other way for so long compels either the NCAA or the Big Ten to act. the debate whether the NCAA has "jurisdiction" to act if it so chooses has ended with the NCAA's pronouncement that it will act once it receives Penn State's response to it's letter of inquiru

[Dr. Strangelove]

If the NCAA acts in this case and has whatever authority they declare themselves to have on any given day, then they have the authority to lay sanctions on any program that has a player arrested for any reason. Period. And they do not have to hold a fair trial or play by the standard rules of a judicial system before rendering their verdict.

Once the door's opened, it can't be closed. Perhaps the NCAA sees its chance at a power grab and is taking it.

[entropy]

With the sec... Maybe they should grab more power.

[UMStan White]

Absolutely wrong . If the NC AA acts and I believe they will it's not because a "player committed crime". It's because the administration acted unethically in covering up such a nenious crime.