Do college football coaches become campus deities?
Many posters to this blog have remarked on the elevated role of football in setting agendas and goals at Georgia high schools.
AJC.com has a good story today on the influence that football coaches and programs exert on college campuses. The story relates to the scathing report on the Penn State cover-up of Jerry Sandusky’s sexual abuse of young boys. The report concludes that legendary coach Joe Paterno and other Penn State leaders downplayed allegations against Sandusky to avoid bad publicity about a football program that was both highly revered and highly profitable.
I recently read “Gods of Alabama” by local writer Joshilyn Jackson. Among the gods Jackson lists are “high school quarterbacks, trucks, and Jesus.” She might well have added college football coaches to her list.
Here is an excerpt from the AJC story:
To those who may be shocked the situation in State College got so out of hand, people who study sports have a message: Don’t be so surprised.
College coaches and their teams bring in truckloads of cash, feeding a beast that sometimes overwhelms many of the loftier goals of a university. Examples have been around since the first leather helmet, but seem to have multiplied in recent years.
“In these small towns, in these bubbles, the main thing is these sports teams and the coaches,” said Murray Sperber, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and author of several books on the negative effects of big-time sports on higher education. “I can’t believe people didn’t know, but they didn’t want to know. So there were huge amounts of deniability.”
The Penn State debacle is just the latest example of problems that skeptics blame on the culture of major-college athletics.
Ohio State ultimately vacated all its wins from that 2010 season, including a Sugar Bowl victory over Arkansas. Tressel was forced out for his actions, though fans still held a pep rally supporting him at his house. He has now landed at the University of Akron, as a vice president outside of athletics.
Southern California was hammered by the NCAA for allowing an agent to pay Heisman Trophy winner Reggie Bush and his family. The Trojans lost their 2004 BCS national title, 30 scholarships and two years of bowl eligibility. And yet the penalties may ultimately amount to a speed bump for USC, which is expected to contend for a national championship this season as it returns to bowl eligibility.
–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
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74 comments Add your comment
bootney farnsworth
July 15th, 2012
2:43 pm
something I’ve long supported is the seperation of so called competitive athletics from colleges and universites. I’d prefer it at HS level, but its not as vital there.
use the student funds to create intermural leages. something that any interested student could try out for with a chance of actually participating.
THAT would be an excellent use of student fees. something for the students. imagine.
bootney farnsworth
July 15th, 2012
2:46 pm
a question for DA:
how many peodphiles are OK on a coaching staff?
how many child rapes is OK before it outweights the importance of the football team?
is there a limit so long as the team wins?
after all, its not like they are your children. I hope.
bootney farnsworth
July 15th, 2012
3:08 pm
when -if ever- does the costs (all of them) exceed the value of having a football team?
Tabitha
July 15th, 2012
3:20 pm
The Duke Lacrosse case proved that when leadership is more interested in protecting the institution than the truth that the resulting corruption destroys both. In the Duke case, the sports participants were the victims of a false accusation but the president decided that sometimes its best for a few to take a hit to protect the institution. This kind of “leadership” is always corrupt whether the sports figures are victims or above the law.
Ben
July 15th, 2012
3:51 pm
Of course they become demi-gods(Hercules) not gods(Zeus) and there is a difference. We worship strength, blood and the youthful vitality that athletics exude and when those athletes and coaches win national championships for their home teams they are rightfully put on pedestals. There are a lot of people who disagree with that concept but it is basic human nature. People follow and bow to the alpha dogs of the pack and the ones who train them, which is why collegiate football makes the most money for colleges, not soccer or lacrosse but football & basketball. Honestly think about it.
Reallyperplexed
July 15th, 2012
4:07 pm
Let’s face it–This tragic football scenario begins on the high school level. Coaches are permitted to get away with duties simply because they are called coaches. Don’t even attempt to use the gym facilities for eduactional purposes—NO!!
This ALSO filters down to the football players and coaches do anything to ensure their eligibility to play. I keep on hearing that sports changes lives, but in reality, learning how to read, analyze, become good citizens and take education and family seriously changes lives to the positive. Close down all school sports and make them organizations of learning again!!!
Dr. Craig Spinks/ Georgians for Educational Excellence
July 15th, 2012
4:11 pm
Unfortunately, the tail wags the dog not only in Athens but also in many other American college towns.
Tony
July 15th, 2012
7:07 pm
Is this an indicator? http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/07/14/artist-paints-over-paterno-halo-on-pa-mural/
Math & Tech teacher
July 15th, 2012
8:22 pm
Of course. Sports, athletes and coaches are the holy grail of our society. That doesn’t help us with global competition, but hey, we can say “we’re number 1″. It’s a cultural phenomenon that starts back in grade school and goes through adulthood. Pep ralley for academic success? Unheard of.
Good Mother
July 15th, 2012
8:33 pm
Really Perplexed makes a very good point.
