The Nittany Turkey

Primarily about Penn State football, this is a tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

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This Ought to Be Good!

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The scandal at the University of North Carolina has taken a turn for the worse — much worse. It has far transcended even what their internal audit of 2007-2011 revealed. As the investigation progresses, each opened door reveals more and more institutionalized fraud. It is a veritable nightmare.

Or, wait! There’s that word “schadenfreude” again. How is Mark Emmert of the NCAA going to handle this one? When he spoke of Penn State’s transgressions, he called them unprecedented. Well, guess what? At North Carolina, not only are the transgressions worse in that they hit at the heart of the basic student-athlete concept that is the foundation of the NCAA, but also they involve an internal conspiracy between academics and athletics that has existed for many years.

Lest someone pull out “the victims” or “the children” to smack me between the eyes, I have to say that Sandusky’s crimes were terrible, and if Spanier, Curley, Schultz, and Paterno knew about what was going on there (and we still haven’t established that to everyone’s satisfaction), they were good men gone bad. Or bad men gone worse, if you prefer. My point is not that there is a defense for anything that went on at Penn State, but that it was a criminal matter, a non-athletic, and a non-academic matter. It involved a criminal and possibly four facilitators, arguably not within the NCAA purview. I won’t go on forever, as many dead horses won’t forgive me when I join them in the great beyond.

Now, on to North Carolina. Folks, we’re talking big-time institutionalized academic fraud in support of athletes who were given the easy ride through nonexistent classes. The 2007-2011 review revealed fraud and poor oversight in 54 no-show classes in the Department of African and Afro American Studies. These classes met either irregularly or not at all, and last summer included one class with 18 current football players.

That would be bad enough, right? Well, the big newspaper in North Carolina, the Raleigh News & Observer did some additional digging. Whereas the university said that two department heads were responsible for the fraud, the newspaper found evidence that academic advisers steered athletes to the crib courses. The UNC Board of Governors has shown reluctance to dig more deeply into the scandal.

But that’s not all. Recent revelations suggest that a couple of prominent UNC players could have benefited gradewise from similar fraudulent schemes up to a dozen years ago. A transcript purportedly belonging to Julius Peppers, now  a Chicago Bear, and another belonging to Marvin Austin have turned up — showing that they were academically ineligible for sports. This could just be the tip of the iceberg.

But the larger question for the university is the possibility that the academic fraud had gone undetected for more than a dozen years, and may have stayed that way without public knowledge of the transcripts of Austin and Peppers.

Peppers was a two-sport athlete: basketball and football. That means there are two programs the NCAA should be investigating. Yet no one has heard a peep from the great white palace in Indianapolis.

So, what’s it going to be, Mark Emmert? Here you have a situation that hits at the heart of the student-athlete concept that you and the NCAA hold so dear. You made a great show of lowering the boom on Penn State, levying draconian punishments against a football program that was innocent in itself of any transgressions and you decried the football culture at Penn State even though PSU’s graduation rate for athletes is at the top of the heap. What are you going to do now with UNC, with collusion between athletics and academics? What are you going to do now that it appears as if the vaunted basketball program was also involved?

Just because UNC doesn’t make the NBC Nightly News with their scandal doesn’t mean you can ignore it, Emmert. Where are the death threats? Come on, already. We’re watching you, and you can’t squirm out of this one!

Thanks to reader Joe for pointing me toward a Sporting News article and video that got me cranked up. For a refreshing change from other publications that were quick to condemn Penn State, I thought TSN was fair to the Lion.

Four PSU Trustees Appeal Sanctions

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Even though NCAA spokesman Bob Williams declared last week that the Penn State sanctions are not subject to appeal, four trustees, led by retired Navy SEAL Ryan J. McCombie, who was elected to the board in June have filed a letter of appeal with the NCAA. ESPN is reporting:

Trustees and a person with first-hand knowledge of the discussions said the move is a precursor to a federal lawsuit asking a judge to invalidate the sanctions, because trustees expect the NCAA to reject the appeal.

Essentially, McCombie is saying that the NCAA did not follow its usual investigation and enforcement procedures with Penn State, that the consent decree is unfair because it relies on the Freeh report (which contains some disputed unproven conjectures) and that the sanctions are “excessive and unreasonable”, inflicting “permanent damage to an entire generation of student athletes and coaches who were innocent of any wrongdoing during their time on campus…”

McCombie retained the Boston law firm of Jackson Lewis to file the appeal. He wrote a letter to trustees Monday afternoon asking for their concurrence. Three immediately hopped on board. There was no comment as to whom, but I think we can probably guess at least three of them pretty quickly.

McCombie wrote to the trustees that it was his belief that the matter required board approval and that the board should engage in a full and complete review.  He went on to write, “Furthermore, only after we have given all involved the opportunity to be heard can we move forward together as one university.”

No comments were to be had from either Penn State or the NCAA.

Well, this should drive a wedge into the board. These are interesting times. If the NCAA does shut down the appeal, which is I think about 105% likely, and the federal courts get involved, the case could broaden and get into all kinds of great anti-trust issues with the NCAA. They deserve to be slapped down by somebody, and who better than a Federal court to do it? Maybe pay liquidated damages to all the members and then reorganize into a helpful adjunct, rather than a dictatorial Kindergarten teacher.

I’m going to have my cookies and milk and think about this a little more.

Meanwhile, for those who want to read the actual appeal, I have it available here for downloading. PSU_trustee_appeal (pdf – 174K).

Today’s BOT Meeting

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For those of you who have been waiting for some news about today’s board of trustees meeting to address the NCAA sanctions levied against Penn State, the Centre Daily Times published the following statement from the board:

The Penn State board of trustees met for a discussion tonight. A vote was not required and none was taken. The board finds the punitive sanctions difficult and the process with the NCAA unfortunate. But as we understand it, the alternatives were worse, as confirmed by NCAA President Mark Emmert’s recent statement that Penn State was likely facing a multi-year death sentence.  The university and board resolve to move forward together to recognize the historical excellence in Penn State’s academic and athletic programs. We anticipate and look forward to demonstrating our outstanding performance in complying with the sanctions. We continue to recognize the important role that intercollegiate athletics provides for our student athletes and the wider university community as we strive to appropriately balance academic and athletic accomplishments. Penn State will remain a world-class educational institution of which our students, faculty, staff and alumni can be justifiably proud. The commitment demonstrated by our student athletes in recent days embodies all that is good about Penn State and we look forward to unprecedented support by the Nittany Nation when we take the field this fall.

Damn! Looks like we hit another dead end!
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