Detroit News Publishes Summary of MSU Football and Dantonio’s Legal Issues
Cause for alarm
In early 2016, Dantonio gathered his coaching staff in his office at the Skandalaris Football Center to discuss recruiting. Eventually, Dantonio asked most of the staff to leave — with the exception of Blackwell, defensive line coach Ron Burton and then-offensive coordinator Dave Warner, whose recruiting responsibilities included Indiana and Fort Wayne.
Dantonio asked each of them their thoughts on Robertson.
"I have a daughter on that campus, and I wouldn't feel comfortable with Auston Robertson being on campus with my daughter," said Burton, according to Blackwell’s sworn deposition.
There was cause for alarm.
I have a daughter on that campus, and I wouldn't feel comfortable with Auston Robertson being on campus with my daughter.
DEFENSIVE LINE COACH RON BURTON, ACCORDING TO BLACKWELL’S SWORN DEPOSITION
Robertson had originally committed to Michigan State at the RAS Camp run by Mike Ledo, co-founder of the area's Athletes with Purpose. The program has a religious bent, and many of its campers have been labeled “choir boys.” Robertson did not share that reputation.
Ledo had made Dantonio and others aware that Robertson had a checkered history, according to Blackwell's testimony. Ledo did not return multiple messages from The News.
►READ: Curtis Blackwell's deposition
Then, there was the latest trouble. Weeks after he initially committed, he was kicked off his high school football team. By Signing Day, he had been kicked out of high school entirely. MSU was aware of these measures and the reasons behind them, Fort Wayne Community Schools spokeswoman Krista J. Stockman confirmed to The News.
In fact, sexually disturbing behavior by Robertson had been documented by police as early as 2009. When Robertson was just 11 years old, a neighborhood woman told police Robertson threatened to rape her daughter, according to court records obtained by The Detroit News.
From July 2009 through October 2015, Robertson was accused of at least 11 instances of sexually assaulting, threatening, grabbing, dragging, tackling or disrobing five girls or women, according to police and court records obtained by The News.
At the Skandalaris Center, each of the three coaches remaining with Dantonio that day objected to bringing Robertson to Michigan State, according to Blackwell's testimony.
On March 30, 2016, Dantonio announced Robertson's signing in a statement that read: “While utilizing all resources available to us to thoroughly review his situation … given all the information available to us, we believe Auston should be provided with an opportunity to begin his education and playing career at Michigan State.”
January 12th, 2020 at 10:21 PM ^
There really isn’t any new information in the summary if you’ve been following the case on the board for a few years but to see and read all of it in one article is a bit shocking.
The money quote from Dantonio in the wake of all of it,
Robertson "broke our trust,” Dantonio told reporters.
“Obviously, we took a risk,” he added. “We vetted the young man.”
January 12th, 2020 at 10:48 PM ^
"We vetted the young man" WTF Deantoni, WTF!!!
January 12th, 2020 at 10:51 PM ^
I wonder if he thinks that means giving a big recruit a Corvette.
January 13th, 2020 at 12:51 PM ^
....it most certainly does in columbus, right terelle!
January 12th, 2020 at 10:25 PM ^
Also, what I posted above is just a part of the article. I encourage you to click and read the whole thing.
January 12th, 2020 at 10:52 PM ^
Wait...the name of the football center is "Skandalaris"? That's just asking for trouble!
January 12th, 2020 at 11:00 PM ^
Sounds like a clumsy, misspelled portmanteau of “scandal” and “hilarious” which sounds about the way MSU admins regards serious allegations and criminal activity.
January 13th, 2020 at 1:44 AM ^
Named after MSU grad and businessman Bob Skandalarias. Currently owns Quantum Ventures out of the Detroit area. Basically he's the MSU football version of their basketball Dan Gilbert.
Bob sits on the MSU athletics advisory board and like Dantonio and Izzo knows where the bodies are buried. More importantly knows how to bury the bodies so people forget them.
He's also donated lots of money to Washington University in St. Louis and sits on their board of trustees. I doubt they'd take a rapist though.
January 13th, 2020 at 7:54 AM ^
Am I the only one that reads that and thinks Sandusky? That's a terrible name to sound like.
January 12th, 2020 at 10:53 PM ^
How can a guy who got kicked out of high school be attending a big ten college?
January 12th, 2020 at 10:57 PM ^
"If you can't get in to college, go to staee". ( clap clap )
January 12th, 2020 at 10:59 PM ^
6’4” - 270 lb - 4 Star and terrible leadership.
