RF23 - They Weren't Family

RF23 – They Weren’t Family

After the NCAA socked the Nittany Lions in the eye, with costly sanctions, and all but took down Paterno’s legacy in regards to his place in NCAA Football history, it didn’t take long for the weak hearted among us to start to feel sorry for the school and the football program, Paterno built.  And, it seemed like the enclosure that should’ve been Joe Paterno’s memorial is still open.  There are a lot of questions, that, if he were alive, he’d have to answer and no question could be as simple as “why?”  

Why did you turn a blind eye to (now we know that you were aware of) what your assistant head coach was doing? 

Simple, huh?

Here’s another..

Why did you allow the multiple years of cover ups?

Oh I can see you liking these...

Why didn’t you do something besides exercise an exit strategy in regard to your last contract?

I’m not a seasoned journalist, but these are the most basic questions I could ask.  I think a tight knit community like Penn State would want to know.  You would  think the students, faculty members, alumni, fans and surrounding communities would want to know why a man of Paterno’s stature would turn a blind eye to what happened under his watch.  What happened with what many regarded as possibly the greatest coach of all time, evidenced by his many wins.  I won’t even scratch the racial aspects of this in regard to who I think is the greatest ever, classiest ever, and oh by the way, historic ever: the late Eddie Robinson.  I feel sick, just by putting this great man’s name in this opinion.

My apologies to you, sir. 

What I can’t get past in my mind is the cover up, why after knowing what this predator did, they allowed this animal to stalk among them and although there are no allegations that he attempted to molest some unsuspecting 17 year old freshman, who was happy to get a letter from Penn State it is a doggone miracle! And that’s the problem!

It wasn’t our recruits or our kids is probably the mindset of those most knowledgeable.

And I believe that is the mindset of every individual who swept the crimes of this animal, placed it into a dustpan and put under the rug!

And now we’re supposed to stand behind the school, continue to turn a blind eye to the crimes and continued crimes that went on?  This is not nazi Germany where six millions souls weren’t taken, but to these young boys, it might as well be, because their lives are ruined.   I never heard a bell that was rung and taken back and no matter how much money in endowment is placed into programs, how much money is eventually settled for the victims in civil suit.  They. Can’t. Un-ring. That. Bell.

You want to know what’s more disgusting? 

The outright denial of some of the former players, students and now the Board of Regents, they won’t let this story simply fade even a little bit.  And although understandable, the Paterno family’s reaction to the Freeh Report and subsequent sanctions, which all but indicted, tried, convicted and sentenced Joe Paterno to almost 11 years of vacated wins, is all understandable...but don’t take a leak on our legs and tell us it’s raining, when in fact, the man whom they are trying to preserve cannot be.  At some point and time, there has to be a different route for which this family can pick up the pieces and understand why everyone outside Penn State is so abhorred.  Paterno saying at the end, I should have done more, simply doesn’t mean jack, when you should’ve done something in the very first place.  Paterno picked his path, and when he saw that path was full of deep vines and thickets, he negotiated an exit strategy to continue protecting him and his family. 

It wasn’t your recruits or kids, huh Joe?

RF23 - Off The Pedestal

Penn State:   O’ what a tangled web Penn State weaved, when they practiced to deceive..This morning Penn State University was hit squarely in the eyes from the NCAA over the inaction of four or five individuals who put one man, one program on a pedestal and the victims of the cover up, behind the shower curtain with a predator.   By now, you’ve heard the sanctions placed on the school and the wins by Paterno vacated going back to 1998.   I opined earlier that I would be okay with any punishment, which included the death penalty if the NCAA deemed that the inactions of the individuals were so egregious and the total lack of institutional control by those individuals called for the school to lose one or two years of a suspended football season.  

All of the above makes Ohio State’s tattoo issue, USC’s Reggie Bush’s and the pay to play at Auburn so insignificant when it comes to the harming of children on your campus and the ensuing cover up by those of authority that the NCAA should suspend the prior punishments of the aforementioned schools and rethink what infractions it wants to punish.

Next, the sports media can’t have it both ways, you can’t one week ask if the NCAA is going to get involved and agree it should and then three minutes after sanctions are placed on the school, say, what about the kids? They had nothing to do with it and spare me the talk about the welfare sports programs that generate little or no money to its prospective program.   Because no matter how big Pat Summit was, how many undefeated seasons at UCONN and how many years Brittany Griner plays at Baylor. Forbes article    They all depend on football and men’s basketball to put uniforms on them.   So like Penn State football, all other sports programs have to suffer the same penalty, due to the fact they depended on the deity that was Joe Paterno and every year under Paterno, that deity made an average of over $60 million dollars a season.  This does not calculate the bowl dollars, TV deals and sponsorships. 

Today, the word is unprecedented, because what happened this morning to Penn State is and going to be unprecedented, until the next cover up is brought to light and when it does.  Everyone will know the penalty, the question is, like steroids, is getting it now, the price to pay for losing it later.

Golfing:  There is one person in the sports world happy about the sanctions and the breaking news regarding Penn State and that’s Adam Scott, lets make that two people, we can throw Tiger Woods into this as well, because not only did Scott choke, and there’s no proverbial choke, he straight up choked and the more I type, the more I realize that Scott got over before the Penn State sanctions came down, because I’m imagining a good number of Tiger fans picked up the remote, hit the off button, left the house or just played what was on their play list on their DVR because Woods checked out of the British Open on the sixth hole.   And since it’s Tiger’s world, if you think that Tiger was feeling sorry about Scott’s choke job on Sunday, I got two bridges and a dam to sell you.  The thought of this guy winning another tournament with Woods former caddie, Steve Williams and Williams talking trash afterward would have Tiger looking for his nine iron to crack his ‘ol friend in the head with it.   I think Tiger would take his melt down on the sixth hole and eventual loss in a major any day just to see Williams and his golfer look hopeless and try to figure out the right words to get them to sleep Sunday night.  As for Tiger, he slept with a grin.

