• Watch Out for Scammers!

    We've now added a color code for all accounts. Orange accounts are new members, Blue are full members, and Green are Supporters. If you get a message about a sale from an orange account, make sure you pay attention before sending any money!

Paterno to retire

Maggot

"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood"
Supporter
Full Member
Minuteman
  • Jul 27, 2007
    25,879
    29,153
    Virginia
    If they dont fire him first. sad end to a great career,but he should have spoken up.

    Curley and Schultz indicted.

    Yes!


    STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (AP)—Penn State football coach Joe Paterno has decided to retire at the end of the season, according to a person familiar with the decision.

    The person said Paterno will announce his retirement later Wednesday.


    Joe Paterno's weekly news conference was canceled on Tuesday.
    (Getty Images)

    The person spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because the decision has yet to be announced.




    Paterno has been besieged by criticism since former defensive coordinator and one-time heir apparent Jerry Sandusky was charged over the weekend with molesting eight young boys between 1994 and 2009. Athletic director Tim Curley and vice president Gary Schultz have been charged with failing to notify authorities after an eyewitness reported a 2002 assault.

    Paterno decided to retire at age 84, in the middle of his 46th season with the Nittany Lions. He won 409 games, a record for major college football, but now, the grandfatherly coach known as “Joe Pa,” who had painstakingly burnished a reputation for winning “the right way,” leaves the only school he’s ever coached in disgrace.

    But Paterno might not be able to execute his exit strategy as the school’s board of trustees is still considering its options, which could include forcing Paterno to leave immediately.

    Paterno has not been accused of legal wrongdoing. But he has been assailed, in what the state police commissioner called a lapse of “moral responsibility,” for not doing more to stop Sandusky, whose attorney maintains his client’s innocence.

    Paterno has been questioned over his apparent failure to follow up on a report of the 2002 incident, in which Sandusky allegedly sodomized a 10-year-old boy in the showers at the team’s football complex. A witness, Mike McQueary, is currently receivers coach for the team but was a graduate assistant at the time.

    Paterno told the athletic director, Tim Curley, who has since stepped down and has charged with lying to the state grand jury investigating the case. The Penn State vice president has also been charged, and the university president could follow.

    But in the place known as Happy Valley, none held the same status as Paterno. And in the end, he could not withstand the backlash from a scandal that goes well beyond the everyday stories of corruption in college sports.

    “If this is true we were all fooled, along with scores of professionals trained in such things, and we grieve for the victims and their families,” Paterno said Sunday, after the news broke, in a prepared statement. “They are in our prayers.”

    The coach defended his decision to take the news to his athletic director. Paterno said it was obvious that the graduate student was “distraught,” but said the graduate student did not tell him about the “very specific actions” in the grand jury report.

    After Paterno reported the incident to Curley, Sandusky was told to stay away from the school, but critics say the coach should have done more - tried to identify and help the victim, for example, or alerted authorities.

    “Here we are again,” John Salveson, former president of the Pennsylvania chapter of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said in an interview earlier this week. “When an institution discovers abuse of a kid, their first reaction was to protect the reputation of the institution and the perpetrator.”

    Paterno’s requirement that his players not just achieve success but adhere to a moral code, that they win with honor, transcended his sport. Mike Krzyzewski, the Duke basketball coach, said in June for an ESPN special on Paterno: “Values are never compromised. That’s the bottom line.”

    His sudden departure leaves both his fans and detractors to ask who the real “Joe Pa” was.

    Was he a gentle once-in-a-lifetime leader with a knack for molding champions?

    Or was he simply another gridiron pragmatist, a detached football CEO, his sense of right and wrong diluted by decades of coddling from “yes” men paid to make his problems disappear.

    It will be a debate for years, and history will decide whether the enduring image will be that of Paterno surrounded by all those reporters as he hurried to practice this week, or his signature look on the sidelines.

    Rolled-up khakis. Jet-black sneakers. Smoky, thick glasses. That famous Brooklyn accent that came off only as whiny as he wanted it to be.

    “Deep down, I feel I’ve had an impact. I don’t feel I’ve wasted my career,” Paterno once said. “If I did, I would have gotten out a long time ago.”

    Along the road to the wins record, Paterno turned Penn State into one of the game’s best-known programs, and the standard-bearer for college football success in the East.