January 12th, 2020 at 11:00 PM ^
I had thought about posting this but, as you said, nothing really was new. In hindsight, I agree that everyone should read this through if only to be reminded of the moral bankruptcy of the MSU administration. I include Dantonio as he knowingly and, against the advice of many, brought a sex offender onto campus. And when he learned of an assault by his players, did not follow protocol by alerting police immediately.
I would hope Michigan would fire any coach who did something similar. That MSU allowed him to become their winningest football coach is a shame they will have to live with.
January 13th, 2020 at 7:27 AM ^
So True Dantonio did not follow proper protocol. But, according to all the Spartans he did.
sad!
January 13th, 2020 at 9:12 AM ^
A shame they have to live? That assumes they feel shame at all....
January 12th, 2020 at 11:15 PM ^
You know, I've known about this and read it multiple times since it all occurred, yet it never ceases to make me sick.
January 13th, 2020 at 10:48 AM ^
Nuke 'em. Let's nuke the bastards....
January 12th, 2020 at 11:21 PM ^
Dantonio collects his $4.3 million retention bonus on Wednesday, then apologizes and retires on Thursday. Perfectly setup by MSU grad Tony Paul.
January 12th, 2020 at 11:35 PM ^
"Greed is the root of all evil"
January 12th, 2020 at 11:23 PM ^
Whenever I see something like this or Baylor or whatever, I am always mystified. It’s just football. Why would you sell your soul to the devil for a goddamned game. I’d rather the Big House burn to the ground than have a successful athletic department that was so vile
January 12th, 2020 at 11:26 PM ^
And then you read the other half of the posters here who would do anything for wins and you understand how it happens.
January 13th, 2020 at 5:58 AM ^
And then you consider that there are some boosters who would also "do anything for wins" ... except they have the $ to make their voices heard by the powers-that-be.
January 13th, 2020 at 8:03 AM ^
Speaking only for myself, and by my own admission I'm not an alum, but I'd trade a bit of academic and ethical high ground for beating our biggest rival a little more often, assuming of course that everyone else does so. But, there is a fine line between giving a kid and his family that doesn't have much a few thousand dollars and sexual assault. One is simply not pretending our NFL talent is focused on school whereas the other puts half the student body in danger.
January 13th, 2020 at 9:20 AM ^
One could argue that a kid who at age 11 threatened to rape someone's daughter might have enough of an anger management problem that the other half would be at risk too. Maybe not of rape, but of something.
January 13th, 2020 at 8:40 AM ^
Ask anyone here if they'd want someone with Robertson's high school rap sheet on the team and I believe 98% of the people would say no. Paying kids and offering online courses are in a totally different ballpark than sexual assault.
January 13th, 2020 at 11:03 AM ^
Valenti says it almost daily. Nothing else matters but winning.
January 13th, 2020 at 12:50 PM ^
I think you're lumping together a number of issues that shouldn't be lumped together.
Many posters believe we should run our sports, particularly the football team, more like a business. We know that national contenders are paying players, investing ludicrous amounts into recruiting, encouraging their players to take online classes, and so forth. It's very difficult to compete with that using the traditional student-athlete model, so I can understand why people want us to move in that direction.
However, I don't know of a single MGoBlog poster who thinks we should recruit players like Auston Robertson. The debate over paying players or otherwise "professionalizing" our football team is very different from the question of lowering our standards to admit rapists.
January 12th, 2020 at 11:55 PM ^
Especially in the wake of what happened. Knowing MSU stands by Dantonio through this, having poor staff and recruiting, a 3-9 and 5-7 record...and still retaining him....why even risk it for a recruit that at best gets you maybe 1 extra win in his entire career? The risk-reward is so out of whack.
January 13th, 2020 at 10:37 AM ^
My only assumption is that at this point Dantonio "knows where the bodies are buried" and MSU worries what would happen if he turned on them. MSU seems unwilling or unable to take their medicine and accept the reckoning they desperately need.
January 13th, 2020 at 6:09 AM ^
It's not just in football either, the lengths businesses go to just to make a little bit more profit sometimes are outrageous
January 13th, 2020 at 12:54 AM ^
How'd this kid get through the clearinghouse? Someone had to pull strings somewhere
January 13th, 2020 at 1:04 AM ^
MSU fans are claiming that Dantonio only knew of the one incident. But it was reported during his recruitment that ND cooled on him due to his "off the field character". I mean when even Brian Kelly is giving a hard pass on you that says something. At the end of the day MSU was only recruiting against themselves. Crazy too that Hollis didn't want him admitted
January 13th, 2020 at 1:34 AM ^
Its not like they practiced 15 min to long.
