NYT article on the next HUGE mess....FSU!!
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/10/12/us/florida-state-football-casts-sh…
October 10th, 2014 at 10:21 PM ^
I don't know what will come out of this. The article is much more critical of the police than the university. And the ramifications for the police? It's Florida, nothing will happen.
October 10th, 2014 at 10:27 PM ^
Like a month ago. After the National Championship and.the Heisman for Winston.
October 10th, 2014 at 10:45 PM ^
Yes, but many schools are struggling to adjust to the most recent directives regarding how to interpret the mandate. And what is the punishment for failing to do so? If FSU puts procedures in place to come into compliance, then nothing will happen. And they know it.
October 11th, 2014 at 8:20 AM ^
October 10th, 2014 at 11:06 PM ^
ESPN as a co-conspirator. ESPN was openly, and heavily, advocating that Winston be cleared so that Heisman Trophy voters could vote with a clear conscience and to also keep FSU in the MNC hunt.
October 11th, 2014 at 2:13 AM ^
Yes a million times.
It was disgusting watching them promote for their best interest. ESPN blows. I try my best to avoid all ESPN products. I know it doesnt make a difference, but it makes me feel better when I ignore all their crap.
October 11th, 2014 at 9:46 AM ^
I know it's cool to knock ESPN, but is there actual evidence for this?
October 11th, 2014 at 11:14 AM ^
if ESPN really wanted to do.......what's the word......oh yeah, journalism, then it would perhaps investigate stories like this. ESPN has the resources to do real investigative journalism into stories like this, domestic violence in the NFL, rampant cheating in college football etc etc--but chooses not to. Instead, it is complicit. It is nothing more than the public relations arm of the sports it covers. A mutually profitable venture. ESPN is to sports journalism what Entertainment Tonight is to film commentary.
October 11th, 2014 at 8:20 PM ^
They pay hundreds of millions of dollars for the broadcasting rights of these sports. Especially the SEC. If they practiced real investigative journalism of the sort required to out all this stuff, they could potentially harm the product the pay so dearly for.
October 12th, 2014 at 2:04 PM ^
of the NFL scandal without seeing someone on the network bash the NFL, from Hannah Storm's weepy editorial to Jeremy Schapp to the sports reporters show to commentators on both NFL live (Mark Schlereth) and to all the guys on NFL Gameday. This POV is completely baseless.
October 11th, 2014 at 10:14 AM ^
I'm not sure how conspiratorial they are, but the fact that they don't hide their biases one bit in situations like this makes it hard to ignore.
October 10th, 2014 at 10:30 PM ^
http://m.espn.go.com/ncf/story?storyId=11678392&src=desktop&rand=ref~%7…
October 10th, 2014 at 10:27 PM ^
I don't see anything happening.
October 10th, 2014 at 10:38 PM ^
Sounds like the kids love BB gun fights; they make up like half of the offenses here. Maybe we should build a BB gun fight facility to woo recruits. /Brandon'd
October 10th, 2014 at 10:44 PM ^
Infuriating. This is the side of college athletics in 2014 that pisses me off more than anything else. Players getting paid, rules against players getting paid, sponsorship for everything, all of that... none of it feels as utterly awful as this stuff does. And it's not like it's just happening in Tallahassee. I'd still love to know what the fuck happened in East Lansing with the Appling and Payne thing. And what the fuck happened in South Bend with the Lizzy Seeberg thing.
October 10th, 2014 at 10:46 PM ^
And if we're being fair, exactly what happened with Brendan Gibbons, right?
October 10th, 2014 at 10:53 PM ^
I thought that was handled completely differently. When I look at the Gibbons case, I see (likely) awful behavior by football players, (clearly) awful PR management by our athletic department, and pretty good, responsible behavior by our university and police department. Bad player behavior happens sometimes, as shitty as it is, and bad PR is more stupid than evil. What's been going on with FSU, MSU, etc. feels much, much uglier and scarier to me.
October 10th, 2014 at 11:04 PM ^
I agree with FSU and am pretty skeptical of many Southern schools. Just a little reminder that we've had our misdeeds as well even under Hoke. I know the Payne/Appling reports were pretty bad though if true.
October 10th, 2014 at 11:15 PM ^
In my view, there are different types of misdeeds. Players are going to do bad things. That's bad, obviously, but it's going to happen sometimes, and it happens with athletes and non-athletes alike. What's on a completely different level to me is universities and the institutions surrounding them (e.g., local police departments) protecting their athletic programs by allowing athletes and others to get away with horrible things. That's terrifying, horrible, and makes me want to hit someone. If Michigan or the Ann Arbor PD starts pulling that shit, I'm done with them.
October 11th, 2014 at 1:27 AM ^
The deeds might not always be as heinous as rape, but police giving breaks and preferential treatment to certain people happens all the time. Bobby Petrino had a police officer bending the rules for him; Barry Switzer just commented that he used to get calls from local sherrifs and police about athletes picked up on charges like drunk and disorderly and would send an assistant coach to go pick up the player. Perhaps Taylor Lewan was given preferetial treatment after his altercation with the OSU fan. I had a friend in high school whose brothers were picked up with a pound of pot, taken to the police station, were about to be booked when the officer noticed their last name and asked if they were related to one of the prominent lawyers in the city. When they said it was their father, the officer told them not to do that again and let them go.
Granted, these are not all on the same level, but the reality is that being a starter or star player on university football team does often lead to preferential treatment.
October 11th, 2014 at 3:31 AM ^
Hell, I think I've heard Dan Gable years back having to go downtown to the Iowa City PD to get wrestlers "picked up". Shit happens everywhere.
