TBird41
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Post by TBird41 on Jul 23, 2012 21:22:53 GMT -5
The punishment from the NCAA is disgustingly light, considering the crimes. As a minimum Penn State should have gotten the death penalty for two years. As a maximum they should indefinitely have been kicked out of Division I football and forbidden from playing any NCAA teams. Removing records is a slap on the wrist. Reducing scholarships is a slap on the other wrist. The money fine: big deal. I dont think this is the best, most constructive punishment that the NCAA could have handed out. But the Death Penalty does nothing but hurt innocent people. We have to remember that for all the vile, disgusting behavior that has been revealed at Penn State, none of what I have read have been NCAA violations (if this is wrong let me know). I keep seeing people criticize the penalty as meaningless, or not contrustive, but without offering what they think would have been appropriate (not just you jgalt). So what do you think should have happened? I know some folks think it wasn't harsh enough, but I'm unclear what other non-death penalty punishment would have been better. And that being said, I think that vacating the wins was a necessary, but not sufficient penalty. The win record was a contributing factor and Paterno doesn't deserve it.
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TC
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Post by TC on Jul 23, 2012 21:34:38 GMT -5
I don't believe that Paterno was idolized in Happy Valley merely because his teams won a lot of football games. If he were John Calipari in cleats, I'd have no sympathy for him at all, but that's not the case. I'm sorry, but John Calipari probably slips recruits a couple bills and plays monkey business with test scores. He doesn't cover up child rapes and display an absolute callous disregard towards the victims. If we're going to play the Calipari card here - does John Calipari not donate to charity? He's a serial sports cheater, but that doesn't mean he doesn't try to make his community better. Joe Paterno probably did a lot of good things at Penn State. He helped kids with cancer. He helped injured players. He donated to the University. He lived a relatively humble life given his position. He also exerted undue political influence over the University justice system, fought with student affairs, tried to usurp power from every other University department to deal favorably with players, and covered over child rapes to protect his program. So yeah, he wasn't all bad. But acting like this was some blip and the "Penn State Way" narrative was right all along is just myopic. The problem here isn't just hero worship as much as John Thompson tried to spin it that way.
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miracles87
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Post by miracles87 on Jul 24, 2012 9:09:53 GMT -5
For all of the recent news, the trial, the leak of e-mails, the Freeh report and the NCAA sanctions, the main finding of fact regarding the coverup is yet to occur. There is much still to learn, and I am hopeful it will provide a more, for lack of a better word, understandable, beginning to the trip that ended up in firmly in hell. The destination will remain unforgivable for all time, but we do not yet know what road they set out on. To the extent that it matters at all, is up to anyone to decide for themselves. Still, you cannot ascertain the facts of the coverup by peering into the shadows of other behavior. Joe Paterno having "exerted undue political influence over the University justice system" is the proverbial parking ticket used to allege that, well, maybe he is a murderer too! Paterno didn't set up a good program to give himself cover for future bad acts, though that seems to be what people think.
