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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If Costas speaks after the hockey game, will anybody listen?

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Costas flip-flops on Penn State
Is this really happening?

Tonight, after what promises to be a balls-to-the-wall Game Seven of the Redwings-Blackhawks Round Two Stanley Cup playoff matchup, NBC Sports Network (formerly Versus) will air an edition of “Costas Tonight”, some of which will be devoted to Bob Costas’ change of heart with respect to the Freeh report and Penn State. Additionally, Adam Rittenberg of ESPN.com is reporting that the Paterno family is expected to announce a lawsuit against the NCAA on that same show.

Oh, the melodrama!

We have arguably one of the most respected names in sports journalism (such as it is) presumably flipping over to Penn State’s side. Who cares? I know that we all do, but will it matter to anyone else that the vaunted Bob Costas has changed his mind? In “Habemus Papam“, I noted that what Costas says or does shouldn’t really matter, and I have no reason to alter my position on that. However, I’ve softened a bit in the respect that Costas’ revelations will be a dose of chicken soup for Penn State: It might not fix the problem, but it couldn’t hoit!

Alas, the slot for this pronouncement proposed by the pre-eminent Costas is an obscure one. The NBC Sports Network is not on everyone’s TV lineup, and non-hockey fans probably won’t know where the hell it is, even if they do get the channel. Costas is slotted in nominally at 11 PM ET after the big game tonight, a Game Seven that is scheduled for 8 PM ET. A typical hockey game takes about three hours; however, this, being an all or nothing game, might take a bit longer. If it goes into overtime, it could take a lot longer, for in the playoffs, unlike the regular season, teams play full, twenty minute overtimes until someone scores a goal. (I personally have watched a playoff game go five overtimes between Toronto and Pittsburgh. I fell asleep sometime in the third period of a 0-0 game, woke up a couple hours later, and saw that the game was still going at 1 AM). Anyhow, what I’m trying to get across here is that this isn’t exactly a situation in which huge numbers of people will be paying rapt attention. Those who have been watching the game most likely will either want to go to bed or go to the bathroom. A few will hang around blankly staring at the TV. And then, there’s us.

For their part, NBC has been intensely hyping this edition of Costas Tonight. They aired several promos for it during last night’s other Western Conference Game Seven in which the L.A. Kings outlasted the San Jose Sharks, competing for the privilege of playing either Chicago or Detroit in the Conference Final. No doubt, NBC will take advantage of play stoppages and intermissions during tonight’s game to promote the Costas interlude.

According to Rittenberg, the Paterno family, represented by attorney Wick Sollers, will announce its lawsuit against the NCAA during the show:

The announcement will come on Bob Costas’ “Costas Tonight” show on the NBC Sports Network after the Red Wings-Blackhawks hockey game. Paterno family attorney Wick Sollers, former Pennsylvania Gov. Dick Thornburgh and Paterno family spokesman Dan McGinn are expected to appear on the show, an NBC spokesman told The Patriot-News. Costas also reportedly will discuss the Freeh report and question its validity on the show. Thornburgh, the former U.S. attorney general, contributed to the Paterno family’s review of the Freeh report.

The University has already distanced itself from the Paterno suit, even before it is announced, much as they had done with the Federal antitrust suit filed by Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett against the NCAA.

Stay tuned, mateys. This should be interesting meat for your summer menu.

CBS Sports says Hitt, O’Leary must go; Paterno family called irrational

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Last week I gobbled quite a bit about the similarities and differences between the two schools recently sanctioned by the NCAA, namely Penn State and University of Central Florida. I felt that UCF got off easy, considering that it is a repeat offender, and that President John Hitt hired head football coach George O’Leary over protests from his faculty and the community, and that the two had presided over a program in which a player had died during practice, resulting in a civil judgment against UCF. Furthermore, UCF’s violations affected both the basketball and football programs. Finally, in contrast to Penn State, UCF’s transgressions involved recruiting, thus potentially cheating to create a competitive advantage, whereas PSU’s violations, egregious as they were, did not affect performance on the field.

Dennis Dodd, Senior College Football Columnist for CBSsports.com, is in accord with me on this one. In his article “Appeal of bowl ban (and other ills) should cost O’Leary, Hitt UCF jobs,” he writes:

Eight days after the nation decried the football culture ruling all at Penn State, football culture is ruling all at Central Florida. Have we learned nothing? We’re not comparing this bowl ban appeal to the horrid abuses at Penn State, but it certainly is another example of the tail wagging the dog. ??? ?????

In another post, Gregg Doyel, National Columnist, hits at the Paterno family for wanting to appeal the Penn State sanctions, about which I also opined last week. In his piece entitled “Paterno family pursuit of record goes from insulting to irrational,” he writes:

According to the letter, the Paterno family wants to soften “the enormous damage done to Penn State, the State College community, former and current students and student-athletes, Joe Paterno and certain others involved, as a result of the unprecedented actions taken by the NCAA.”

Let’s try that last paragraph again, because the part written by the Paterno family was misleading:

According to the letter, the Paterno family wants to soften “the enormous damage done to Penn State, the State College community, former and current students and student-athletes, Joe Paterno and certain others involved, as a result of the unprecedented actions taken by the NCAA.”

Doyel is a bit unfair, as he has nothing at all good to say about the Paterno family. He even gets in his licks at Jay, stating:

…how about a lifetime show-cause penalty for Jay Paterno? Don’t let him coach college football ever again. Part of me thinks Jay Paterno won’t coach again anyway, because who would hire such a dislikeable cretin? But the coaching community is a closed circle, and Jay was born on the inside. Someone would hire him, but not if he has a lifetime show-cause ruling that would force any potential employer to sit before the NCAA and explain itself.

Now I know you want to read the damn thing. You’ll be calling Doyel an Emmert lover, but sometimes it’s good to get mad. ???? ??????

Paterno family to appeal NCAA decree

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Wick Sollers, attorney for the Paterno family sent a letter to NCAA President Mark Emmert today stating that the Joseph V. Paterno estate intends to appeal the NCAA decree against Penn State. He continued, writing that the estate  “undertakes this appeal to redress the enormous damage done to Penn State, the State College community, former, current and future student and student athletes, Joe Paterno and certain other involved, as a result of the unprecedented actions taken by the NCAA.”

“This matter may be the most important disciplinary action in the history of the NCAA, and it has been handled in a fundamentally inappropriate and unprecedented manner.”

This is something we should have expected from the Paterno family, inasmuch as it has responded to every significant development in the Sandusky Scandal. The question in this Turkey’s mind is whether they have any standing at all to appeal anything as a non-signer to an agreement between Penn State and the NCAA. Is it possible that the Paterno family is sowing the seeds for an eventual civil lawsuit against the University and the NCAA? I have to wonder whether this is going anywhere.

Read the story by Anne Danahy of the Centre Daily Times.