October 11th, 2014 at 9:08 AM ^
I think "shit happens everywhere" is almost always a horrible argument. Even if no one is perfect, things definitely don't happen the same way everywhere. Do you really think that the Stanford and Ole Miss football programs behave similarly with respect to rules and ethics? Fine, no one is perfect, but that doesn't mean that we should excuse the egregious offenses or not acknowledge that they're different - and worse - than the milder ones.
October 11th, 2014 at 10:40 AM ^
Oh I don't mean it to be we should accept it...I just meant, it really does happen everywhere, even lowly Iowa. That type of culture (we're king of the world, we do what we want) is prevalent with these atheletes, everywhere, and yea, it is a shame and really should not be tolerated.
October 11th, 2014 at 9:11 AM ^
Oh, I don't think this is new, but I don't think its prevalence makes it any less awful. If I were a college president at a school with a major athletics program, one of my agenda items for my first couple of weeks would be to communicate to the city police department, campus police department, and athletic staff that we're not doing the "protect our people" thing. I'm fine losing a couple of games or dealing with some bad newspaper headlines because some kids (or caoches) do stupid things. I'm not fine with letting athletes feel above the law, letting other people around campus (especially college girls) feel unprotected by police, and letting the coaches feel that all that matters is winning and avoiding bad newspaper headlines.
This obviously isn't a 21st-century phenomenon and it's obviously not unique to college sports. That doesn't change the fact that it could be the ugliest thing happening in college sports right now, even if that's partly because the federal government is finally putting pressure on schools to do something about it.
October 11th, 2014 at 11:55 AM ^
Who cares how pervasive or long-standing an issue it is? Still a huge issue.
The conflict of interest for the local police, as a department and individuals, who make so much money directly from the university is also problematic.
October 11th, 2014 at 4:28 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 8:04 AM ^
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October 10th, 2014 at 10:52 PM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 12:20 AM ^
So Winston's lawyer was and continues to be completely full of shit.
October 11th, 2014 at 1:26 AM ^
Does anyone really think that Winston wouldn't be in jail right now if there was any actual evidence that a rape took place? This is another attempt to create a story over a "hot button" issue. The "victim" has already tried to extort $7 million from the school.
Sorry, but "he said, she said" coming from a "victim" should never be enough to convict a person of sexual assault if there is no actual evidence that an assault took place.
October 11th, 2014 at 1:52 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 6:00 AM ^
It's a very dubious one, only made by Winston's lawyer. It's another he said, she said, except this time the parties are the lawyers.
October 11th, 2014 at 9:37 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 9:59 AM ^
If you're looking for a moral crusade to go on, there are many more worthy than protecting the right of guys to take advantage of drunk coeds.
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October 11th, 2014 at 2:29 PM ^
seems to be your standard.
He/she is arguing that the same standards of guilt should apply to rape as in any other case. So the eyewitness testimony of the alleged victim should not be enough to charge or convict somebody. Unfortunately, such an insanely unjust "guilty until proven innocent" standard is often applied in the case of an alleged sex crime. And it's now being applied regularly on college campuses at the insistence of the federal government.
And unfortunately, people like you send innocent people to prison for alleged sex crimes all the time.
And maybe I can give you a little advice. A "moral crusade" protecting the rights of the accused is definitely worthy of somebody's time.
And when you get a jury summons, please for the love of God and humanity, do everything you can to get out of it.
October 11th, 2014 at 4:08 PM ^
He/she is arguing that the same standards of guilt should apply to rape as in any other case. So the eyewitness testimony of the alleged victim should not be enough to charge or convict somebody.
This is completely wrong. In any kind of criminal case, testimony from an eyewitness is sufficient for a conviction, if the jury agrees that is enough evidence for guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
What you're arguing is that a different standard should apply in cases of rape, where for some reason we should require additional evidence not required in any other kind of prosecution.
Of course there are false accusations of rape, just like with any other crime. Those situations are relatively rare, because women know they are likely to be disbelieved. When the attacker is a famous athlete, they know most of the university community will turn against them and in favor of the athlete.
If I were on a jury, I don't know if I would vote that a purely he-said-she-said case was enough to prove someone guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. But I don't know why people here seem so eager to believe Winston over his alleged victim.
October 11th, 2014 at 11:27 AM ^
Does anyone really think that Winston wouldn't be in jail right now if there was any actual evidence that a rape took place?
Answer: NO!!!
Did you read the fucking story or any of the previously ones? The local prosecutor makes it pretty clear that he would have proceeded if the city and university police departments hadn't (intentionally) fucked up the case--along with the complicit athletic department.
Instead, you slander the victim.
October 11th, 2014 at 12:03 PM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 4:17 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 11:32 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 8:57 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 9:55 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 10:43 AM ^
You can kill someone with a BB gun. I guess when it happens it's kind of a fluke but try telling that to someone who loses a loved one.
October 11th, 2014 at 11:48 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 2:34 PM ^
They were breaking windows shooting from the street. You take one of those BB's in the wrong spot on the neck and you're dead.
October 11th, 2014 at 8:34 PM ^
We wore our ski goggles during BB gun wars. Of course a BB hit one of the kids in the lip, embedded up under the skin and into his nose. He had to go to the hospital to get it removed. Then cops came to our house to investigate the shooting.
October 11th, 2014 at 9:10 AM ^
I'm not surprised. It wouldn't be shocking to me if we found rampant rules violations at all the most recent national champion schools. It's something the NCAA doesn't want to look at because of all the money its making.
October 11th, 2014 at 9:32 AM ^
October 11th, 2014 at 9:47 AM ^
is the use of exclamation points in the title of the post
October 11th, 2014 at 10:19 AM ^