Insensitive or Idiot:   On HBO’s Boxing After Dark, Adrien Broner was stripped of his Super Feather Weight title for not making weight for his 130 pound bout on Saturday against Vicente Escobedo, but no matter how big HBO tried to make that the story for viewers to watch, it was after Broner’s fifth round TKO of Escobedo that received some conversation.   After the fight, Broner got down on one knee, took his girlfriend by the hand and asked her to.....

brush his hair.

That’s right, Broner faked a marriage proposal for a hair brush proposal, in which I right away thought two things,  one, he’s insensitive or two, he’s an idiot.  And since idiots can’t be geniuses, I won’t give him the benefit of the doubt of being Mayweather like and speaking of Mayweather, Broner had on a blue tee shirt that said “Free Money Mayweather.”  I told you, Broner may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, although his boxing skills are Mayweather like, with more power, his brain usage is way below Mayweather’s.   I think someone should have pulled Broner to the side and told him Mayweather is not a political prisoner, he plead for this deal and therefore agreed to spend 90 days of his life in county jail, period.   Now if Saturday was day 89 of Floyd’s incarceration, then Broner’s tee shirt would be appropriate, but since it wasn’t, lets just place that in the idiot section.  Oh! memo to Escobedo’s corner, in order to stop your fighter from further damage, you must throw the towel in the ring to stop the azz beatin’, not just stand there waving the dang thing, like you’re a cheerleader.  Now having said that, if you’re the referee and see said fighter getting his azz beat and not protecting himself, feel free to assert your authority and end the doggon’ fight.

More Boxing:  Look if you’re an up and comer, please stop calling out fighters, we all know you can’t beat.  Just because you dropped a tomato can or four to the canvas does not mean fighers like Pacquio or Mayweather are going to.  They’re pound for pound best for a reason and have seen fighters like you before.  Both of them are the reason why Ricky Hatton  and Sugar Free Mosely are out the sport.   Look stick with the talent pool on your end of the pool and let the big boys do what they do..

Just Conversation:  I need more Facebook friends, yesterday, I asked my present group of friends to give football commandments after I posted my own and you know what I got..

two likes...and no commandments.

Memo to friends, I know my takes are likeable!  I wrote them, what I want is your takes and I will over look the misspelled words, just interact with me.  Dang, you would think I started a game of operation, got out the rib bone and everyone is scared to take a turn. 

RF23 - Legacy Gone

RF23 - Legacy Gone

The Penn State Story is not going away and although degrees away from the crimes committed in WWII Germany, what happened on the Penn State campus will live with that school forever.  Unlike Marshall University, where there was a movie about that courageous football team that played with heavy hearts after it lost nearly all of its team members in a plane crash on November 14, 1970, there will be no movie for Penn State.  

What would it serve?  a reminder?  A reminder of courage of one victim, to inspire others to come forward to publicize the monster, that is jerry Sandusky?    A reminder of a serious lapse in moral courage in a man, who, in my opinion only thought of himself and his legacy to sweep the crimes that was going on, on his campus, in his locker room and in the name of Penn State football for over ten years under the Nittany Lion rug.

I got a question, and I may have asked this before, but where are the protestors?!  Where are the people who lined up to jeer, Michael Vick?  After he paid for his crimes involving dog fighting and cruelty to animal charges?  Where are they?  They didn’t protest at Penn State’s last bowl game and after a brief search on the internet, there are no reports of any protests of any kind directed at Paterno or Penn State University.  This is the kind of stuff that keeps the Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson’s of the world relevant, why?  Because of the double standard of advocacy groups that protest the adultery of a golfer (which was none of anyone’s business) and someone involved in dog fighting and cruelty.  The double standard is that Sandusky is white and the golfer and football player are black.  Thousands showed up and still express hatred toward Michael Vick for crimes in which he paid for.  Hundreds still express their disdain at Woods for his indiscretions, which cost him his family, tarnished his name and cost him sponsors.   As of 2011, only one sponsor has withdrawn from ESPN that showed Penn State football games and that was only for two weeks last season. 

On Monday night, NCAA Mark Emmert was on the Tavis Smiley Show, I guess to give to give Smiley the state of Black Athletics and to explain, I dunno the graduation gap rate among black athletes and whites.  During the interview, Emmert was asked about the Penn State scandal and said the NCAA is going to look into the Freeh report and it was reported yesterday that the NCAA has requested more information from Penn State.  There are two debates in the sports-talk world, one, should Penn State remove the statue of the late Joe Paterno and two, should Penn State receive what’s called the death penalty for lack of institutional control, and based on the Freeh report, lack of institutional control is an understatement as to what didn’t happen for ten years on the Penn State University campus and Athletic Department from people who should have simply done something!!

My opinion is that removing a statue or as reported tearing out the showers is not going to change the stench that went on and not reported.  A monster for ten years raped little boys in his home and on campus.  So called grown men, leaders did absolutely nothing but deny this monster a title of “Head Coach.” Sandusky was to be the heir apparent to Paterno, we now know why that didn’t happen.   My next opinion in regard to sanctions to the school, I am in support of harsh sanctions up to and including the death penalty.  What the administration and Paterno didn’t do to protect the innocent and did do protect the monster is inexcusable!  

As for Paterno, the term ”leader of men” should not be equated to him anymore.