Clarett spills the beans on Ohio State

Bill_Abner · Post by **Bill_Abner** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 10:04 pm

...and so the back peddling begins:

Dom Tiberi (local sports newscaster on Ch 10) talked to Marco Cooper. Cooper's statement was that his words were misconstrued and he received no money, cars or furniture.

Sammy Maldanado said (again not on the air) he thought Espn the mag was interviewing him for a story on himself and he said he knew nothing of Clarett's insinuations.

ESPN aired audio tape of Marco Cooper where he admits and verifies Clarett's accusations. Then during channel 10's sports tonight they had a phone interview with Cooper. In which he denies the ESPN accusations that interview was sometime today.

Clearly Mr. Cooper has lied either to ESPN or to Channel 10.

(the above was pasted from Bucknuts)

So, now what? Who's lying? Who's not? What a cluster****.

Bill_Abner · Post by **Bill_Abner** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 10:06 pm

bdoughty wrote:
And yeah, we all thought Robert Smith was telling truth, too.
Hmm my sarcasm meter is not working right now? I did believe Smith.

I agree with everything you have said on Clarett, as I mentioned those who are backing him are not the most credible of sources.

No, really, we did too. I wasn't being a smart ass at all. Smith's accusations made perfect sense at the time, and they still do.

bdoughty · Post by **bdoughty** » Tue Nov 09, 2004 10:11 pm

Bill_Abner wrote:
bdoughty wrote:
And yeah, we all thought Robert Smith was telling truth, too.
Hmm my sarcasm meter is not working right now? I did believe Smith.

I agree with everything you have said on Clarett, as I mentioned those who are backing him are not the most credible of sources.
No, really, we did too. I wasn't being a smart ass at all. Smith's accusations made perfect sense at the time, and they still do.

Thanks for the clarification, I really could not tell. What Smith had problems with happens at every school. Not many players like Smith around who would not comprimise his education over football and I applaud him for that.

Jackdog · Post by **Jackdog** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 6:22 am

Bill_Abner wrote:
JackDog wrote:
Programmed2Kill wrote:
And if I recall, this would not be the first time Tressell got himself into trouble.
Didn't he pay a QB at YSU? Anybody know for sure?
He did the same thing for that player that he did for Clarett. He set up a car deal for him, which in and of itself is not illegal.

As for him being in trouble, Jim Tressel has never been sanctioned nor has a team that he has coached ever been sanctioned in any way by the NCAA. Is OSU 100% clean? It's silly to think that. I'm sure stuff goes on there just like it does everywhere else, but this whole Clarett thing was already investigated by the NCAA for months. If you happened to hear or read Geiger's press conference he was more or less saying, "Bring it. We've been down this road and nothing was found."

If Tressel was dirty, Andy Geiger would fire him. Geiger fired his closest friend in the entire OSU program when he fired Jim O'brien, the head basketball coach, when he found ot he paid a player $6,000 to give to his refugee mother in former Yugoslavia. Trust me, Geiger would can Tressel if he knew or suspected him of being a dirty coach.

And yeah, we all thought Robert Smith was telling truth, too.

Anyway, after reading all 4 ESPN articles, I find it funny that:

-They make Clarett out to be the victim. Come on. It read like "look what big bad OSU did to Clarett and his mom." Clarett could have been a straight arrow. He wasn't. He wanted the easy way out..he STILL wants the easy way out. This is ALL about Clarett and him wanting to be drafted higher than he deserves. This has nothing to do with anything else other than that.

-The sources for this, every single one of them that are trashing the school are either:

A) Suspended
B) Arrested and kicked off the team
C) Flunked OUT of school

Now, if OSU were making it so super easy for these kids to graduate and stay eligible, how did all these guys flunk out? Are they EXTRA stupid?

It should surprise no one that universities guide athletes on which classes to take. A kid might ask, 'which classes should I take to stay eligible for the season.' The advisors tell him, "Music Appreciation, Intro to Golf, AIDS Awareness, and Basic Enlgish 100." ESPN makes this out to be some kind of violation. Why? At OSU, I took every one of those classes and I didn't star at anything except drunken stupors every Saturday night. It's extremely common for athletes to take "easy" classes during the season; this happens at every school in the country. The Craig Krenzel's who do Micro Biology or whatever he did are the exception, not the rule.

Anyway, ESPN, Outside the Lines, and ESPN the Magazine will get a lot of traction out of this story. $$ makes the world go 'round, even if the news is hardly "new" to the NCAA or Ohio State.

Hopefully it'll blow over next week.

Good read Bill. You make some good points. Why does ESPN have such a hard on for Ohio St?

Anyhow this is not what I want to read during the week leading into "The Game".

bdoughty · Post by **bdoughty** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 7:12 am

Anyhow this is not what I want to read during the week leading into "The Game".

Actually Oklahoma and Nebraska play this weekend.

Jackdog · Post by **Jackdog** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 12:26 pm

bdoughty wrote:
Anyhow this is not what I want to read during the week leading into "The Game".
Actually Oklahoma and Nebraska play this weekend.

Bill_Abner · Post by **Bill_Abner** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 12:52 pm

More from the two sources that back up Clarett:

Statement from Sammy Maldonado regarding his being mentioned in the ESPN.com story on Maurice Clarett:

"I want to make clear that the reference to something I said regarding my transfer from Ohio State had nothing to do with anything about the Maurice Clarrett situation that was mentioned today on ESPN.com. The interview that I did was with ESPN the Magazine and was about me and I said nothing about -- and have nothing to say about -- Maurice Clarrett or anything that was mentioned in the article today.

"I mentioned my academic situation and about the credits I had earned and what ended up transferring, because I was telling the reporter some of what I had to go through to get here to Maryland. Ohio State is in my past, I am on course to graduate, and I have nothing to say about what they are talking about on ESPN.com." --Sammy Maldonado

Marco Cooper on Channel 10 news said, "I basically made very broad statements. I said I didn't want to be involved. I didn't want to do these interviews. I guess he took whatever he wanted to take out of the interview. He made out of it whatever he wanted to make out of it."Channel 10 says in their report that Cooper said, "ESPN Twisted My Words."

This is really some top notch investigating by ESPN.