Tressell steps down

[billybud]

Mea culpa, Mea culpa, Mea maxima culpa.....

I plead guilty...after reading this, and I do agree with the author, I have decided to tone down my act some...

"The scorn industry -- that co-dependent network of writers and readers, yakkers and listeners, trolls and tweeters heaping contempt on our fellow man -- manufactures one thing: Moral outrage. It's a very popular product. Like Coke, scorn is produced and consumed nearly everywhere on Earth. And too much of it causes decay."

[Spence]

You can't believe everything you read. The SI guywho wrote the scorn piece made a good point about Tressel and Madoff. Tressel didn't do what he should have done. The NCAA rule he broke was that he didn't tell them about someone else breaking the rules. There were no recruiting violations, there was no academic fraud, and the guy who sold the cars says he has paperwork to back him up that the deals he made were legit and no one got a special deal from him. So currently Tressel is in trouble for keeping his mouth shut. That is a cardinal sin with the NCAA, but in Washington it is standard operating procedure.

The NCAA has talked with the car dealer. It seems Pryor never bought a car from him, because " the guy in Jeanette always had a better deal." They have talked to Pryor's mom about his new car and she says it is on the up and up. That I have my doubts about. She was homeless a year and a half ago. That would be a remarkable turn around.

[donovan]

Mea culpa, Mea culpa, Mea maxima culpa.....

I plead guilty...after reading this, and I do agree with the author, I have decided to tone down my act some...

"The scorn industry -- that co-dependent network of writers and readers, yakkers and listeners, trolls and tweeters heaping contempt on our fellow man -- manufactures one thing: Moral outrage. It's a very popular product. Like Coke, scorn is produced and consumed nearly everywhere on Earth. And too much of it causes decay."

I think this is a good reminder for all of us. Facts are what they are, seldom known. By what we do as individuals is what we can control.

I am reminded of President Bush the Elder when he said we should be a "kinder and gentler nation," and he was scorned, made fun of a weak. In principle, then and now, I think, what's wrong with that? Good to be reminded, thanks, Mr. Billybud.

[Spence]

On thing also about Tressel, if he is the guy in the SI article why doesn't any of the hundreds of kids who played for him speak out againt him? Surely a guy who would screw over anyone to advance his agenda would have left tire tread over someone along the way. We is a guy who screwed up. I won't say he made a mistake because that implies he didn't do it on purpose and he did, but he screwed up and it was cost he over ten million dollars. I'd say that is a pretty solid punishment.

[GoBoilers]

As someone else posted there are programs that don't cheat and there some that pushed the edge and don't get caught. I'd opine that they in the minority. It's nothing I can prove but, too many of us know people at our alma maters or have seen first hand a little "look the other way". Doesn't have to be money. It can be extra cash to tutors or set up (stooge) classes for grades. I know that happens. Saw it my school 40 years ago because I was in a math class. What a joke-20 football players, 5 basketball and assorted other "minor sport athletes". I told my advisor to never put me in such a class again as I was there for a real education. Money has perverted what athletics is at the collegiate level.

[Spence]

I agree.

[Vileborg]

If there are rules, there are always ways to bend them and break them. Any time you write something down on paper it is left open to interpretation.

Under rules, as a booster I can't give you anything, but I can hire your homeless mother at 150k a year to be my consultant. I haven't needed her services but I fear I may so I keep her on the payroll anyway. Of course your caring mother is going to make sure that you are well adjusted and have all that you want. I may also give her bonuses when I appreciate your on-field activities which just may trickle down in the form of cars, clothes, and living expenses.

Under NCAA rules I have done nothing wrong. I have hired an employee and treated them like gold.

[billybud]

I. too, was in school 40 years ago. Athletes weren't always the brightest but they weren't what we have now. That amalgum of scholar-athlete hadn't shfted as far to the "athlete" side as it has now...

And guys like Fred Biletnikoff and Joe Namath (and yes, I casually knew Joe since he was dating a girl next to my place who I went to high school with) didn't have Denali's.