    National titles in 1982 and 1986 cemented him as one of the game’s greats. In all, Paterno guided five teams to unbeaten, untied seasons, and he reached 300 wins faster than any other coach.

    A year after he arrived at sleepy Penn State in 1966, Paterno began a 30-0-1 streak fueled by players such as Jack Ham and Dennis Onkotz.

    But the Nittany Lions fell short in the polls, finishing No. 2 in 1968 and 1969 despite 11-0 records, and No. 5 in 1973 despite a 12-0 record.

    In 1969, Texas edged out Penn State for the title with help from an unlikely source: President Richard Nixon declared the Longhorns No. 1 after their bowl game.

    “I’d like to know,” Paterno later said, “how could the president know so little about Watergate in 1973, and so much about college football in 1969?”

    Elite status finally arrived in the 1980s. The Nittany Lions claimed national titles in 1982, with a 27-23 win over Georgia at the Sugar Bowl, and in 1986, intercepting Miami’s Vinny Testaverde five times in a 14-10 win at the Fiesta Bowl.

    They have made several title runs since then, including the 2005 run to the Orange Bowl and an 11-1 regular-season campaign in 2008 that ended with a trip to the Rose Bowl and a 37-23 loss to Southern California.

    “He will go down as the greatest football coach in the history of the game. Every young coach, in my opinion, can take a lesson from him,” former Florida coach Urban Meyer said after his last game with the Gators, a 37-24 win over Penn State at the 2011 Outback Bowl.

    Paterno’s longevity became all the more remarkable as college football transformed into a big-money business.

    The school estimated there have been at least 888 head coaching changes at FBS schools since Paterno took the job. He is the all-time leader in bowl appearances (37) and wins (24). And he sent more than 250 players to the NFL.

    On Oct. 29, Penn State beat Illinois 10-7, earning Paterno win No. 409, breaking a tie with Grambling State’s Eddie Robinson for most in Division I.

    All he wanted to do, he had said two days earlier, was “hopefully have a little luck and have a little fun doing it. I’ve been lucky enough to be around some great athletes.”

    He said the success came because “the good Lord kept me healthy, not because I’m better than anybody else. It’s because I’ve been around a lot longer than anybody else.”

    So long, in fact, that it seemed there was no getting rid of him, even as age and injuries crept up and his famous resistance to modern technology - tweeting, texting and other so-called must-haves of 21st century recruiting - turned him into a dinosaur.

    But just as much, it was a string of mediocre seasons in the early 2000s that had fans wondering whether it was finally time for Paterno to step aside.

    Others questioned how much actual work Paterno did in his later years. He always went out of his way to heap praise on his veteran assistants, especially if an injury help him from getting in a player’s face in practice or demonstrating a technique.

    “I’m not where I want to be, the blazing speed I used to have,” he said in October, poking fun at himself. “It’s been tough. … it’s a pain in the neck, let me put it that way.”

    Paterno cut back on road trips to see recruits. He ended his annual summer caravan across Pennsylvania to exchange handshakes and smiles with alumni and donors.

    He often said he never read the newspaper - though the critical comments got back to him somehow. Some suspected his wife, Sue, kept him abreast of the news.

    “You guys write stories about how I sit around and don’t do anything,” Paterno said after watching his 409th victory from the Beaver Stadium press box. “I just hope we can help the team do the things that they want to do.”

    Still, the question persisted: How much longer was he going to coach?

    It was, until this week, the biggest question to dog him. That made him no different from the handful of coaching lifers who stay in the game into their 70s and beyond.

    “Who knows,” Paterno said with a straight face in October, when he was asked how his latest injuries affected his future. “Maybe I’ll go 10 years.”

    The terms of his departure conflict significantly with the reputation he built over nearly a half-century of turning a quaint program into a powerhouse with instant name recognition.

    He made it to the big-time without losing a sense of where he was - State College, population 42,000, a picturesque college town smack-dab in the middle of Pennsylvania.

    Paterno and his wife, Sue, raised five children in State College. Anybody could ring up his modest ranch home using the number listed in the phone book under “Paterno, Joseph V.” Anybody could walk up to offer good luck as he walked to home games.

