All Things Notre Dame - The Clashmore Mike Memorial Thread

[hack]

I do have the utmost respect for DSL as a legit fan. We'll see.

I've seen good posts from the guy too, so I'm wiling to run with that. Just not lately. I understand the degree of difficulty in doing so lately for OSU fans, but a race to the bottom is no excuse.

[Dr. Strangelove]

I've seen good posts from the guy too, so I'm wiling to run with that. Just not lately. I understand the degree of difficulty in doing so lately for OSU fans, but a race to the bottom is no excuse.

Race to the bottom? You're just irritated that I'm not cowering, whimpering in a corner liked a whipped dog and not offering all sorts of apologies for my team like you think you are entitled to.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Jamie- I understand the accident falls outside the purview of the NCAA. I am putting out there that Tressel is being called scum-of-the-earth for violating rules that govern a game. Not laws that actually affect other people, the rules of a game. Maybe his life deserves to be ruined over that. I dunno. I think we can agree that a kid giving his life to film football practice is a far bigger tragedy than a few football games' integrity called into question over ineligible players.

I certainly don't expect the NCAA to do anything, it's beyond their scope. I just wonder why a person's character is defined more by how well they obeyed NCAA rules and less about how well they behaved in society in general.

[Jamie H]

Trying to paint Tressel in a good light by comparing his acts to an accident that resulted in a dead kid is about as low as you can go. I'm pretty sure that is what Hack is saying.

[Jamie H]

I just wonder why a person's character is defined more by how well they obeyed NCAA rules and less about how well they behaved in society in general.

What about a lawyer who is a completely upstanding citizen but blatently violates the ethics laws that lawyers are governed by? Should those ethics violations be ignored because he "behaved well in society in general"?

Certain professions involve having more upstanding ethics than others. I would say college football coaching is one such profession. When you are a leader of essentially kids, you are expected to follow the rules and set an example, not lie and be a part of a big cover up. If Tressel wants to lie and cover stuff up, he should get out of coaching and go into politics.

[Dr. Strangelove]

What about a lawyer who is a completely upstanding citizen but blatently violates the ethics laws that lawyers are governed by? Should those ethics violations be ignored because he "behaved well in society in general"?

Certain professions involve having more upstanding ethics than others. I would say college football coaching is one such profession. When you are a leader of essentially kids, you are expected to follow the rules and set an example, not lie and be a part of a big cover up. If Tressel wants to lie and cover stuff up, he should get out of coaching and go into politics.

Let me say for probably the 45th time on this board that I think Tressel deserves to be punished. I am going after all those attacking his character and calling him the lowest of the low because he broke rules governing a sporting event. He will suffer no criminal prosecution for his actions nor will he even be liable for any sort of civil suit as far as I can tell. A lawyer who violates ethics rules is open to all sorts of lawsuits, particularly from clients. You want to say he should be fired, fine. Comparing him with Hitler or Madoff is insanity. I know Jeff is kidding around when he says things like that but I'm not so sure with other people.

I'm not really going after Notre Dame here either. I just find it a little jarring that so many seem to be "forgive and forget" over an incident that cost someone their life but are "burn the witch!" over football games. Sorry.

I mean I don't expect him to be given fair treatment on a Michigan board but geez...the double standard at least merits some commentary.

[Jamie H]

Jeff is not really comparing Tressel to Hitler. He is merely pointing out that at the time, lots of people made lots of excuses for why Hitler wasn't really a "bad guy", and those excuses turned out to be full of shit. It's easy to pretend someone isn't a bad guy when you have a vested interested in him NOT being a bad guy. That is how Hitler came to power, because Germany continually made excuses for him and made rationalizations for his bad behavior.

Is Tressel the scum of the earth among all humans? No of course not. I'll leave that for people who murder and rape etc. etc. But is what he did pretty scummy in terms of NCAA athletics? It sure is. If every coach intentionally covered up every eligibility violation at his school we'd have outright anarchy in college athletics and no point for any governing body whatsoever.

Do I think Tressel is the only coach doing it? Hell no. I suspect most of the SEC does it too. But I guess most people (outside of CBS Sports) expect more out of Ohio State than an SEC school.

