Chuck Samples: Extent of Penn State penalties surprising
By CHUCK SAMPLES
ISL Correspondent
Well, I didn’t expect that.
Last week I wrote I anticipated there wouldn’t be a football program at Penn State for 2013 and possibly 2014 once the Department of Education finished its investigation into possible Clery Act violations stemming from the Sandusky child sex abuse horrors. I was not ready for what NCAA President Mark Emmert handed down with an iron fist:
1. A $60 million fine, or equal to a year’s worth of gross revenues from the Nittany Lion football department.
2. Loss of scholarships.
3. Four-year bowl ban.
4. Ability of athletes to transfer anywhere and play this year.
This brings Penn State football to a screeching halt almost any way you look at it. The Nittany Lions are now a toxic team from a recruit’s perspective for at least five years. Seriously, if all a recruit wanted was the football experience, there is very little reason now to go to Penn State. The tradition is tarred and tarnished. There is no hope of postseason bowl glory that draws the best recruits to the best programs. And the team you figured a few days ago would be pretty good on the field this season now suddenly has to prepare for a mass exodus of its brightest stars to other places.
From the program’s perspective, how do you reverse this? How do you seal the deal with a potential recruit with all this so fresh in everybody’s mind? Hows do you build trust with a recruit’s parents? End result: how do you not become SMU, which is only now starting to recover from its booster scandal of the 1980s?
Emmert’s announcement wasn’t the death penalty, but at least for the next decade, it may as well have been a death sentence.