January 13th, 2020 at 1:54 AM ^
Mork is a dirtbag like his mentor Tressel.
Just hope this isn't used as an excuse or fuel for MSU to let him go.
He needs to stick around and dwell in the cellar that his garbage program is and have Harbaugh beat him like a drum for a few more years.
January 13th, 2020 at 6:34 AM ^
This is WAAC.
Win At All Costs.
Markie Mark is toast.
January 13th, 2020 at 6:47 AM ^
The answer to the question "Why now?" is the most intriguing and probably important aspect of this story.
Somebody or a few people with some clout probably wish Dantonio would take whatever money and free up the football program to move on.
This has all been out there in balkanized small article on the back page form for quite a while.
But putting it together in this way at this time says a lot about what might be happening.
Unless you are both hardened pro Dantonio and living in a dreamland about how quickly the direction of MSU football can be turned around, cutting ties doesn't seem like a bad thing. And him hanging around only makes the process of getting good longer and harder.
So you push something like this article out there. It's deeply embarrassing and it's also informative. Many many people haven't followed the entire case with this recruit and Blackwell. Most of the rest of the world doesn't frequent message boards.
January 13th, 2020 at 8:43 AM ^
I don't know how much say the author has in when this story is released, but I don't think he's in the Dantonio camp. He will not shed a tear if Dantonio doesn't get his $4.3mil retention bonus.
January 13th, 2020 at 9:06 AM ^
Anyone wondering why Dantonio isn't being pushed out only needs to know that it was Beekman that approved the admissions of Robertson over Hollis's objection...that is how you get a job as AD of a school like MSU with ZERO AD experience
January 13th, 2020 at 10:33 AM ^
Sounds like Robertson's high school didn't tell MSU about his other issues, maybe they weren't allowed to legally. That kid is a predator.
Blackwell comes across as a total slime ball in all of this, so glad we never brought him to Michigan!
January 13th, 2020 at 11:18 AM ^
uh, he was kicked out of school. how the hell would msu not know that?
January 13th, 2020 at 11:24 AM ^
I think it says they were told that he was kicked out because of the 1 incident they knew about.
That's the thing here, when you know of 1 incident, when talking about young people, there are likely other issues that are sealed. That seems to be the case here. The 1 issue MSU knew about should have kept them from bringing him in. Huge mistake.
January 13th, 2020 at 4:47 PM ^
your take doesn't jive with the article:
"Ledo had made Dantonio and others aware that Robertson had a checkered history, according to Blackwell's testimony. Ledo did not return multiple messages from The News.
Then, there was the latest trouble. Weeks after he initially committed, he was kicked off his high school football team. By Signing Day, he had been kicked out of high school entirely. MSU was aware of these measures and the reasons behind them, Fort Wayne Community Schools spokeswoman Krista J. Stockman confirmed to The News."
January 13th, 2020 at 8:38 PM ^
His post makes no sense unless it’s a pro-MSU troll.
Nothing in the whole process looks good for MSU. Why did every other major player back out? Why did the assistants cool to Austin? Why didn’t MSU dig past the “one issue” when it was such a huge issue and the kid was also expelled? We are supposed to believe a recruit with this big strike was admitted because Blackwell wanted him?
Austin had all the markings of a kid suited for juco and getting his shot straight, but Dantonio advocated for him and missed.
January 13th, 2020 at 11:03 AM ^
Meanwhile over at the RCMB, the conspiracy theories are flying regarding the "Blue Wall" leading an unfair smear campaign against Mark Dantonio and this football program, which is the picture of high standards and ethics. Michigan couldn't beat Dantonio on the field, so they got the media to take him down with this "witch hunt".
MSU fans are infuriating. If there is ever a petition to have them expelled from the Big Ten, let me know where to sign.
January 13th, 2020 at 11:36 AM ^
Tony Paul is a Spartan alum and cheers for his alma mater. And Michigan had already curbed stomped Sparty and lost by the flukiest of flukes in two games under Harbaugh before the party that started all of this.
How about this: Dantonio knew he couldn't beat Harbaugh legitimately and in good weather without potentially turning MSU into perennial Fulmer Cup champion. So he "invested" in a serial juvenile sex offender.
January 13th, 2020 at 3:20 PM ^
I am hoping against hope that one, just one, of those coaches or someone in the athletic department will come forward and start talking. God what an awful place MSU is.
January 13th, 2020 at 7:49 PM ^
Nice to see that they are crawling out from under the rock they’ve been hiding under. It’s about time they started reporting on sparty trash culture. I guess it was too far out in the open to continue ignoring / denying it