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  1. #73

    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    Quote Originally Posted by Ravenswintitle View Post
    hiding him and keeping him on staff and tenured is OK then?
    I'm done conversing with you while you're putting words in my mouth.

    Quote Originally Posted by HoustonRaven View Post
    A self-impostion of penalties would also go a long way in restoring the good name of PSU, but I am doubtful as well.

    They need to rip the band-aid off, not do this slow burn thing they seem to be doing.
    One of the big problems here with the school taking action right now (or anyone taking action right now) is that there simply is no agreement on what the right decision is for how to punish the football program. The death penalty likely completely kills the program for decades. Not years, decades. SMU still hasn't recovered. And the football program has played a MAJOR role in the school becoming as great as it has. Not "great" as in "great at football"...as in "such a great learning institution."

    There's simply no easy answer in this. I'm hopeful the school disciplines itself. That would be appropriate. But I have no problem at all with everyone taking time to figure out what the right course of action should be. Right now, we don't even know that we've learned everything there is to learn about this.

    Quote Originally Posted by ballhawk View Post
    That was a pretty good read on an icon's fall from grace. Ill admit that my first reaction when Paterno died was that at least he wouldnt have to deal with any of this. But, as the truth starts to trickle out, he was just as guilty as anyone. And unfortunately the bastard took a lot of secrets to his grave. Fuck PSU...the entire institution needs to be brought to its knees.
    Aaaaaaaaaaand there's where you lost me.

    Seriously, this is a moronic statement. Not just a bad one. Not just an ignorant one. It's an absolutely, unquestionably moronic riot-mentality statement that when you stop to think about it for even five seconds makes literally no sense what-so-ever.

    Do you know how many people are directly involved with the university?
    ~45k students
    ~12k full time faculty
    ~6k part time faculty
    ~3k non-student staff
    That's just University Park...double those numbers if you include all satellite campuses.

    Right now, we've got Sandusky, Paterno, Schultz, Curley and Spanier who clearly acted inappropriately in some fashion. The first two are in prison or passed away. The second two have been indicted and I don't believe (but not certain) are still directly involved in the university. The fifth was fired as President of the university, though he still remains on staff which I'm not particularly thrilled with. Then there's the Board of Directors who may or may not get replaced wholesale...their biggest crime was in not having adequate controls to learn about this sort of thing happening, though they likely never went along with any cover-up.

    So, out of the approximately 66k people involved in University Park campus, and nearly 125k people throughout the university as a whole, there are just a bit over 50 who acted inappropriately in this manner. Only five of whom actually knew about it. Two being in prison or dead.

    And your answer is that the entirety of the 125k people needs to be "brought to its knees?"

    No.

    Quote Originally Posted by HoustonRaven View Post
    Board of Trustees just decided to keep the statue in place (during the slow news cycle of a Saturday, btw).
    It wouldn't shock me at all if this decision winds up changing in time. I hope it does. I agree...it seems like a no brainer to me.

    - C -
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  2. #74
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    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    You just put a whole lot of words in my mouth PSU.

    LOL





  3. #75

    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    No, actually, I didn't. Unless "the entire institution needs to be brought to its knees" is completely out of context. If you meant just the football program, that would be a different story, but that's not at all what such a statement comes off as. Penn State is not simply a football-institution. It happens to be one of the best university-institutions in the country.

    - C -
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    www.oblongspheroid.com

    A blog about any and everything football.

    Twitter: oblong_spheroid





  4. #76
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    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    psu-

    I was more referring to the board, the administrators, the athletic program, etc. They need to clean house. Period. Thats what i was saying. It really sux for the students and the alumni....but this is a disgusting mess...and heads must roll.





  5. #77

    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    I don't disagree with any of that, but the BOD is the only thing left to clean (save that Spanier somehow still has tenure there, which I don't get). And the BOD wasn't in on anything, they just didn't have adequate controls. A lot of companies have that problem. When it's discovered, common action is to bring in consultants (or regulators) to figure out what's wrong, and then implement solutions. Common action is not to fire all executives and replace them with new ones. The BOD could have anything between zero attrition and 100% attrition as a result of this, and honestly I wouldn't have an issue with any of that range.

    And FWIW, if that's what you meant, you should have stated it as such. Those five idiots and the BOD are not the institution. And I've heard too many complete and utter morons saying some form of "burn it all down" to think it's not possible for someone to think it's a good idea.

    - C -
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    www.oblongspheroid.com

    A blog about any and everything football.

