That's the big question after the National Collegiate Athletic Association's sweeping announcement about Penn State University, where NCAA president Mark Emmert and Ed Ray, the chairman of the NCAA Executive Committee and Oregon State's president, brought the hammer down big time on the Nittany Lions' football program.
I have mixed feelings about the penalties placed on Penn State. I'd like to believe this is, first and foremost, about the children - and I believe some of the penalties do just that. I'd also like to think this is about changing the culture, not just at Penn State, but in collegiate athletic programs nationwide - and I think the jury will be out on that for a long time.
Let's analyze the fallout, shall we?
PENALTY #1: A $60 million sanction. According to Emmert, the $60 million is equivalent to the average annual revenue of its football program. The NCAA ordered PSU to pay the penalty funds into an endowment for "external programs preventing child sexual abuse or assisting victims and may not be used to fund such programs at the university." School leadership followed this by strongly noting none of this will be from taxpayer dollars.
This is, to me, the most important aspect of the penalties levied against PSU. While no amount of money (or any other penalty, legal or otherwise) can ever truly answer for the horrors against society, it's at least a legitimate start in the right direction. This helps the victims ... and isn't that what this is primarily supposed to be about?
However ... I believe it should have been more. While it's estimated the PSU football program brings in $60 million annually, that's gross income; some reports have Penn State's net football income at $15 million. I'd have liked to see the financial penalty be closer to $210 million, which would be that net income figure multiplied by every year Paterno enabled former assistant coach and convicted child rapist Jerry Sandusky through his silence on the topic.
I think it would have also been a nice touch to have Penn State be responsible for some sort of annual check for, I don't know, $5-$10 million a year to external programs dealing with the prevention of child sexual abuse.
PENALTY #2: A four-year football postseason ban. I have no real issue with this, to be honest. Given the nature of the scholarship reduction, plus the strong possibility bowl officials would treat the scandal-impacted program like plutonium, Penn State's potential for reaching post-season action is shaky at best starting in 2013.
But if we're going to play "what if?" games, let's turn this a different way; an alternative would have been to allow PSU to compete in post-season bowls, with the stipulation that its share of the bowl proceeds goes to - you guessed it - external programs dealing with the prevention of child sexual abuse. That way, should the Nittany Lions compete in a bowl game, the victims are assisted.
PENALTY #3: A reduction of scholarships for a four-year period. The scholarship reductions mean Penn State's roster will be capped at 65 scholarship players within a few seasons. The normal scholarship limit for major college football programs is 85; playing with 20 fewer will likely be crippling to a program attempting to compete at a national championship level.
This is essentially a loss of 80 scholarships over a four-year period. Ouch. Big, fat ouch.
The rest of these penalties, a program can overcome. This one ... not so much. This is the biggie. And this is where the "sins of the father" truly impact those who had nothing to do with the problem.
Sadly, virtually every time the NCAA sanctions a program, the students and coaches negatively impacted had no direct involvement with any of the true culprits. When the University of Southern California was penalized for the transgressions of Reggie Bush, not only had the former Heisman Award winner already been active at the professional level, but his coach had bolted to the NFL as well.
Destroying a program by hammering people not involved in a scandal just doesn't feel quite right. Had I been asked by NCAA leaders, I would have lessened this aspect of the penalties, removing perhaps only five scholarships rather than up to 20.
I fail to see where this particular penalty helps either the victims or ensures college athletic transgressions won't happen again. When you look at the history of NCAA infractions, they go back decades. What happened at the University of Miami, Oklahoma, Ohio State, Southern Methodist, USC, and so many other programs, can and will happen again, because there is absolutely no way to stop people from caring about wins over ethics.. The PSU sanctions will not prevent infractions at NCAA programs.
This punishment comes off as vengeful and vindictive by the NCAA, and not only punishes football players who had nothing to do with the scandal, but also negatively impacts all other aspects of campus life - football and non-football, athletic and academic. Football is the school's moneymaker program; this move will ultimately destroy far more than it solves.
According to ESPN's Adam Rittenberg, "The NCAA and Big Ten are making it very easy for current Penn State players to transfer. Players who signed national letters of intent with Penn State in February may be released from those letters and allowed to go elsewhere without penalty. If players pledged to Penn State decide in the next year that they want to compete elsewhere, they shouldn’t face much, if any, resistance. And if Penn State players decide they don’t want to play football but remain in school, their scholarships will be honored until they complete their degrees. "
Despite these allowances, the loss of scholarships is the one aspect of today's announcement which deeply troubles me. Like a lot of observers, I believe this will ultimately result in a noncompetitive program for a decade, probably even longer. Penn State might not recover from this until 2030.