    Former players would parade through his living room, especially on a busy game weekend, for a chance to say “Hello.”

    For the most part, Paterno shunned the spotlight, though he had a knack for making a joke that could instantly light up a room.

    “You guys have to talk about something. The fans have to put something on those - what do you guys call those things, Twittle-do, Twittle-dee?” Paterno cracked at one Big Ten media day.

    He was referring, of course, to the social media site Twitter - and no, the technology-averse Paterno didn’t have his own account.

    Paterno had no qualms mocking himself or the media, with which he could be abrasive at times. Stubborn to a fault, Paterno also had his share of run-ins with his bosses or administrators, as might be expected for someone who has spent decades with the same employer.

    His status didn’t make him immune from external criticism. As his reputation grew, so did the spotlight on his on-field decisions and program as a whole.

    In 2002, following a stretch of run-ins with officials over controversial calls, an effigy of a football official, yellow flag in hand, was seen hanging on the front door of Paterno’s home. Though he never said how the doll got on the door, Paterno hinted his wife, Sue, might be responsible, and it was all done in fun.

    After he started the 21st century with four losing seasons in five years, Paterno faced growing calls for his dismissal - once considered heresy in Happy Valley - during the 2004 season.

    The next year, Penn State went 11-1 and won the Big Ten. The Nittany Lions capped the campaign with a thrilling 26-23 win in triple overtime at the Orange Bowl against Florida State and Paterno’s longtime friend coach Bobby Bowden.

    Following a messy split, Bowden left the Seminoles after the 2009 season after 34 years, finishing with 389 wins.

    Asked in 2010 whether any contemporary coach would stick around as he and Paterno had, Bowden said: “Not likely. It doesn’t seem to be the style nowadays.” He cited high salaries and the demands that come with the big paycheck as reasons, along with the allure of professional coaching.

    “And there doesn’t seem to be the desire to stay in it as long as Joe and I have had,” Bowden said.

    To be sure, Paterno has had other opportunities - and they didn’t all have to do with coaching. A 1950 graduate of Brown University, Paterno said his father, Angelo, hoped his son would someday become president. Paterno himself had plans to go to law school.

    He also played football at Brown. A quarterback and cornerback, Paterno set a defensive record with 14 career interceptions - a distinction he boasts about on occasion to his team.

    Law school never materialized. At 23, he was coaxed by Rip Engle, his former football coach at Brown, to work with him when Engle moved to Penn State in 1950.

    “I had no intention to coach when I got out of Brown,” Paterno said in 2007 at Beaver Stadium in an interview before being inducted into the Hall of Fame. “Come to this hick town? From Brooklyn?”

    In 1963, a fellow Brooklyn native, the late Al Davis, became the general manager-coach of the Oakland Raiders of the AFL and offered Paterno the job of offensive coordinator. He turned Davis down in spite of an offer to triple his salary to about $18,000 and a new car.

    Three years later, Paterno took over as Penn State’s head coach after Engle retired. The New England Patriots offered Paterno the head-coaching job in the early 1970, only to be rebuffed.

    When Engle and Paterno arrived, Penn State had seen three coaches in three years and had an offense made up mostly of walk-ons. Engle never had a losing season at Penn State, but when Paterno took over in 1966, the Lions still were considered “Eastern football” - in other words, inferior.

    As the program turned into something much bigger than that, Paterno’s fans always insisted it was more than simply about football and winning.

    But the program hasn’t been a perennial Top 10 contender, like it had been through the 1990s - not that Paterno measured success entirely by the outcome on the field.

    “He teaches us about really just growing up and being a man,” former linebacker Paul Posluszny, now with the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars, once said. “Besides the football, he’s preparing us to be good men in life.”

    Paterno was a frequent speaker on ethics in sports, a conscience for a world often infiltrated by scandal or shady characters. He made sure his players went to class.

    As of 2011, Penn State has had 49 academic All-Americans - 47 under Paterno - the third-highest total among FBS institutions.

    The team’s graduation rates consistently ranked among the best in the Big Ten. In 2010, Penn State’s 84 percent rate trailed only Northwestern’s 95, according to the NCAA.

    In the ESPN special, Krzyzewski said Paterno had been able to “change how you teach … without changing the values of how you teach.”





    Follow Yahoo! Sports' college football coverage on Twitter.