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theexorcist
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Post by theexorcist on Jul 24, 2012 9:31:49 GMT -5
The punishment from the NCAA is disgustingly light, considering the crimes. As a minimum Penn State should have gotten the death penalty for two years. As a maximum they should indefinitely have been kicked out of Division I football and forbidden from playing any NCAA teams. Removing records is a slap on the wrist. Reducing scholarships is a slap on the other wrist. The money fine: big deal. You do know that the perpetrator is going to jail for multiple life times; there will be millions of dollars handed out in civil suits; and everyone involved is losing their jobs if not more. Additionally there is a possibility that PSU will lose federal funding, which is a much bigger problem for them that losing their football team. The death penalty only serves to eliminate millions of dollars in scholarships for students who may not have been able to go to school otherwise. And it would ruin many small businesses in State College that depend on the money that 7 home games a year provides. And there is the possibility that Penn State would have to cut other sports teams because of budget short falls. I dont think this is the best, most constructive punishment that the NCAA could have handed out. But the Death Penalty does nothing but hurt innocent people. We have to remember that for all the vile, disgusting behavior that has been revealed at Penn State, none of what I have read have been NCAA violations (if this is wrong let me know). This kind of rambles. 1. The big problem that I have with this is that Penn State isn't the University of New Mexico. I firmly believe that, had another state school been this soulless for so long, that death would have been the minimum. The other option would have been banishment from the NCAA for possibly football or all sports (or a revocation of Division I status). I don't think that any of this happened because the NCAA is kind of limited. Iowa fans have booked hotel rooms. The Big Ten network has camera crew assignments. Cutting a laser beam that cauterizes Penn State isn't feasible. And so, with that, you have to compromise. Emmert probably threatened Penn State with death the way you'd threaten a perp with a charge that the cops were pretty sure in no way would stick - the statements by PSU afterwards sounded a heck of a lot like "really, we accept this, because it could have been a lot worse. But bowl bans, scholarship reductions, and financial penalties here were reasonable for basically ignoring the NCAA's bureaucratic process. Death would not have been. Death would have required the NCAA to investigate on its own, during the middle of upcoming civil suits and almost certainly more criminal ones. And it would have been messy. The one possible solution would have been PSU deciding, with the NCAA's "encouragement", to shut down the program for a year or two (I still think that the trustees should have done this, then resigned en masse, since they're a large part of the problem). But, hey, the trustees screwed around on removing Paterno's statue and did it primarily based on the threat of NCAA sanction and optics, so they can't manage anything. 2. Now to the "this hurts students and businesses" argument. First, let's dispense with the students part. The NCAA has imposed practice limitations repeatedly (notably with Michigan football a few years ago), thus limiting players' ability to compete. The NCAA has also imposed postseason bans based on APR rates. If Student A goes to UConn and has a 4.0 average in nuclear engineering, he can't play in the postseason this year. He's being punished for actions that weren't his doing. And yet nobody argues seriously that those NCAA penalties are inherently unfair because innocent students are suffering. If CrueltyCorp gets sued for illegal dealings in California that occurred in 2000 and subsequently gets banned from operating in the state, no serious arguments are made that CrueltyCorp shouldn't be punished because most people weren't aware of what CrueltyCorp was doing and some weren't even working there. Institutions retain culpability, which is why ValuJet merged with AirTran. Next comes businesses. This is the most insiduous argument of all - that State College would suffer. It's insiduous because it's close to the same argument that the Freeh report says the Penn State leadership used - don't want to hurt the institution, don't want to hurt the community. Let's go back to CrueltyCorp, which has its headquarters in an economically depressed part of California and is a major employer. There's pressure on the county and state government to let CrueltyCorp get away with its bad dealings because it makes a lot of money, and making the town dry cleaners suffer is unfair. This allows evil. This excuses evil. When you say that a business or an institution or a person is too big to fail, you excuse a little bit. Then, since you excused a little bit, you begin to excuse a lot. 3. Long story short - I can understand what the NCAA did, and why they did it, because it was the limits of what they could do in a limited time frame. I still think that it was nowhere near enough. Just remember that, on September 1, Penn State will host Ohio. They may lose. There will almost certainly be lots of blue ribbons for child abuse awareness. But 100,000 people will chant "We Are!" "Penn State!". If you have the game on, you'll be able to hear it. One of the most horrific parts of the Sandusky trial, for me, was one of the victims being raped in the basement of Sandusky screaming out for help and Sandusky telling him "No one can hear you". According to the Freeh Report, Paterno, Spanier, and Curley covered up this rape because they didn't want to interfere with all those people and their cheering. And I guarantee you that, before the game, the tailgate in the parking lot will have carboard cutouts of Paterno. Football at Penn State needs to go away. For a little bit, if not permanently.
