tOSU Indiscretions of May (Mega Merge)

[LightningRod]

This might really depress some people, but Downing's outstanding fines and fees that generated the 2004 warrant amount to $93.00. Add to that the costs of the warrant, and this matter will be resolved with a phone call with payment by credit card. I wonder how many athletic programs have something like this appear on the nightly news? Make no mistake, I am unhappy about th eviolent crimes that have been committed the past few years, but this has now reached the level of absurdity. Somebody still must not be happy that the NCAA did not find anything to lower the hammer down on Tressel. And as Clarett's cousin told the Dispatch in an interview last week, it wasn't for lack of trying. Oh well.

Holy cow, Kirk Herbstreit had a speeding ticket 10 years ago. 10TV, 1460 AM's affiliate, needs to make an example of him.

Say it Ain't So

Bruce Hooley also had a speeding ticket - 1460 needs to throw the hammer down on these guys.

Bruce the Law Breaker

As did Bill Livingston - the world is going to hell in a handbasket. Stop the insanity being perpetrated by these sports reporters.

Darn, how many more

 

[Oh8ch]

I am doing a 180. This solution is simple and MUST be implemented.

Seven simple rules:

1. Players must turn in their driver's licenses when they sign their LOI. Only to be returned upon graduation.

2. There are drugs that will make you ill when you drink. All players should be put on those drugs.

3. Daily urine testing.

4. Saltpeter to become a staple at the training table.

5. Six PM curfew (Texas game excepted).

6. Minimum score of 30 on the SAT.

7. Parents families must be independently wealthy.

Some will argue that this will hurt recruiting. Sure, it will turn off a few players, but their parents will love it.


Somebody is taking every player for the past five years and systematically running their name through the records of every municipaility in Ohio and in their home states. If George Bush had $93 in outstanding parking tickets nobody would give a damn. But for OSU it is suddenly good sport.

There is not a poster on this board who cares as much about all the offenses of the past year as they do about beating Texas. What Skeete did sucks. The rest is just bull shit.

 

[strohs]

I6. Minimum score of 30 on the SAT.

I am thinking you mean, ACT, I dont think its even possible to get a 30 on the SAT :)
You would have to get every question wrong, and spell your name incorrectly or something to get a score like that...

 

[Alan]

Amen...

finally people are seeing just how far under the microscope they are....

My brother is great friends with Kelvin Sampson at OU....and he is in disbelief at the difference in the way the two programs are treated by the media.....

At OU, almost everything is kept on the low.......

I heard that Nate Salley got 35 cents too much back in change from subway the other day.....lets kick him off the team.....

 

[sandgk]

I am thinking you mean, ACT, I dont think its even possible to get a 30 on the SAT :)
You would have to get every question wrong, and spell your name incorrectly or something to get a score like that...

Does that equal <5 on the Wonderlic? True proof we would have better than Florida Speed -- before the new kids get out of their blocks.

Somebody is taking every player for the past five years and systematically running their name through the records of every municipaility in Ohio and in their home states. If George Bush had $93 in outstanding parking tickets nobody would give a damn. But for OSU it is suddenly good sport.

I know how you feel - but really you've just decried investigative journalism, exactly the skill we all agreed Friend-less Tom lacked completely.

Like LighningRod I put Downing's name in the fcmc search system and found the $93.00 low cost for TJ to get back behind the wheel. And many outside Ohio think OSU players are always on the take. Here is proof to the contrary.

BTW, putting Schafer's name into that system does not bring up the recent arrest (yet). He does however have two minor driving issues, so I say your number 1 might get a few votes -- JK

 

[Misanthrope]

You refuse to answer the question I have posed... at OSU, who has been given special treatment in order to 'win at all costs' ?

Until you can provide evidence of such, I would say your comments are bordering on slander.

Was Clarett given preferential treatment? Irizarry? Cooper? Skeete? Haw? Guilford? Dukes? etc?

I guess I took Paladin's comments differently.

I haven't seen evidence of any "special treatment to win at all costs" by Jim Tressel. If that's what he was saying then I disagree (although I'm beginning to wonder just how many knuckleheads are being recruited to tOSU).

However, I have seen members of this site rationalize their way to advocating for special treatment, in order to increase our chances of winning games. There's too much talk, by some, of the punishment fitting the talent of the player rather than the crime. That's when one begins slipping down the slope.

Amen...

finally people are seeing just how far under the microscope they are....

My brother is great friends with Kelvin Sampson at OU....and he is in disbelief at the difference in the way the two programs are treated by the media.....