    Updated 22 minutes ago


    Email
    Print
    .
    digg.add to facebook.del.icio.us.Twitter..
    ..
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    He should be fired. Putting football ahead of the well being of children is a discrage and Joe should hand his head..........as well as the rest of them.

    409 wins and ONE BIG LOSE!
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    I believe he dropped the ball. After bringing it to his bosses, that should have been enough. However, when his bosses didn't take it to the police he should have.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Shooter McGavin</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I believe he dropped the ball. After bringing it to his bosses, that should have been enough. However, when his bosses didn't take it to the police he should have.</div></div>

    He should have gone to the police right away. Are you dense?

    It wasn't a verbal altercation with a staff member or a player, it was RAPE OF A CHILD.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    Best thing to happen to the Penn State Football program. Bowden destroyed FSU after he started to rot on the sidelines. Joe has been doing the same for a long time.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    He ruined all the good things he's done for Penn State. And his incredible reputation to this point.

    First of all, WTF was the graduate assistant doing??? Walk into a shower see a coach sodomizing a 10yr old and sneak back out to tell the Head Coach about it later!!

    Are you kidding me, every last one of them are POS's. Worrying about football over the rape of a child. This has got to be one of the most disgusting cover ups ever.

    And Paterno, whom by the way I've always held in admiration and deepest regards. He's as big a POS as the rest of them. The graduate assistant should have his ass kicked for standing down and not stopping this assault. Everyone who knew and as time goes on we will probably find more is as pathetic as the perp!!

    What shame those individuals have brought to themselves and the institution of Penn State.

    All things being true that have been reported, my statement above stands!!!
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    I think people to hold on and wait for all the facts. There have been several different reports and things leaked.

    There was one very recent report released that Paterno was only informed that a kid and Sandusky were horsing around (ie not sexual touching) in the shower. Paterno found it inexcusable and went to Curley and Schultz. Now Schultz also happens to oversee campus police which as far as I know is an actual sanctioned police force, not just rent a cops. After they interviewed McQueary they informed Paterno that it was horsing around and that they informed Sandusky that it was inappropriate (obviously) and they as a result he would not longer be allowed to have children on campus.

    Not trying to protect anyone individual but let's also keep in mind what happened at Duke. Those lacrosse players were crucified and kicked out of school and even had some short stays in prison if I recall before they were bailed out before it was found that the girl lied. Paterno has already come out and said that he did not know that Sandusky was actually sexually assualting kids and with that in hindsight which he had done more.

    There are just different reports coming out as to what actually was said and passed on. Also know that Joe was just received second hand knowledge of the information and sometimes the full details are not passed on. Remember the game you played as a kid where the first person in the line would whisper a story in the hnext kid's ear and it would go down the line and by the time it got to the end if was a completely different story? Even in the Grand Jury report it was stated that McQueary kind of bumbled and jumped around and avoided things etc in relaying what he saw.

    I truly find it hard ot believe that if Paterno knew the full extent of what was going on that he wouldn't report it given his stature, reputation and standing etc.

    Again not trying to protect Paterno just yet but saying let's hold and find out th eexact facts before we jump to conclusions saying this guy did not go far enough.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    Maybe from what Paterno was informed he did not know the facts and actually what happened and he informed that AD and a guy that oversaw the police force on campus. He probably figured they would do an actual investigation to find out what truly happened.

    Again in hindsight it's easy to throw stones at Paterno. Without a doubt they can be thrown at Curley and Schultz who first of all obviously were caught in a lie at the Grand Jury hence them being charged on perjury (Paterno is not accused of lying) and it seems did not do a full investigation that even Paterno had assumed (apparently wrongly despite having a long standing relationship with these guys whom he probably trusted and in turn seem to have turned their back and did not do a thorough investigation).
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I truly find it hard ot believe that if Paterno knew the full extent of what was going on that he wouldn't report it given his stature, reputation and standing etc.</div></div>

    I don't. He said he should have done more. As one alumni said, "Had it been one of Joe's 16 grandchildren he most certainly would have done more." I think he was more concerned with keeping the Penn State reputation intact than the physical and mental state of some wayward youth.

    I'm disappointed the school is letting him retire.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    I think the school knew too.

    He's out as of this evening.