[billybud]

Speaking of serendipity, Joe Namath was a hotshot at Bama when an almost garage band from my home town (Guy Penney and the Laymen) played for a function at Bama. Suzy Storm (real name) was their front singer and someone who I had known since we were in grade school. They started dating and that lasted from college until Joe became "Broadway Joe".

Interestingly, Guy Penney and the Laymen still play gigs.

[donovan]

Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.

Which brings me to the next question, how is it my children can recite the Holy Grail by heart but they have no clue where "The fabric of American empire ought to rest on the solid basis of THE CONSENT OF THE PEOPLE. The streams of national power ought to flow from that pure, original fountain of all legitimate authority." comes from!

Oh well, Hamilton doesn't make me laugh and Monty Python does.

[Spence]

They don't care about teaching history in schools anymore.

[billybud]

We are all drawn to the beautiful and magical in life....

You are right, Hamilton, Jefferson, et al, may be right in their espousals of the foundations of democracy...but they are commanding in the way that a well wrought legal draft is.

The cry of "Give me liberty or give me death" , in comparison, has the emotional appeal and the heroic aura that inspires us and is more memorable.

The Arthurian legends have captivated generations (including the reinvented Arthuriian form of the "Force being with you". I think, much of our attraction to the Highland legends of Braveheart, Robert the Bruce, and Rob Roy is the magic of human will in the face of almost certain inevitable defeat.

An image that has had me spellbound since childhood, was the story my grandfather told me about the battle west of Reims when the Cameron Highlanders entered the fray. Through the early morning mist and smoke they heard the skirling of bag pipes and then, appearing through the mist as from another world, came bagpipers walking erect and playing the pipes while the Highlanders moved up through the ranks to attack the front.

I learned, in my life, that real heroism is much less romantic and is often quite gritty. But I still am drawn to the magic of a JFK over the workday goodness of a Jimmy Carter.

I am of the Camelot generation, a youth when our young Arthur and his court were taking on the villainy of the world both domestic and foreign.

[Spence]

My wife and I went to Boston last September to see the city and tour the history. We were in Cambridge in a park not far from Harvard walking toward a monument. There were about five homeless guys hanging around that monument so we went over to another part of the park where a couple small cannons and a small granite marker set under a tree. The marker said under this tree George Washington took command of the Continental Army. It gave me goosebumps up and down my arms and to think that I would have never saw the spot if not for the homeless guys taking over the big monument. There is a ton of history in Boston and the surrounding areas and it is all very cool if you like history, but that spot just really moved me as being the place where the revolution really got it's teeth. Washington, in my view, was the greatest of all of the revolutionary figures because he is the one who put our constitution into action. The people wanted him to be king and he turned it down because he believed so deeply in what they were fighting for and set the precedent for a president serving only two terms. The precedent was so strong that it didn't even need to be law until FDR decided to break it. If we could find a few guys like Washington to serve this country would be lots better off.

[RazorHawk]

As someone else posted there are programs that don't cheat and there some that pushed the edge and don't get caught. I'd opine that they in the minority. It's nothing I can prove but, too many of us know people at our alma maters or have seen first hand a little "look the other way". Doesn't have to be money. It can be extra cash to tutors or set up (stooge) classes for grades. I know that happens. Saw it my school 40 years ago because I was in a math class. What a joke-20 football players, 5 basketball and assorted other "minor sport athletes". I told my advisor to never put me in such a class again as I was there for a real education. Money has perverted what athletics is at the collegiate level.

And I know you. You were in that class for a reason. Golfers must have been important for Purdue, back then.

[GoBoilers]

As someone else posted there are programs that don't cheat and there some that pushed the edge and don't get caught. I'd opine that they in the minority. It's nothing I can prove but, too many of us know people at our alma maters or have seen first hand a little "look the other way". Doesn't have to be money. It can be extra cash to tutors or set up (stooge) classes for grades. I know that happens. Saw it my school 40 years ago because I was in a math class. What a joke-20 football players, 5 basketball and assorted other "minor sport athletes". I told my advisor to never put me in such a class again as I was there for a real education. Money has perverted what athletics is at the collegiate level.

And I know you. You were in that class for a reason. Golfers must have been important for Purdue, back then.

I got an A! LOL You also are aware I brought the program down to another level.