Blue White Illustrated

CHANGE FROM PREVIOUS PAGE break any new ground, so those looking for a trove of exculpatory evidence are going to be disappointed. Its purpose was not to uncover more documents or compile new testimony, but to put Freeh���s findings in a different context and to re-engage the debate on terms more favorable to Paterno. If there���s not going to be a full and unambiguous account of the university���s response to the allegations against Sandusky in 2001 ��� and it appears entirely likely that there won���t be ��� then the family is going to use its legal clout and media savvy to get its side of the story into the public record. And that, in the end, may be the most interesting aspect of the report���s release. The points it raises will sound familiar to anyone who has turned on a TV or ventured onto a message board in the past year, but its arrival at this particular moment suggests that the Paternos feel the public is ready to hear them out, that the whitehot outrage that followed the Sandusky trial and the release of the Freeh report has cooled to the point that they can at least mount a defense. Todd Blackledge, the former Penn State quarterback turned ESPN analyst, told the Centre Daily Times he was ���glad that some very serious questions are being raised about concerns with the Freeh report.��� A few months ago, that would have been a tough admission to make. ���It was very difficult to even think about saying anything that was contrary to the mainstream narrative that was going on,��� he told the CDT. ���Being in the media and seeing how the story was being represented and told and at the same time having personal feelings for Coach Paterno, for Penn State and things that I believed about him and our program that were being assailed, that���s not an easy place to be.��� It wasn���t an easy place for Nike chairman Phil Knight to be, either, so last summer he retracted the stirring defense of Paterno he had given at the Memorial for Joe the previous January. But after the Paternos issued their report, Knight retracted his retraction. ���I made this statement without having read the [Freeh] report in full,��� he said. ���When I later took the time to do so, I was surprised to learn that the alarming allegations, which so disturbed the nation, were essentially theories and assertions rather than solid charges backed by solid evidence. On reflection I may have unintentionally contributed to a rush to judgment.��� Knight got his start in track and field, so he���s a pretty good judge of which way the wind is shifting. In his statement in response to the Paternos��� probe, he attacks the Freeh report and goes on to charge that ���the NCAA acted outside its charter and rendered judgment absent any kind of investigation or judicial hearing. It was simply grandstanding.��� Ah yes, the NCAA. College sports��� governing body receives a drubbing of its own in the Paterno report, and there���s certainly a case to be made that it was overly broad in denouncing not only Paterno but a supposedly out-of-control football culture over which the longtime coach presided. Even before the Paternos weighed in, Penn State fans were pushing back against charges that the school���s passion for football had created the conditions that led to the Sandusky scandal. The fact that prominent people are starting to call attention to the NCAA���s response suggests that the tone of the conversation has changed. The release of the Paterno report and the public reaction to it are enough to make one wonder how the football program would have fared if the NCAA had waited to pass judgment until after tempers had cooled and the university had done its own assessment of Freeh���s findings. Would it have made a difference if Penn State had taken a more deliberate approach rather than throwing itself on the mercy of the court? Maybe not. The crimes at the center of this scandal are so sickening that it���s possible no amount of time and reflection would have changed the outcome. But we���ll never know. For Penn State, it���s one more question that will forever go unanswered. www.AmericanAleHouse.net 821 Cricklewood Drive, Toftrees State College Now in 2 Locations

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