In discussing the penalties this morning, ESPN Radio's Colin Cowherd noted that unlike USC, which appealed the NCAA's decision for two full years, Penn State had no such option. Further, he noted, USC was able to "stockpile" high school talent while appealing, thus allowing it a better chance at competitive success than PSU, which had no such grace period with which to work.
Also unlike USC, Penn State has the Sandusky stigma to deal with, which other college recruiters have definitely used this past year ... and will be hanging over the program for an indefinite period.
PENALTY #4: A vacation of all wins between 1998-2011. With the wins from 1998-2011 vacated, Paterno moves from 409 wins to 298, dropping him from first to 12th on the winningest NCAA football coach list. Penn State also will have six bowl wins and two conference championships erased.
As Cowherd stated this morning, this penalty is "rear-view mirror" stuff. The way I look at it, Paterno was so concerned about the public image of his program, he allowed a child rapist to continue preying on the innocent to save his empire, taking the "Win At All Costs" mentality to a level never seen before. JoePa basically tried to protect his legacy by sacrificing young boys to a monster.
That's why I have no problem with the NCAA stripping Paterno of every victory - all 111 - dating back to 1998, when he apparently first found out Sandusky was sexually abusing children.
Had Paterno "done the right thing" ethically and morally in 1998, it's quite possible that his recruiting might have been impacted for a few years - thus reducing the number of wins. And if he'd done it in 2001, he might have been fired (as he was last November) for allowing Sandusky to roam the campus of Penn State. Either way, by covering up the entire scandal for 14 years, he and his program were able to benefit both financially and in the win-loss column.You have a head coach, athletic director and university president conspiring to cover up crimes that would have (a) cost them their jobs, (b) damaged Penn State's ability to recruit top players, and (c) ultimately hurt the football program's chances of winning more games.
What happened in State College, Pennsylvania, is no less an NCAA violation than boosters paying players or players hawking jerseys for tattoos.
The wins he oversaw since 1998 are questionable and tarnished beyond reproach. Ultimately, we want honors to be reserved for the honorable.
Joe Paterno no longer deserves such distinction.
This is why I am comfortable with this aspect, just as I was when the statue of JoePa came down yesterday morning.
What is frustrating to me, and to many observers, is the continued "circle 'round the wagon" mentality the Paterno family continues to display regarding JoePa's legacy. I get it; until eight months ago, he could seemingly do no wrong, and suddenly his public image ... and his statue ... and his records ... no longer exist, at least not in any way, shape or recognizable form. But to continue to openly complain about the process, that the NCAA's sanctions "defame his legacy" and are "a panicked response to the scandal that led to them" ... well, those arguments aren't flying, guys.
When the Freeh Report came out a few weeks ago, the Paterno family felt the compulsion to announce it was going to conduct its own investigation, asserting the report was filled with opinion disguised as fact.
The fact this "investigation of the investigation" would cost millions - millions that could, and possibly should, go to Sandusky's victims seems lost on them. Earth to the Paternos: JoePa enabled a child molester to roam around Happy Valley and the campus of Penn State for at least 14 years, and swept it under the rug. It doesn't even matter why he did this anymore ... just that he did. And while the Paterno family may have some understandable reasons to defend him, this doesn't mean taking every opportunity to try to publicly clear the name of a man whose legacy has been so visibly tarnished ... especially since the tarnishing was due to his own actions (or inactions, as the case may be).
The Paternos need to take ownership of the fact much of this entire ordeal could have been easily avoided, had JoePa handled the situation better in 1998 ... or 2001 ... or at all. Honestly, nothing anyone with the last name "Paterno" has to say right now is in any way helping his legacy on the national scale. Or the actual victims, period.
There is great irony in all of this. The Paterno family's inability to acquiesce is doing more harm to JoePa's legacy. If they really wanted it to be about the victims - as they have claimed time and time again - at some point, they need to realize something: the Paternos aren't the victims ... the children Sandusky abused (enabled byJoePa, senior vice president Gary Schultz, athletic director Tim Curley, former president Graham Spanier, and possibly others) are!
If "Penn State" is plutonium to potential bowls, "Paterno" is high-grade uranium to the outside world.
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