What happens to the college football players? Very few make the pros. Even when they do make the pros, they don’t stay a pro. NFL is often said to stand for “Not For Long.”
So 99 percent of college football players don’t go pro. What do they do after college then?
My friends at Hewlett Packard got an earful. A Michigan football player wiht some local fame wanted a job. HP asked him what he cuold do, you know, beside play football…the former player said he was a great football player and nothing else. HP laughed at him.
So at what expense does DA’s entertainment cost?
It cost that Michigan player a future. He has no skills. He didn’t make the pros. He’s now unemployed and begging for a job.
This is what football does. It uses up young men and tosses them aside. It aids and helps criminals.
I was raised on football but when I became an adult, I learned. After sandusky, I’ll never watch another stupid football game again and neither will my children.
bootney farnsworth
July 15th, 2012
8:41 pm
@ Ben
that’s pathetic.
bow all you want – I’ll refrain.
Ben
July 15th, 2012
8:57 pm
It may be “pathetic” but it is the truth. Live with it.
Omega
July 15th, 2012
9:38 pm
Something tells me Ben is not an Alpha dog.
Devil's Advocate
July 15th, 2012
10:21 pm
bootney,
Huh? Way to make stuff up as you go along man. Please show me at what point I said the crimes committed at PSU were okay. I did use well placed sarcasm to ask why a crime committed at one school should define athletics everywhere.
I really don’t get your hypocrisy either. You say competitive athletics should be at the high school level then start ranting about intramurals. I kinda lost you when you started talking about using student fees for intramurals. Are you talking about the high school or college level? Most colleges already have intramurals.
You make no sense other than to rant without a clear target. You’re just mad and someone (anyone) has to pay. How about you place the blame squarely on those who deserve it? Nah, that requires too much effort. Human nature has shown us it’s much easier to label a target then throw stones at anyone matching the general description of the label hoping to eventually take out the right person.
Ben
July 16th, 2012
2:24 am
@Omega
Naw I’ve never pretended to be one. I follow my own path going after the things that are important to me in business, politics and leisure but in my younger years I was devoted to athletics and won a state high school wrestling championship in 1986(185 lbs.), a member of a SOCOM unit and a combat veteran who lived to tell the story. So physically,mentally and emotionally I support the gladiator/warrior mentality that prevails in sports because I was part of that fraternity.
bootney farnsworth
July 16th, 2012
7:02 am
@ DA
sting a bit to be on the reciving end?
if this is too much for you, there are any number of football is God blogs you can join
bootney farnsworth
July 16th, 2012
7:09 am
ah., I get Ben now.
when you percieve yourself as toward the top of the pyramid, you don’t wish change.
fortunately the great men of history tended to feel different.
the greatest hyprocracy ever – I was just following orders.
bootney farnsworth
July 16th, 2012
7:10 am
@DA
you never did say how many molested children are too many as long as the team keeps winning
Pride and Joy
July 16th, 2012
7:24 am
Ben likens sports to the “So physically,mentally and emotionally I support the gladiator/warrior mentality that prevails in sports”
You Ben?
You think wrestling equals a warrior?
That’s an insult to our fine young men and women in the Middle East braving the real war and for fighting in what they believe in.
A wrestler is a warrio? hhahahaha…..how silly.
You are delusional.
Pride and Joy
July 16th, 2012
8:58 am
The Penn State Way.
This is an excellent article about one person trying to be ethical at Penn State under Joe Paterno. It details exactly what it was like to try to do the right thing while the college deity, Joe P, ruled the university.
I am sure every educator on this blog can relate to what this individual endured:
http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/15/us/triponey-paterno-penn-state/index.html?hpt=hp_c1
Ben
July 16th, 2012
4:23 pm
@Pride and Joy
No, it doesn’t equal the warrior in battle but it sets the competitive & combative mindset that is common in warriors and is a part of the psychology to mold young minds in the military to prepare them for combat. I’ve been in combat/ 1989 Panama 20 December. I’ve laid it all on the line. Have u?
Warrior Woman
July 18th, 2012
11:15 am
@Devil’s Advocate – You forgot some:
9. Bad behavior by a some college coaches and athletes negates all the good ever done by the much larger group of coaches and athletes that raise money for charities and do good in their communities;
10. Students, including student-athletes, that do not complete college have been irreparably harmed by exposure to higher education;
11. Assisting student-athletes that reach college without having received even a basic education in K-12 to actually learn to read and write is wrong.
Warrior Woman
July 18th, 2012
11:20 am
@Pride and Joy – Perhaps you should read before attacking Ben. Ben was an award-winning wrestler before becoming a combat veteran. I suspect he knows a bit about the role of warriors.
A person SMART enough to know...
July 18th, 2012
6:44 pm
I’m still here – and still an idiot pretending to be SMART!