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jgalt
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Post by jgalt on Jul 24, 2012 11:54:03 GMT -5
I keep seeing people criticize the penalty as meaningless, or not contrustive, but without offering what they think would have been appropriate (not just you jgalt). So what do you think should have happened? I know some folks think it wasn't harsh enough, but I'm unclear what other non-death penalty punishment would have been better. And that being said, I think that vacating the wins was a necessary, but not sufficient penalty. The win record was a contributing factor and Paterno doesn't deserve it. The part of the punishment that have the real problem with is the loss of scholarships. The wins vacated, the money penalty (the only really constructive part of the punishment), the bowl ban, all i am totally fine with. More on this below As for what I would have liked to see: something directed directly at Spanier. The NCAA is controlled by the school presidents and they have always been cautious of punishing their own. They dont want it to come back and bite them when they are doing things wrong. This is a fundamental flaw in the NCAA. Much of what people wanted was to change the "culture of PSU". Cultures of organizations begin at the top. If the executive level is rotten, the whole will be too (and miracles, im not saying that PSU students and fans are bad people just that this creates a culture susceptible to bad behavior). I dont have my management text books from when I was in school with me or I would site sources and have some quotes. Now, the culture at PSU has been changed. Not in the way that people want (I think the PSU community will be stronger and more insular because of this), but it will be changed. So you have to focus on change the cultures at all the other school. All of them are capable of this sort of thing, it just has happened or come to light yet. The way to do that is to make the rules makers and enforces (the presidents, dean, ADs, etc.) more responsible for the actions of their institutions. Violations committed under the watch of these people should follow them from job to job, making schools think twice about hiring them. I obviously havent worked out all the details, so you'll have to forgive me. First, let's dispense with the students part. The NCAA has imposed practice limitations repeatedly (notably with Michigan football a few years ago), thus limiting players' ability to compete. The NCAA has also imposed postseason bans based on APR rates. If Student A goes to UConn and has a 4.0 average in nuclear engineering, he can't play in the postseason this year. He's being punished for actions that weren't his doing. And yet nobody argues seriously that those NCAA penalties are inherently unfair because innocent students are suffering. I never think taking away scholarships is a just punishment. It only ever hurts people who are not involved with the violation. There are a fixed number of scholarship each year, so if you remove one or fifteen from the pool, at some point in the system, someone isn't getting one and there is no justice in that. If the NCAA wanted to take away scholarships from football, thats fine but they should have mandated having the same number of scholarships be given to other students, so that the pool remains the same. As for the analogy with a large corporation: I dont subscribe to "too big to fail", I argued vehemently on this board to let banks and car companies die off. But they were dying under their own power, the market had determined they had no value. What you are talking about is an outside party, not the market, deciding to destroy an organization because of an isolated incident. This will have an effect on enrollment and football attendance (not for the first game this season, but after a few years it will). And if that kills businesses in State College, so be it. But you cant just decide to pull the rug out from under these people because you are angry at Sandusky and Paterno and Spanier.
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theexorcist
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Post by theexorcist on Jul 24, 2012 12:14:30 GMT -5
Thanks for the reply. Interesting idea on scholarship limits - I'd favor making them academic, so that the field hockey team doesn't get a bonanza every time the football team cheats on a test.
I know that "too big to fail" is loaded, but it really does seem to encapsulate how people deal with Penn State.
While the terminology has only been applied to banks and auto companies, there are also cases where companies are banned from operating (at a micro level, a lawyer can lose a license - on a macro level, Chinatown bus companies have been shut down - at an even higher level, companies have been banned from operating in states or countries).
I'll use the Chinatown bus example for a quick and dirty example - the bus companies have usually come down to defend their actions by saying "you'll only be taking away seats from people who need them". The response to that from the government has been that the violations were so egregious that the benefit to people or inconvenience of same was immaterial - somebody was going to die.
The problem is that, the bigger a company or institution gets and the more it affects the surrounding area, the more problems people are willing to overlook. If the Chinatown buses were had tens of thousands of fans who were vocal in their support of the service despite the dangers, rather than shut them down the probable approach would be to work with the bus companies to improve things. Politics affects how the issue gets handled. In some cases, it's good. In this case, I don't like what it's defending.
