Posted on 12/30/2009 11:01:42 AM PST by Carbonsteel
I realize Wikipedia isn’t the most trusted source but you can verify what’s posted, Knight’s past has been well documented.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Knight
Btw, I am a fan of both Coach Knight and Coach Leach. I just find it hypocritical that the man who hired Knight after his well-documented past would fire Mike Leach for something that seems very minor compared to Knight’s history.
I’m not defending Leach either but was curious as to what you thought was out of Knight’s playbook. I’m not sure that Leach did anything that was necessarily out of bounds but I don’t know the details and haven’t really followed the story.
“Btw, I am a fan of both Coach Knight and Coach Leach. I just find it hypocritical that the man who hired Knight after his well-documented past would fire Mike Leach for something that seems very minor compared to Knights history.”
To my knowledge, Knight never endangered a player’s life by using methods banned by international torture treaty, or punished him for being injured. Those are the accusations against Leach, and given the lawyer’s statements in the past 2 days, I’d say that they indeed did happen.
And, yes, Knight’s style of leadership belongs to days gone by too. Keady at Purdue was worse, and Heathcoat at MSU was just as bad I think. You’ll note that coach — if not leadership styles everywhere — are much different now.
Different, as Leach just found out.
“Im not sure that Leach did anything that was necessarily out of bounds but I dont know the details and havent really followed the story.”
Even if Knight (and other coaches of his era) did nasty things to players, such isn’t allowed now. Woody Hayes can’t be punching opposing players on the sideline, for instance.
The story is that this player was told to stay away from practice by doctors. To “punish” the kid, he was locked in solitary confinement in non-residential places (ie, cleaning closet?), in the dark, and told to stand there, not leaning on anything. If that would’ve happened at Gitmo then we’d be hearing about it on the nightly news (like the hooded guy w/ his arms out?).
It might’ve happened in the past, but it cannot happen now. And, even if Knight did that in the past, it doesn’t make it right (now or then).
"The story is".....
We shall see what the real "story" is.....
Maybe we will get it.........
The "closet" as it is called is actually the media room in which the coach is interviewed. The 'Shed" was an equipment building where they kept four wheelers and other equipment. Neither were little confined spaces.
“The story is”.....
I knew Leach was a goner when this lawyers confirmed, albeit in spin (”the room wasn’t THAT bad” and “Those undergrads were pre-med students”) that these things had happened.
Basically, he gave a scholarship to the son of an ex-nfl player and the son was a problem child. When the kid got a note from a team doctor saying he had a concussion and had to wear sunglasses to practice Leach sent him to a garage and later a “media room”.
Story is pretty slanted either pro or anti Leach. The article I linked seems to be one of the least biased. The kid’s dad works for Espn so over there Leach sent Jr. to a closet and confined him because he had a concussion. Local TV footage of the “closet” show it as a one car garage with some equipment in it and are trying to show that Jr was a team cancer.
My personal opinion is that the AD fired Leach when he lawyered up and pressed the university so he could coach during the Alamo Bowl instead of just keeping this “in house”. Leach and the AD had a pretty big battle over Leach’s salary last summer.
His contract gave him an $800,000 bonus if he was head coach on December 31.
But that doesn't mean that's what exactly happened.
The Jacoby's probably figured...high profile parent of a player, not a good tale, let's cut our losses here.
My extremely wise pop...said many times...you can be totally right...but be wrong too.
“My personal opinion is that the AD fired Leach when he lawyered up and pressed the university so he could coach during the Alamo Bowl instead of just keeping this in house. Leach and the AD had a pretty big battle over Leachs salary last summer.”
That, and a $800k bonus?
“My extremely wise pop...said many times...you can be totally right...but be wrong too.”
I was too late in learning that the CSA (Confederates) won most of the battles in the Civil War, but lost the entire thing.
I’ve won battles in my jobs, but lost my job to people w/ half my abilities ‘cause they were more popular.
Sometimes, you just gotta blend it.
I’ve been surprised at ESPN’s obvious bias...mostly giving one side of the story (the dad of the athlete works for ESPN).
They did a very short interview with Leach’s lawyer, however, and it was clear Leach could have picked a much better lawyer. The guy sounded slow, not sharp at all.
The problem is that the AD hired Knight in 2001 after Knight had been under investigation for what was basically assault and battery that had taken place the prior year.
While I agree that several coaching tactics that were used in the past are now inappropriate and rightly so I don’t think the cut-off date was 2001.
As for the kid’s life being in danger I don’t know enough about concussions to make a comment on that.
How was his life in danger?
Where does the team line up? Will they mail it in for the bowl game? I can't see them playing their hearts out for anybody, although I suppose they will be playing for personal pride.
The president of the university should also be canned for such a knee-jerk reaction. Future recruiting will be very difficult.
Cheers!!
This kind of crap happens all the time in higher education, but usually not at such a visible and high level. The AD wanted to can Leach, and Pansy James gave him an outrageous, if true, story to accuse Leach with. I would bet the real reason has to do with the inability of the AD, Leach, alumni, and others to get along. Also, saving 800,000 bucks may have had something to do with it.
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