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  6. #78
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    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    Quote Originally Posted by psuasskicker View Post
    One of the big problems here with the school taking action right now (or anyone taking action right now) is that there simply is no agreement on what the right decision is for how to punish the football program.
    To me, it is not so much about "punishing the football program" as it is about putting their priorities in the right place. It was the the overwhelming desire to protect the program, and in many aspects, Paterno himself, that led many to make the decisions that were made. And it was not just the 4 named in the report. Remember the janitor that saw one of the crimes and failed to report it because he was afraid "that they would fire us all"? I suspect there were many others that saw something, or felt something wasn't right, that failed to follow-up for fear of going against the program. That is the culture that needs to be changed.

    A simple, "We are not going to play football for a year or two to let us all focus on making sure the priorities of the University are straight." would be suffice.

    The death penalty likely completely kills the program for decades. Not years, decades. SMU still hasn't recovered. And the football program has played a MAJOR role in the school becoming as great as it has. Not "great" as in "great at football"...as in "such a great learning institution."
    Sorry, I am having a hard time squaring the "price" of a lost football program vs. the damage that has been done to young lives. That type of argument is nonsense squared.

    And SMU is ranked #62 in the US News and World Report 2010 ranking of US colleges. Seems like they are doing ok.

    If temporarily removing the football program is going to impact the university to that degree, then that tells me that it truly does need to be shut-down for a while. There are many "great universities" around the world that don't revolve around a "great football team", or a football team at all. How do they manage?
    Last edited by PeterB58; 07-15-2012 at 12:18 PM.





  7. #79
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    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    Even if they don't formally do anything to the football program I would imagine that they're going to suffer a bit anyway because it is going to be that much harder to recruit players for Penn State's program in the near future.

    For PSU: (See...I can find things on the interwebs too!!!! Imagine that!)

    http://www.altoonamirror.com/page/co...l.html?nav=746
    Holtz is the third player to decommit since Paterno's firing. Four-star Colorado guard Joey O'Connor was the first, followed by Mechanicsburg linebacker Bryton Barr. Barr was coming to Penn State as an invited walk-on but received a scholarship offer from Cincinnati around the time the Sandusky scandal broke.
    http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/footbal...g=ycn-10897153
    Given all of the circumstances surrounding the program there wasn't going to be an elite class of major recruits. Penn State had some but lost them.
    http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1...ost-in-the-mix
    Penn State Nittany Lions had the unimpressive 2012 recruiting class that everyone expected following the turmoil in Happy Valley this season.

    The Nittany Lions managed to sign 19 players, with just one 4-star prospect among them.

    Penn State's new arrivals are projects for the most part, outside of Eugene Lewis.

    http://bleacherreport.com/articles/9...usting-scandal
    The effects can already be seen in this tweet by prized recruit Noah Spence.

    "@nspence94

    um psu might be a no no for me ewww"


    According to Scout.com, Spence is the No. 1 rated defensive end recruit in the nation.
    Last edited by wickedsolo; 07-15-2012 at 03:18 PM. Reason: So PSU is Happy. Because that's what we're here for. :-)
    Disclaimer: The content posted is of my own opinion.





  8. #80

    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    Quote Originally Posted by PeterB58 View Post
    To me, it is not so much about "punishing the football program" as it is about putting their priorities in the right place.

    A simple, "We are not going to play football for a year or two to let us all focus on making sure the priorities of the University are straight." would be suffice.

    Sorry, I am having a hard time squaring the "price" of a lost football program vs. the damage that has been done to young lives. That type of argument is nonsense squared.
    You haven't really made a compelling case for WHY shutting down a program that Forbes estimates to be worth $100MM would allow for the school to completely refocus itself and ensure that the football program is entirely realized to be not all that important. Why is death penalty - self imposed or not - the required step that must be taken in order to ensure something like this doesn't happen again?

    I also don't think you understand just how much such a thing would impact the school. It's hard to describe, but the cost of shutting down the football program for even a year would be dramatically more than simply the lost income for a season. The football program brings in approximately 100k people to the area in the weekends where there is a game. Take out the stuff they buy at football games (tickets, food, beer, etc). If each of these people on average spend $20 per person per weekend they're in town, over seven home games, you're talking about a $14MM hit to the local economy, and that $20 estimate is frankly extremely low. I think the overall economic impact to the university and the surrounding town's economy would be $100MM just next year if they shut down the football program, and would be probably half that ongoing for however many years it would take for the school to fully recover.

    And while SMU isn't terrible right now, they simply aren't what they once were. Big football programs - like it or not - bring a lot more to a school than simply great football. National recognition as a powerful football school brings in students, brings in funding, and brings in a lot more than just general football-related income.

