Life has intersected sports once again. Shortly after the news broke…a discussion was prompted. I felt as though he’d remain simply because they didn’t want to walk away from all that glittered. His and by default, their, futures were far too bright to interrupt things. Of course, Urban Meyer is the he and Ohio State’s Board of Trustees are the respective, they. Hmmmm….trustee, as in trust?
I trust the decision to keep Urban was made long before a formal meeting took place. What took better than ten hours to decide was how to walk backwards into the aforementioned decision to keep their head coach. A head coach who so boldy touts his core value of respecting women that he has the words inscribed on a locker room wall…yet sat idly by as a woman, in his inner circle, was repeatedly abused. A head coach who, without hesitation, told a bold faced lie for public consumption. A head coach who, without hesitation, immediately resorted to deleting text messages older than a year. I suppose a dosage of the meds which reportedly induce his periodic memory loss was bypassed that particular day!
When news of the 3 game suspension officially broke…what was previously muddy became perfectly clear. Taking notice of Urban’s body language—posture of one dealing with an annoyance…listening to what he did say—repeated mentions of Zach Smith and Buckeye Nation and most importantly what he didn’t—the utterance of Courtney Smith’s name….it was easy to see how the terrible chain of events unfolded.
Zach, Urban & everyone in Courtney’s path that had failed her, were responsible for the situation coming to light. Yet, the press conference had every bit a tone of blaming the victim. Buckeye Nation was not on the receiving end of his mentor’s grandson’s attacks. Urban had power and instead of wielding it for good…he, for all intents and purposes, appears to have dismissed her.
The weak apology to Courtney and her children…two days after the fact… was far too little, far too late!
One of the things which infuriated me most was Urban’s decision to keep Zach employed…until he could no longer, explicably, keep Zach employed. Doing so, created the outward appearance, that his assistant coach was a standup guy…yet, Urban knew full well he wasn’t. In the end, by keeping Urban, Ohio State’s Board of Trustees opted to do the very same thing!
