Penn State NCAA penalties. Dangerous precedent?

[jdm61]

The NCAA just handed down it penalties on Penn State. No "death penalty" but darn near. What concerns a number of writers about this case is that it would appear that the NCAA used this arguably very severe case to bypass their own rules and procedures. I say arguably very severe because although the allegations are severe (perhaps not as severe re Joe Paterno as some are saying, but there nonetheless) this is an area where the NCAA has not tread before and one that many say should have been left to the criminal and civil courts, at least for the time being at a minimum. Some have said that the NCAA Prez may be trying to do a Roger Goodell and become the King of All College Sports and rule by fiat. I don't know if this is the first time that the NCAA has handed down severe sanctions without even conducting their own full investigation or putting it before a number of their own committees, but if it isn't, it has to be one of the few times they have done anything this way. This is a problem that we see more often than we would like. A bad situation is used to justify attempts to end run around normal rules and procedures. What really puzzles me about this case is how the NCAA, an allegedly not for profit organization, decided that levying a $60 million cash fine on Penn State, another allegedly not for profit STATE institution, is a valid exercise of their authority and a good idea to boot. That number is what Penn State football supposedly takes in every year, but if they are on probation with no bowl games for 4 years and all of the "leftover profit" from the program has to be used for stuff like Title 9, who really suffers? I wonder what the NCAA plans to do with this money? This was a strange and disturbing case and this only makes it more so.

[RMLamey]

Dont cover up kids being molested by staff, on campus in some instances, and you wont have to worry about NCAA fines or any other legal issues for that matter. Quite simple really.

[Ed Fowler]

While I don't like the idea of punishing the innocent future athletes and coaches for something in the past, this just may send a message to the big shots other programs that they could fall also.

[powernoodle]

This sanction was hardly severe. Penn State has a $ 1.8 billion endowment. The University, and/or its athletic department and football program, can write a check for $60M and never notice. No one suffers here. The Board of Trustees remains intact, which is the heart of the culture that hid a pedophile within its midst for the purpose of protecting the legacy of a football coach who should have retired 20 years ago anyway. The sports programs continue on as if nothing happened, and the rich alumni will continue to support the university and the football program.

This "sanction" was nothing more than smoke and mirrors. A true punishment would have included - at Penn State's option - a death penalty for the football program, or the current penalty plus the resignation of the Board of Trustees. Those options might change the culture at Penn State. The current sanction will not.

As it stands, the monetary penalty is nothing, and they lose a few scholarships. The loss of scholarships is meaningless because the HS kids raised in a culture of worshiping Penn State will still attend Penn State, and you can bet that some way will be found to pay their tuition.

And Title 9? Honestly, who cares if college women don't get paid with free tuition to play field hockey.

Penn State suffers little here, but at least the real evildoer will spend the rest of his life in a cage getting buggered on a daily basis. Thats what really matters.

[Esav Benyamin]

How is this political? I would move it to Current Events. Any reason not to?

[jdm61]

This sanction was hardly severe. Penn State has a $ 1.8 billion endowment. The University, and/or its athletic department and football program, can write a check for $60M and never notice. No one suffers here. The Board of Trustees remains intact, which is the heart of the culture that hid a pedophile within its midst for the purpose of protecting the legacy of a football coach who should have retired 20 years ago anyway. The sports programs continue on as if nothing happened, and the rich alumni will continue to support the university and the football program.

This "sanction" was nothing more than smoke and mirrors. A true punishment would have included - at Penn State's option - a death penalty for the football program, or the current penalty plus the resignation of the Board of Trustees. Those options might change the culture at Penn State. The current sanction will not.

As it stands, the monetary penalty is nothing, and they lose a few scholarships. The loss of scholarships is meaningless because the HS kids raised in a culture of worshiping Penn State will still attend Penn State, and you can bet that some way will be found to pay their tuition.

And Title 9? Honestly, who cares if college women don't get paid with free tuition to play field hockey.

Penn State suffers little here, but at least the real evildoer will spend the rest of his life in a cage getting buggered on a daily basis. Thats what really matters.