    Take the hospital/clinic piece out of the 2012-2013 income budget for the school, and the $50MM-$75MM that the football program is expected to earn for the university represents 1.6% - 2.5% of the entirety of the school's revenues. That includes all satellite campuses, not just University Park. If you talk just University Park, the football program is about 3%-5% of its revenues. That's a gigantic impact. And that also assumes there are absolutely no other impacts as a result of removal of the football program, which is not a good assumption to make.

    Your suggestion is not so simple as to just put aside football and it won't really have that big an impact on the university. Shutting down the program for a year has a massive impact on the welfare of the school and the community around it. And it is arguable how much of a positive impact it would make to reset peoples' priorities. If it were black and white, such that you could say "If you don't shut the program down, this sort of thing could continue; but if you do shut it down, everyone will realize this can't continue and it will never happen again," then it's a pretty good argument to make.

    But it's NOT that black and white. Why would the solution of shutting the program down work better than, say, eliminating ten scholarships for the program for the next two years, and/or making them ineligible for a bowl game for the next two years, and/or any of some other far less drastic actions would would have nowhere close to the negative impact shutting it down completely would have on the school? How exactly would shutting it down completely ensure that everyone takes your attitude and realizes the football program isn't that important and guarantees nothing like this would ever happen again?

    And so, like I said, this is not such an easy answer, and I don't think anyone should be rushing to come to judgment on what should happen as a result of this situation.

    - C -
    Last edited by psuasskicker; 07-15-2012 at 02:45 PM.
    ---------------------------------------------------

    www.oblongspheroid.com

    A blog about any and everything football.

    Twitter: oblong_spheroid





  9. #81

    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    Quote Originally Posted by wickedsolo View Post
    Even if they don't formally do anything to the football program, they're going to suffer for a long time anyway because no top recruits are going to want to play there.
    You argued this before. Rivals disagrees. So does Scout. I already pointed that out to you. Come up with a better argument, because yours is completely inaccurate.

    - C -
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    www.oblongspheroid.com

    A blog about any and everything football.

    Twitter: oblong_spheroid





  10. #82
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    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    Quote Originally Posted by psuasskicker View Post
    You argued this before. Rivals disagrees. So does Scout. I already pointed that out to you. Come up with a better argument, because yours is completely inaccurate.

    - C -
    Just my opinion. Not really an argument.


    But here, I'll go ahead and re-word it so you can better understand what I was trying to say.
    Disclaimer: The content posted is of my own opinion.





  11. #83

    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    Other than Spence, those links you posted mostly didn't say anything that would indicate your point. The guy that decommitted we would have lost anyway because he wasn't a scholarship player and he got offered one elsewhere. The bleacherreport article is stupid...it's either very old or very inaccurate, because all the major scouting sites have PSU having signed a solid number of 4-star recruits, many of whom signed close to commit-day. The Rivals article says they lost a QB, which is far from the first time a big time QB recruit has been lost. With no statement that it's from this problem, that's a stretch to assume, especially since the guy committed to PSU initially AFTER the scandal broke. Spence we never had a shot at anyway, so I don't really care what he said.

    The point is, you're claiming it's having a big negative impact on their football recruiting. But PSU has signed their strongest recruiting class in years, and second strongest I think in the last decade and a half. It's a claim that a lot of people are making, but it doesn't seem to be bearing out.

    - C -
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    www.oblongspheroid.com

    A blog about any and everything football.

    Twitter: oblong_spheroid





  12. #84
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    Re: The Freeh Report and the Future of Penn State

    Quote Originally Posted by psuasskicker
    The point is, you're claiming it's having a big negative impact on their football recruiting. But PSU has signed their strongest recruiting class in years, and second strongest I think in the last decade and a half. It's a claim that a lot of people are making, but it doesn't seem to be bearing out.
    For someone who doesn't like to have words put in their mouth, you sure as hell do a lot of that. I never said it is having a "big negative impact". I said that their program will likely suffer (which it already has to a certain degree) and it may be quite some time before they fully recover from this.

    All I'm saying is that as this stuff continues to unfold it isn't exactly an unreasonable expectation or speculation that players will leave the program, ask for release from their scholarship, and guys coming out of high school (due to the uncertainty of the program) may opt to go to other places.

    That is simple psychology 101. I'm not basing it on anything other than my own opinion and some of the things I've read.

    In my opinion it is reasonable to think that Penn State's football recruitment is going to take a hit over the next couple of years. Especially if the NCAA or whoever issues sanctions, takes away scholarships, suspends the program, etc.
    Last edited by wickedsolo; 07-15-2012 at 04:41 PM.
    Disclaimer: The content posted is of my own opinion.





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