Truth Will Out

Ho, hum how the mighty have fallen.  Who is Jim Tressel?  Tressel is one of the most respected coaches in college football.  He has tenured at The Ohio State University for 10 years and has kept the school in the national spotlight all those years.  His winning percentage is an astounding 106-22 at OSU.  He made differences.  The best thing about James was his class, honestly, and integrity.  He is a man who always stays straitlaced, never allowing his players nor himself to step out of line.  He has an iron-fisted hold on the Ohio State community.  He brought OSU a National Title, remember?  All the way back in 2002, his only National Championship, but I mean that's alright.  Tressel's teams always competed.  They never came up too short.  A terrible 2004 was followed by a Fiesta Bowl win and then back-to-back appearances in the Title game.  They lost both, but hey, the Bucks were there.  A loss the next year and suddenly people were getting skeptical about Tressels conservative style.  He played the game too close to his sweater-vest.  Thanks to back-to-back BCS Bowl game wins (Rose and Sugar) Tressel kept his job at OSU.  He appeared to have one of the top teams in the country coming back for 2011-2012...but then everything unraveled.

Somehow involved

Everything spiraled when some tattoos of Terrelle Pryor were investigated and found to have been acquired using monies traded for his Big Ten Championship ring.  Oooooh...how terrible.  Terrelle Pryor sold his own property to get tats, utterly unacceptable.  Anyways, the super duper NCAA decided to continue deciphering the situation at Ohio State and found a couple more players were guilty of selling their possessions earned through football in order to ink themselves up.  Sigh, it was a sad day in Buckeye land.  The student athletes were punished via five game suspension.  Luckily Ohio State's first five games: Akron, Toledo, Miami Florida, Colorado, and Michigan State.  It's not too bad when your toughest game is going down to visit an average ACC team in the midst of coaching catastrophe.  So the Bucks were looking alright at worst.  Then the entire world collapsed upon the University...or well, upon James.  Jimmy Tressel was investigated, and found to have had known about the terrible, horrible, and grotesque crimes committed by the athletes for months.  The NCAA was furious and suspended Tressel for the same five games.  The world seemed to settle back into place, but the world could not forgive Jim Tressel.  The Ohio State scandel turned into Watergate II.

Pictured: Jim Tressel?

The crimes committed were soon forgotten, mainly because of how insignificant they were, and it was the cover-up which led to mass hysteria.  Tressel had known, and not told...similarly Richard Nixon had known about C.R.E.E.P.'s plans and had kept them clandestine.  This is unforgivable.  This is truly unacceptable (sarcasm is not being used right now, unlike earlier when talking about the athletes crimes, do try to keep up).  Tressel proved he was not the man he tried to appear.

Trustworthiness ≤ amount of sleeves on sweatervest

It's truly a shame.  I'll continue to preach the similarities between Tressel/OSU and Nixon/Watergate respectively.  First, it cannot be denied both men were able leaders who had brought their respective offices honor.  Nixon had been the greatest president since FDR and Tressel's accomplishments are listed above including his 82.8 winning percentage.  Secondly, both situations were unnecessary.  Nixon was going to be re-elected and Ohio State has the prestige and players to suffer through the loss of five, no matter who they are.  Thirdly, both men were blinded by the greed for victory.  Nixon wanted re-election and Tressel wanted wins.  Fourthly, neither men were involved with the crime.  Nixon was charged with obstruction of justice for covering up the actions, not being involved and Tressel probably did not go around advertising the sale of the player's merchandise (although it is still debatable).  Fifthly, both men had been previously been understudies at their institutions.  Nixon was the Vice President for Dwight Eisenhower and Tressel was OSU's top assistant from 1984-1985.  Sixthly, the cover-ups were worse than the crimes.  Pointed out earlier, the crimes committed were pretty nonsensical.  C.R.E.E.P. had attempted to steal information from the Democratic National Party, but failed.  The organization compiled very little information in the one and only spy mission.  For OSU and Tressel, it as players selling their own EARNED awards and rings.  In both situations, the clandestine actions far outweighed the crimes, especially when the crimes were unnecessary.  Seventhly, and most important, both crimes were the resulted of dishonesty.  This is pretty obvious, but both men chose to be dishonest.  All Tricky Dick needed to do was tell everyone he had nothing to do and reveal everything that had happened and he would've been re-elected (I mean he was anyway).  All Tressel needed to do was tell everything that had happened and he would've been praised for his honest actions, the way he had all throughout his career.  It's a shame.  The final similarity is that both situations ended with resignation.  Tressel will go down in infamy, a villain who disgraced The Ohio State University and the honor which its name carries.  He may never work again in College Football.  The NCAA will no longer have James Tressel to kick around.  So it goes.

We're not a crooks