And if you don't think Tressel isn't getting a bunch of extra flack because of his whole "holier-than-thou" act, you are kidding yourself. People tend to really dislike hypocrits.

I guess the moral of the story is that it's easy to write a book about how ethical you are, but much harder to actually BE ethical when you are faced with a tough situation.

[lineygoblue]

And if you don't think Tressel isn't getting a bunch of extra flack because of his whole "holier-than-thou" act, you are kidding yourself. People tend to really dislike hypocrits.

A good example of this is Jimmy Swaggart. He was the single most popular television evangelist in America before the fertilizer hit the ventilator in his sex scandal. And it wasn't so much that a "man" had an affair with a "woman", it was WHO the man was, and what he stood for, that made it a big deal. Swaggart has been mocked for years, for his "confession" and begging for forgiveness.

Tressel is a man who, away from campus, will go and speak in churches, focusing on young people, and encouraging them to live a life close to God. I'm no Bible scholar, but I think the Bible takes a pretty dim view of lying. Tressel has not only damaged his reputation with the NCAA, he's also damaged it on a personal level, which may be even more tragic, because of those who look up to him.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Good read. Well said, Jamie.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Tressel has not only damaged his reputation with the NCAA, he's also damaged it on a personal level, which may be even more tragic, because of those who look up to him.

I think an argument can be advanced that the most appropriate punishement for jim tressel is to make him work for his redemption. I don't agree with that course but I'm wondering if that is what the deciders at osu are working on.

[hack]

Trying to paint Tressel in a good light by comparing his acts to an accident that resulted in a dead kid is about as low as you can go. I'm pretty sure that is what Hack is saying.

It's one thing to just do what Tressell did -- lots of people do that, like Pete Carrol or Barry Switzer or any of those others. What makes Tressell a bit unique is that he has gone to great efforts to craft a public persona around being a good person and a mentor to young men He's cloaked his virtue in religion and he is ``in character'', so to speak, not just for the masses but in individual emails with people like Ciciero. And furthermore Tressell is asking mothers and fathers to trust the development of their sons to him and his mentoring abilities all the while knowing that a lack of integrity tends to spread within an organisation, as he points out in ``The Winner's Manual''.

That's calculating and hypocritical on a level few humans are capable of. Does he lack the ability to feel remorse?

[Jeff Buchanan]

I thought Linesman's comparison of Jimmy Swaggert to tressel was a pretty good one. Jim Baker is another one.

Other than my undying hatred for osu driving my desire to keep hammering osu fans over tressmess, there's a real sense of anger over the apparent facade tressel has created for himself.

Yeah, you can argue, and many have on tressle's behalf, that one mistake does not tarnish a life time of doing good. But to me and a lot of others, tressel's conduct is so egregious and callous in its disregard for well established NCAA rules about reporting violations (regardless if the violations are fair or not) and holding players out who are ineligible to play because of rules violations, that I just can't abide by not holding him accountable and dishing out severe penalties for that conduct.

So, what's an appropriate penalty? I think most of us agree that too often, typical NCAA penalties hurt players and sports programs that don't deserve to be punished. Do osu players who played by the rules deserve future bowl bans? Does the entire osu football program deserve to be disadvantaged with scholarship reductions that are going to damage the program going forward when there is only one set of players and one coach who f'ed up?

NCAA precedent doesn't support that argument but I can see how it is being advanced by osu fans to the snickers of the rest of the CFB world. I think the NCAA should deliver a Show Cause Letter to tressel; I don't know how they cannot avoid it if they really want to be perceived as making an effort to stop this kind of behavior which anyone who has watched CFB and CBB for any time knows is a problem.

Beyond that, I don't really know but I don't think osu and their football program going forward can be allowed to skate given the recent NCAA imposed penalties to Alabama and USC.

[hack]

It's not one mistake. Well, I guess in the sense that he got caught this time it was a mistake. He clearly doesn't think it's been many mistakes.

[entropy]

amazing how one can convince themselves of innocence

[Clashmore Mike]

This asshole is taking the off season a bit harder than most of us...[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yurU4YieBq4&feature=player_embedded"]YouTube - Danny addressing all the lies on Canestime[/ame]