YES, what really matters is that the criminal justice system has done its job with one defendant in this case and has two others on the docket. As for the "true punishment" how does the NCCA have anything to do with the Board of Trustees? One thing that I have trouble with is that an NGO with no real power other than what the member institutions give it has bypassed its own rules and procedures and fined a PUBIC institution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to the tune of $60 million. Has there ever been another case where a school had to pay this kind of fine? We aren't talking about "lost revenue" from NCAA or Big 10 sanctioned events and/or media contracts, but cash money. Of course, the state will not object because to do so would be a public relations disaster, but doesn't anyone else think that this is rather unusual? What puzzles me is not the discussion about what might be some appropriate sanction, but how the PResident of the NCAA has taken advantage of this situation to stick his agencies nose into places where is has never gone before and where it arguably does not belong, at least at this time and under these circumstances. Unusual or REALLY egregious cases are the primary reason that we have rules and procedures in general. The easy ones don't really need such safeguards very often. As for Title 9, I will tell you who honestly cares. The US Department of Justice, that's who.

[555]

What's really sad is hearing people in this state, who don't want to deal with this, or deny what it is and want to go back to business as usual ASAP.

[jdm61]

Okay, i will play devil's advocate here re the fine. If, in fact, $60 million is a drop in the bucket for Penn State as Powernoodle said, is what we have here the NCAA discovering that the misery and misfortune of others makes for a nice profit center for them?

[goosefacer]

IMO the death penalty was warranted. SMU got it for paying players, Sandusky raped children - in the PSU on-campus facilities and it was covered up. Lack of institutional control for sure and morally bankrupt to boot. PSU got off easy. Disgusting crimes and a slap on the wrist.

[Mitchell Knives]

Sounds like the NCAA just imposed a tuition hike on all students.

[jdm61]

The difference with SMU is that the death penalty had never been imposed before and nobody knew what its impact would be. Notice that it has not been imposed since then. The OTHER difference is that the Sandusky case did not arguably involve the football program or the athletic program directly. It involved the school administration in their capacity as local law enforcement among other things and in 1998, it involved Sandusky as an employee of the school and football program, but conduct that was not part of his job nor did it involve any students of the University. In that case, the "cover up" was the apparently work of university law enforcement and the local district attorney. The school reported Sandusky back then and his employment with the school ended shortly after that. The incident with the janitors not reporting what they saw also did not involve the football program. it involved some maintenance supervisor deciding that his job was more valuable. The real problem arises with the 2001 incident with McQueary caught Sandusky in the shower. But nothing that I have read in Freeh's report indicates that he was privy to any more information about Joe Paterno's role in this matter than the grand jury was and that grand jury indicted Paterno's bosses but not him. The question here is not whether it was a slap on the wrist, but whether Penn State should have been slapped at all by the NCAA for something that is arguably outside of whatever jurisdiction that the NCAA has carved out for itself.......well, I should say arguably outside of its jurisdiction prior to July of 2012.

IMO the death penalty was warranted. SMU got it for paying players, Sandusky raped children - in the PSU on-campus facilities and it was covered up. Lack of institutional control for sure and morally bankrupt to boot. PSU got off easy. Disgusting crimes and a slap on the wrist.

[bja5006]

as a Penn State alum and someone who was raised in Happy Valley, I find it very refreshing to see a sensible discussion by sensible people. Thank you all for being BY FAR the most mature internet discussion group I've seen on this topic.

as for the comment about us denying it or not discussing it... we prosecuted the guilty and took what punishment the NCAA had for us. we're not the kind to piss and moan, we just want to move on. because in the end, this is not what PSU means to us.

as for the dangerous precedent portion, I do agree that this was a strange way to punish the university. unfortunately, it does only that, punishes the current and future students. we already had to deal with yearly tuition hikes and rising ticket prices. I can only imagine the rate of increase this coming year. I hope the NCAA has a very transparent financial plan for the $60m. I hate to see a bunch of guys in suits using it for their own means. I feel sorry for the thousands of athletes and hundreds of thousands of alumni like myself who would've turned this guy in the instant we knew something was up. this was clearly a criminal matter, and I do believe that the courts of Centre County are handling this quite well. honestly, i'm surprised the death penalty wasn't incurred due to all the media hype surrounding this and the pressure from ESPN to wipe us off the earth. it makes me sad to think that a lot of people out there are influenced by that godless money machine and their talking heads. thankfully, you guys seem to be pretty level-headed.

[goosefacer]

The NCAA is composed solely of its member institutions - if those selected to the NCAA Board determine its their jurisdiction then it's just that - their jurisdiction. I'm all for what the NCAA did - just wish it had been a bit more. Student athletes were granted permission to transfer to another D1 school without having to sit out or they can stay, still play football and get their degree. The football-first and at all costs mentality of PSU is who took the hit and rightfully so.