At OU, almost everything is kept on the low.......

Am I supposed to take solace in the possibility that OU is having as many problems but we just don't hear about them? Gee, you don't suppose we're no worse than Miami and Florida State do you? That would make me feel a lot better.

I heard that Nate Salley got 35 cents too much back in change from subway the other day.....lets kick him off the team.....

That would be funny if we didn't have guys selling weed, smoking it in public, getting into bar fights not too mention that old mugging/robbery thing. And then there's the issue of improper gifts.

We can talk about being under a "microscope" all day but the fact is, if these things weren't happening there would be nothing to see.

 

[Oh8ch]

(Preface - MIsanthrope - not really coming after you personally, just using your quotes because you have been the most vocal and articulate representative of one side of this argument.)

Am I supposed to take solace in the possibility that OU is having as many problems but we just don't hear about them? Gee, you don't suppose we're no worse than Miami and Florida State do you?

We can talk about being under a "microscope" all day but the fact is, if these things weren't happening there would be nothing to see.

I am gonna keep on beating this drum. This stuff does happen everywhere and that IS the issue. Rapes at Notre Dame. Certified Felons playing for Nebraska. Free shoes at FSU. Probation for Miami. Hookers in Colorado. QBs ganging (raping?) their buddies gf the night before the Fiesta Bowl (take a hard look at THAT coaches action if you want to question ethics).

If you want to root for a program where none of this stuff happens - pick a different sport.

If you want to root for a program where the level of incidents is lower than the norm you need to first identify that norm.

A program not under the microscope could easily have swept the Troy Smith incident under the carpet. I believe many programs do it every year. OSU self reported.

Take a step back from the entire horrid MC fiasco. What really happened? Somebody paid his cell phone bill and he got a couple of other perks that are going on at schools across the country as we speak. Try writing a report about the precise benefits that MC received in relation to a player at Fresno State and nobody cares. It is because it was 1) OSU and 2) a Heisman candidate that made it news. Is that the basis for a norm of behavior?

We have had some players get in fights. We have had some players get drunk and do stupid shit. We even had one smoke a joing.

Two incidents in the past five years bother me. The Irizarry mugging and the Skeete drug bust. When one of those two shows up on the field in Scarlet and Gray I will be ready to talk about Jim Tressel's ethics.

I am NOT condoning any of the above mentioned behavior. It needs to have consequences. In EVERY instance it has. We have twice gone into bowl games with our starting QB on the bench (is that how one defines winning at any cost?). We lost a likely Heisman Trophy winner after his Frosh season for nuts sake.

The key questions is "What are the norms of behavior by which we are to judge Jim Tressel and the OSU football program?" We have looked deep into one closet and found lots of smelly linen. Go through enough closets to provide some meaningful numbers and we will begin to have an idea of how 17-22 years old testosterone driven males behave. Then we can talk.

Clearly some want OSU to be 'better' than these other teams in off the field behavior. (After all as Tibor keeps reminding us JT promised as much.) Maybe we are. The news makes it tough to make that case, but we really don't know. I don't care how many parking tickets we find - we really don't know. (ESPN news releases are not a meaningful metric.)

But let me say clearly that as long as we are within one standard deviation of the mean on either side (and in the absence of more data I am justified in believing that we are) I am happy.

Just keep on winning - this board exists because we do.

 

[BuckPride]

You have people from all over the country relocating to Columbus. Not everyone is home grown like Lincoln NE.

And people come across information that is damaging. The last place I want anything damaging is in Columbus legal system. You have 100 plus practicing attorney here in colmbus who are graduates from Michigan LOL!. Check the Columbus Bar association website. They probably have better connections then we do on any OSU boards. Going from top to the police and PI's.

I caught a post awhile back on Winged Helmet from a michigan grad who worked for a Columbus TV station. He was filling everyone in on what he heard about Clarett snd whst was being investigated. So yes, we are scrutinized, up the wing wang!

 

[CleveBucks]

I feel sorry for the intern at 10tv that is being forced to search the Franklin County courts Web site looking for traffic tickets at the like. Maybe the crack staff can go back through 10 years' worth of rosters to compare the crimes year by year.

Only in Columbus...

 

[BB73]

Two incidents in the past five years bother me. The Irizarry mugging and the Skeete drug bust. When one of those two shows up on the field in Scarlet and Gray I will be ready to talk about Jim Tressel's ethics.