    It won't end with him though the cowards who fired him may think so. He should have been fired the second after he learned about Sandusky and did not either call the police or resign and then call the police, when the university gagged him.

    Just a theory of course but this kind of institutional cowardice is a plague that has overwhelmed this nation and much of the western world.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: EddieNFL</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I truly find it hard ot believe that if Paterno knew the full extent of what was going on that he wouldn't report it given his stature, reputation and standing etc.</div></div>

    I don't. He said he should have done more. As one alumni said, "Had it been one of Joe's 16 grandchildren he most certainly would have done more." I think he was more concerned with keeping the Penn State reputation intact than the physical and mental state of some wayward youth.

    I'm disappointed the school is letting him retire. </div></div>

    Ok but just like a bunch of other journalist hacks you are misquoting him. Please insert the first part the sentence when he stated that. He stated before that IN HINDSIGHT. I think anyone who knows what they know now that they would have done something more. Crap I played the lotto last night before the drawing and no in hindsight I wish I had picked different numbers.

    Again not protecting the guy but lets wait til we get ALL THE FACTS not hearsay
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: queequeg</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I think the school knew too.

    He's out as of this evening.

    It won't end with him though the cowards who fired him may think so. He should have been fired the second after he learned about Sandusky and did not either call the police or resign and then call the police, when the university gagged him.

    Just a theory of course but this kind of institutional cowardice is a plague that has overwhelmed this nation and much of the western world. </div></div>

    Well he did inform Schultz who oversaw the Police Dept. Not saying that is enough but we NEED to know what Paterno knew.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    You sound like a huge Penn fan Anthony.... you are bouncing around protecting Joe Paterno when he is as guilty as the others for NOT DOING ENOUGH. You are talking about the physical abuse of a 10 year old boy in his locker room. That is not to be tolerated no matter what. You will never know what Paterno did or didn't know so stop using that as an excuse to alleviate his roll in the scandal.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Again not protecting the guy but lets wait til we get ALL THE FACTS not hearsay</div></div>

    Sure ya are.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: anthony20031</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: queequeg</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I think the school knew too.

    He's out as of this evening.

    It won't end with him though the cowards who fired him may think so. He should have been fired the second after he learned about Sandusky and did not either call the police or resign and then call the police, when the university gagged him.

    Just a theory of course but this kind of institutional cowardice is a plague that has overwhelmed this nation and much of the western world. </div></div>

    Well he did inform Schultz who oversaw the Police Dept. Not saying that is enough but we NEED to know what Paterno knew. </div></div>

    MOST of us know all we need to know. JoePa KNEW that a 10 year old was being molested in HIS lockerroom. He didnt tell the cops. What more do you NEED to know?
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    IMO it is disgusting that football is as important to Americans as what it is. And we all know it comes down to money.

    If I walked by and saw a grown man abusing a 10 year old there would be no need to tell the coach. I would be telling my story to a lawyer who was representing me for killing that Bastard that was hurting the kid.

    Skip all the BS. They are all a bunch of weasles. Paterno is a weasel as well if he had any knowledge what so ever of a child being hurt. Simple as that.

    For Gosh sakes the guy is a football coach. And we put him up on a pedastal?? Really??

    It reminds me of how much people look up to Muhammad Ali. A disgusting DRAFT DODGER!! Tom.
     
    Re: Paterno to retire

    <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: HOGGHEAD</div><div class="ubbcode-body">IMO it is disgusting that football is as important to Americans as what it is. And we all know it comes down to money.

    If I walked by and saw a grown man abusing a 10 year old there would be no need to tell the coach. I would be telling my story to a lawyer who was representing me for killing that Bastard that was hurting the kid.

    Skip all the BS. They are all a bunch of weasles. Paterno is a weasel as well if he had any knowledge what so ever of a child being hurt. Simple as that.

    For Gosh sakes the guy is a football coach. And we put him up on a pedastal?? Really??

    It reminds me of how much people look up to Muhammad Ali. A disgusting DRAFT DODGER!! Tom. </div></div>

    Yeah, I admire Ali. Not because he was a draft dodger but because he was the greatest boxer that ever lived. Even after spending two years of his prime in jail he was still the best. And he did a lot to give the black people of America a better image of them selves.