OUInsider - Owen Field

I've been a member of the site for a number of years and this is the first and probably the only time I will post. The reason why I don't post is quite frankly I don't feel that I have the football knowledge to articulately a proper post on the board regarding OU football, which I have loved and watch since I was a kid. But I do enjoy the knowledge I learn from this board from knowledgable OU fans and the the 247 staff. More importantly I am a father of a 10 year old boy and a 16 year daughter that play sports and this subject hits very close to home for me. I'm about to get emotional here and that's not my style and this post is not intended to be a personal attack on someone. But here we go.

Let's be clear here's these children were raped and sodomized by an adult man. Do you understand what sodomize means? We're not talking about two mutual adults in a relationship, these children had NO choice in the matter. These children at the time were rape and sodomized on and off the campus of PSU under the umbrella of a non-profit for dis-advantaged children that PSU and the state of Pennsylvania financially supported. The College President knew, the AD knew, the Head Coach knew, the assistant coach who wittiness the event knew, a VP in the school knew and I think multiple members of the Board of Trustees heard rumor of what was going on (the email prove that). What the hell did you expect the NCAA to do? PSU is a member by choices of the NCAA and Big 10. If this is not lost of institional control, then I don't know what is. An evidence was presented to a Grand Jury, a court case with a guilty verdict tooks place and a report by Louise Freese was made and accepted by the NCAA and the Punishment was accepted by PSU that they were institutionally passively in allowing this behavior by their employee/assistant coach. Next will be the civil suits, which will cost PSU between $100-$200 million. My god man, these children were hunted down and raped like game.

And the question is why is the NCAA involved? The answer is, it was the NCAA responsibility to take action because PSU is a member.

And all the people in power could do is stand and watch it happen. I am by no means a liberal limp wristed guy and by no means a bible thumper. But there some people that passively stood by and let this man hunt these children down will have a lot explaining do when they meet our maker.

Good points about the innocent being punished. I'll play devil's advocate though.

1. The school and their football team benefitted greatly from the cover up and were given an advantage by avoiding the serious fallout from allowing the truth to come out. This punishment will negate those benefits.

2. The fans and school did play a part in this according to the opinion of many. The atmosphere they created where the coaches could do no wrong and have practically absolute power is what allowed this to happen. The NCAA can send a message to the rest of the college sports world that this kind of atmosphere is dangerous and football programs should not be given a higher priority than the university or individual people and their safety. It sounds like this is the message they want to send.

I was talking to a player some years ago; I can’t remember what the subject was about but the meat of the conversation was about coaches not knowing what was going on with their team. He told me that he didn’t know about that but he knew that every time he tried to sneak out of his room on road games the coach knew about it before he could get out of the parking lot.

The shame of this incident is that we will never know just when JoPa knew about what was going on. My bet is that it was some years ago and very well might have been much longer ago than what they are being punished for now. I do know that if he would have stepped up then and told his bosses what he found out and was going to suspend this guy and turn the whole thing over to the police he wouldn’t be facing the shame that will now follow his name. But not only did he and the executives of the university not do the right thing they facilitated the crimes to continue. The right thing to do isn’t the easiest thing to do but it is the right thing to do.

Several Good Posts... Warsp, you should post more often. There are plenty of subjects on this blog that don't require detailed football knowledge. It's always good to hear the voice of reason.

Do you really think that ONLY just a few knew of this??? Were all the professors not cognizant of the environment that the athletic department had managed to build and ENFORCE??? Let's not treat this as a 3-5 person secret, I would bet that at least 3-5 board members had knowledge of these events and went along with the cover-up.

Yes their was an un-told amount of people that knew. It would be impossible to say how many, but definitely not single digits. I would guess the count would be in the dozens. When the grand jury originally met, they were confident they could contain it. When the grand jury came back with their verdicts, (long before the stuff was hitting the fan), the amount of people who knew about Sandusky grew exponentially. They still did not feell the need to come clean. They felt it would be difficult, but in their wildest dreams they never thought Joepa would be rolled up into this. They felt that they could contain everything to Sandusky, let him be sacrificed, but that their reputation would over-ride everything, with a little time. And they just felt that it would be real imbarrassing. Last summer, some radio jocks started getting "secret, and off the record information". These radio jocks were not in State College, they are in the Harrisburg area. These radio jocks were under intense pressure, because as they leaked facts about the grand jury information, they were saying that it was going to get a lot worse. Most of central PA, resented hearing it and did not want to hear it. The fact that molesting children was not an issue. Protecting PSU and more than PSU, Joepa was everything

Is the grad assistant being prosecuted for not contacting the authorities right away? Did he eventually contact them? Im guessing that's how word got out?

It was reportedly a high school coach who pursued it. Apparently Sandusky was volunteering at a school where one of his victims attended and another coach caught them "wrestling" on the weight room floor. He talked to the kid and his mother who then called the authorities. Amazing what happens when someone does the right thing...

Jim, are you in PA now or have relatives there? Have you heard anything about McQueary being given his job basically as hush money? I've heard it 3rd or 4th hand thru the grapevine that PSU had no spot for him (said to not have qualifications yet) once his GA time was up then suddenly he was hired as the QB coach.

I don't live in PA. I live in Texas. I travel across the country in my job. The last two companies I have worked for are headquartered in State College. Without exposing too much of who I know, I do know some people who are/were very close to all of this stuff. Very. And one in particular, it would not bother me if I never see him face-to-face again. I know he did what he did, because of fear of losing his job. But I just can't accept it. A company where I worked had tv cameras come into the company headquarters hounding the poor receptionist, because of some employees real close to elements of this. I have been to football and baseball games on campus, along with tours of most all of the campus areas. I go a few times every year to State College for meetings. Usually when I work in PA, it is not in State College. You are right about the HS coach having providing some individuals courage to go forward.

I have heard the rumors about McQueary, but I don't know enough to validate in my own mind. But, I don't think too highly of anyone who would see something like that happening, go home and discuss with his dad what he should do about what he saw and then based on that discussion with his dad, tell Joepa the next day and then see that nothing happened. Does that sound like a leader to you? Again, I understand the awe, reverence, fear and everything else that surrounds that program. (I don't really understand it. But, have seen and heard it.) But, somewhere you have to draw a line. I have some opinions on why that line may have not been drawn, but don't consider them appropriate right now.

I'd sure like to hear them!