Paterno out

There is no reason for me to repeat it, but I may as well for posterity. Last night, Penn State’s Board of Trustees fired head football coach Joe Paterno and university president Graham Spanier over the child sex-abuse case that has shocked the Keystone State and, to an extent, the nation. Both deserved it, and no one can tell me otherwise, including the thousand or so poorly informed Penn State students whose knee jerk reaction was to riot.

While writing last night’s post-election post, I was watching the Duquesne-Arizona men’s basketball game on ESPN2. Ryan Burr broke the news of Paterno’s firing, but I did not turn it to the live coverage on ESPN until I pried the remote from Mervgotti. I was a little surprised to see students rioting, but I suppose it was to be expected; some football fans are not the sharpest knives in the drawer. A testament to that were the very emotional and uninformed fans who were interviewed. ESPN’s live coverage was also lamentable; taken out of their scripted comfort, Steve Levy and Stuart Scott had one hell of a time trying to sound intelligible.

Regardless, JoePa is gone. No one thought it would end like this. Everyone assumed — as we always do regarding a legend like him — he would leave his longtime post gracefully; a last, celebratory season with each game serving as part of a grand farewell was due. But we were all too naïve, assuming that life is perfectly scripted. College football fans assumed Bobby Bowden would have one last season, but he retired abruptly without fanfare after investigations regarding an academic scandal. Woody Hayes infamously punched a Clemson player during the Gator Bowl and was fired the next day. I suppose given their respective careers and personalities, neither departure should have been surprising. But Paterno? The little humanitarian who ran a squeaky clean football program and served as a father figure for an entire university? In the annals of college football lore, his downfall takes the cake.

Many are saying Paterno did nothing wrong; he fulfilled his legal obligations by reporting the incident to administrators. (How awful and ironic is it if they were considered, under Pennsylvania law, child protection authorities.) Well, they are wrong. He protected a pedophile and did nothing to prevent former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky from preying on children. I suspect Paterno and everyone involved knew about Sandusky’s problem for a long time and were keeping things “within the family” to protect a friend.

It is sad Paterno’s coaching career had to end this way, but it is a necessary example.