Unfortunately the punishments trickle out to fans, etc but at the end of the day it's the fans that allowed the football program to dictate how things were handled - or not handled - so that argument rings a bit hollow to me.

[panzertroop]

Play stupid games and win big prizes. They got what they deserved. Lack of institutional control on a large scale and perverse nature. Paterno should rot for what he did as well as anyone else on staff and in admin that knew what they knew and did nothing. These are children for god's sake! Football programs have gotten too big, too powerful and it's all about the money. Hopefully this sends a signal.

[jdm61]

Aye, there's the rub. What exactly did Joe Paterno do or fail to do? Whatever his actions may have been, the grand jury appears to have felt that he did not commit any criminal acts and that his bosses did. Like I said before, I have gone through the "findings of fact" of the Freeh report and I don't feel that I have learned anything more about Paterno's alleged actions than I already knew from what the grand jury said. What I did find out was why the other two guys were indicted, but I am still not sure that they can be convicted unless they roll over and take a deal. As for lack of institutional control on a "large" scale, how does lack of control of a couple of guys and two known incidents as best as I can tell constitute a "large" scale? We as members of the general public sometimes have the bad habit of assuming facts not in evidence. I think in this case, the NCAA may have knuckled under to PR pressure and abandoned anything resembling "due process" much like MLB did in 1919-1920 when they created the position of Commissioner of Baseball and appointed K.M. Landis as Czar for Life after the Black Sox scandal.

Play stupid games and win big prizes. They got what they deserved. Lack of institutional control on a large scale and perverse nature. Paterno should rot for what he did as well as anyone else on staff and in admin that knew what they knew and did nothing. These are children for god's sake! Football programs have gotten too big, too powerful and it's all about the money. Hopefully this sends a signal.

[lawp]

Pay the fine and back to normal? Not even a new normal? I don't know anything about NCAA bylaws, but I can guess the members signed up for token fines for token infractions. This is more than that, in that Penn State's athletic program is fundamentally flawed. I would have voted for banishment from all NCAA events, in all sports, for a long time. At least 10 years, 20 is better.

[jdm61]

Well, if this is a reflection on Penn State's entire program, why not call it a reflection on ALL college altheitcs and eliminate ALL programs and the NCAA for ALL time?

Pay the fine and back to normal? Not even a new normal? I don't know anything about NCAA bylaws, but I can guess the members signed up for token fines for token infractions. This is more than that, in that Penn State's athletic program is fundamentally flawed. I would have voted for banishment from all NCAA events, in all sports, for a long time. At least 10 years, 20 is better.

[goosefacer]

Pay the fine and back to normal? Not even a new normal? I don't know anything about NCAA bylaws, but I can guess the members signed up for token fines for token infractions. This is more than that, in that Penn State's athletic program is fundamentally flawed. I would have voted for banishment from all NCAA events, in all sports, for a long time. At least 10 years, 20 is better.

Yup - as harsh as the punishments handed out are severe it leaves the door open to rebuild the program. PSU is a university charged with teaching young people and providing a safe environment for society's future, not a pro sports franchise - PSU failed miserably to provide a safe environment for kids that were already living a hard life and chose to protect the football program when all they needed to do was blow the whistle and get that pedophile locked up years ago. Instead he was free to rape more children while the PSU officials continued like nothing happened.

[jdm61]

How was Penn State charged with providing a "safe environment for kids that were already leading a hard life" particularly kids that were not PSU students?

Yup - as harsh as the punishments handed out are severe it leaves the door open to rebuild the program. PSU is a university charged with teaching young people and providing a safe environment for society's future, not a pro sports franchise - PSU failed miserably to provide a safe environment for kids that were already living a hard life and chose to protect the football program when all they needed to do was blow the whistle and get that pedophile locked up years ago. Instead he was free to rape more children while the PSU officials continued like nothing happened.

[Soulrack223]

Punishment for lack of institutional control is necessary and justified. The four most powerful men on campus covered up for a pedophile for 14 years. The penalties handed down are not too severe. There is a very good argument for a 14 year no football ban but that would have put a severe burden on the innocent community that would have caused unemployment, bankruptcy and a mass exodus of the populace. Saturday football is an enourmous part of their local economy. I believe that while part of me wanted the no football ban to be handed down, what the NCAA did will be a kiss of death to the football program's success but not to the extent that the innocents in the community will be unduly punished. YMMV