Oh8ch, Great post. But I'll point out that the Marco Cooper arrest was in April 2002, and Chattams' golf club fiasco was in July, 2002. Those incidents, along with the two you mentioned, are the ones that bother me under Tressel's time at tOSU.

And I agree that none of those 4 guys shoud ever play another down in a tOSU uniform.

 

[sandgk]

6:30 In The Morning Meeting?

Reportedly (per a BN post) The Coach and Players met early today.
One group told one more and you are out, other told one more and you are suspended for year.

If true its a step in the right direction, in the right manner.

 

[HineyBuck]

Now I'm thoroughly depressed. There's a four page thread over on B'Nuts entitled "Fire Tressel now." While some posters were embarrassed by the thread and wanted it locked, it took the board-as-a-whole four full pages to come to a rough consensus that maybe Tressel shouldn't be fired just yet.

Sheesh!!

Some posters are confronting the boo-birds head on. VLMarti lays it to those who are calling for Tressel's hide:

[begin VLMarti quote] Are you aware of how foolish you sound?

To hear your take on the matter- and God knows, we all do since you have posted on this topic time and again- we are to believe that JT is a wimp and a disciplinary light weight who allows the boys to run him over like a marshmellow.

Along comes Delreek, champion of coacing orthodoxy and scourge of any wimp who tries to reduce the OSU football team to a criminal asylum.

You couldn't be more daft if you tried!

Coach JT has won four National Titles in a highly competitive environment- playoff oriented D1AA ball.

He has one NC at OSU and more than his fair share of other great wins.

Do you think for one minute that he doesn't know how to deal with an occasionaly out of control 280 lbs. juvenile who happen to behave like- well, like a college kid does, from time to time?

JT runs a small business enterprise that includes 175+ souls who are, in general terms, pulling for the same thing: success on the football field.

Between recruitng, coaching, community service, program selling and alumni support do you think that JT does not possess the necessary lead in the pencil to get the job done?

You would presume to tell this man how to discipline his team? Based upon what resume and what credentias do you boast your knowledge?

And as far as Spielman is concerned-please! He is a great Buckeye, no question. I have been a fan of his since he was on the cover of a Wheaties box while he was still in High School.

That said, do you think that he has more acumen than JT on this subject? Do you really think that he could do a better job at the helm of OSU than JT?

More pointedly- do you think that he could honestly say that his contemporaries could have escaped the new 24/7 internet radar as well as the current batch of Buckeyes?

This is a far more difficult issue today; evidenced by the fact that we are parsing this issue on a message board! Remember, there was no Internet around when Chris and the boys went out to party. And they did party!

Face it, it is a new day. You will have to deal with more intimate details of the boy's lives because the ability to publicise their movements is so easy to do. You can't put the genie back in the bottle.

I am sorry to break it to you, but this type of stuff, and far worse always went on- yes, even under Woody. We, the inquring public, simply did not know.

GO BUCKS! [end VLMarti quote]

Tressel and company know what they're doing. Let them do their job.
:osu:

 

[hoyalawbuck]

Now I'm thoroughly depressed. There's a four page thread over on B'Nuts entitled "Fire Tressel now." While some posters were embarrassed by the thread and wanted it locked, it took the board-as-a-whole four full pages to come to a rough consensus that maybe Tressel shouldn't be fired just yet.

To be fair. the "Fire Tressel Now" post was a misguided attempt at sarcasm. That was made clear by the original poster’s actual message, which was basically to get off Tressel’s back. And of those posters who took it seriously, all but one of them either unreservedly supported Tressel, or at worst observed that he wasn’t perfect.

There is no significant "fire Tressel" movement at BN. And as for the poster to whom VL directed his remarks, his writing style is pretty crude and in-your-face, and he makes an easy target. There are many more very loyal and moderate Buckeye- and Tressel-supporters who yet think that more could be done to reduce the incidence of off-field "stuff."

 

[osugrad21]

To be fair. the "Fire Tressel Now" post was a misguided attempt at sarcasm.

Agreed. The board has been well-behaved lately besides for a few knuckleheads...but we have a few of those here as well.

In my opinion, the BN$ board has contained some of the best football/recruiting dialogue I have seen in months...not so much inside information, but just opinions and discussion from the group as a whole.

 

[Steve19]

I'm with LR, different era, different situation.

I think there aren't too many people who would advocate looking the other way with all this off-the-field nonsense, but Logan is less than objective if he believes there is more now than back then. Geez, an unpaid traffic ticket? This isn't something you hang the coach for, it's just a stupid, stupid thing to do. This team is living under a microscope all the time but they also are doing really stupid things.