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DFW HOYA
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Post by DFW HOYA on Jul 24, 2012 12:33:09 GMT -5
While the terminology has only been applied to banks and auto companies, there are also cases where companies are banned from operating (at a micro level, a lawyer can lose a license - on a macro level, Chinatown bus companies have been shut down - at an even higher level, companies have been banned from operating in states or countries). Not a good analogy. Chinatown bus companies are notorious for corporate shell games that come and go as the wind blows. The moment "Blue Star Bus" is shut down, up pops "Red Diamond Bus"--same bus, same driver, same phone number. (It's been alleged that the use of white buses allows an easy change of stock between owners or even between companies withiout an old brand along the sides of the bus.) And to the analogy, it's not like Penn State can close on Friday, reopen on Monday as Keystone State University and go back to Big 10 football. (Now, returning you to the topic at hand.)
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jgalt
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Post by jgalt on Jul 24, 2012 13:54:34 GMT -5
The problem is that, the bigger a company or institution gets and the more it affects the surrounding area, the more problems people are willing to overlook. If the Chinatown buses were had tens of thousands of fans who were vocal in their support of the service despite the dangers, rather than shut them down the probable approach would be to work with the bus companies to improve things. Politics affects how the issue gets handled. In some cases, it's good. In this case, I don't like what it's defending. I totally see your point. I guess the disconnect that I have is seeing this as caused by the football program. Obviously the key players were coaches for the football program, but the program's operation didnt cause the cover up, it was the individuals' idea that they had to protect the program. I see the correlation but not the causation. I Think most of the difference in opinion that people have is base on this. Many (i not saying you necessarily do exorcist) see football as the cause of this while some dont. I recognize of course that football's domination of PSU gave JoePa the opening to become a demigod, but he still had to make the choice to cover up Sandusky. I wonder what PSU FB would be like now if everyone had come forward immediately? Cant imagine we would even talk about it anymore and Paterno would probably still be coaching.
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theexorcist
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Post by theexorcist on Jul 25, 2012 8:03:48 GMT -5
That's what gets me - if Paterno had shut Sandusky down publicly - maybe even after 1998 - he would have become a god. The defensive coordinator who helped take down Miami? Nope, doesn't get you a free pass to rape kids. He would have been lauded. Penn State might have been investigated for a little bit of "how did this guy stay for so long", but the buck would have stopped with Paterno.
Oh, and I have to confess that what disappointed me most about the Freeh report was that Paterno wasn't covering for Sandusky but the football program. I can see someone making the decision that someone whom you've worked with for decades and who helped get you where you are today - it would have been a one-shot deal. It still would have been incredibly wrong, and I hope that I will always have the fortitude to stop close friends if I was ever in the same situation, but placing someone on a higher pedestal because of what he did has some twisted logic to it.
Paterno just covered it up for football and to preserve what he built. There's no honor or defense in that.
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skyhoya
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Post by skyhoya on Jul 25, 2012 9:57:36 GMT -5
College athletics goes through cycles. My long time friend's era ended in shame. I feel for the victims as it happened to my nephew and I watched from a distance as his life deteriorated and had a tragic end. I also have sympathy for the current athletes who are affected by the sanctions. The upper classmen will probably stay and the under classmen will do what they want, because I don't think they have fully bought into the old system.
What upsets me now is the O'B is pitching an NFL future to everyone on the team. Less than a handful of the current roster will make it in the NFL. This is not the clean slate that I had hoped for. Of course, I still am waiting for a real AD and a real Prez up there, but it looks like that might not happen. When I was recruited by Rip, the pitch was come and get a good education, get out of dirty air of the city and enjoys the clean air. I’ll get you ready to move forward with your life. I never hear the word NFL.
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njhoya78
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Post by njhoya78 on Jan 16, 2015 13:39:03 GMT -5
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DanMcQ
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Post by DanMcQ on May 5, 2016 20:21:37 GMT -5
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kchoya
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Post by kchoya on May 5, 2016 20:39:59 GMT -5
I forgot how bad skyhoya was in this thread.
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