Which athletes/coaches do you think get a free pass from the press?

When Thompson the elder was coaching, the media loathed him. Don't know about now, since I rarely hear about him.

 

Ummmm.... Are you perhaps thinking of Skip Holtz?

And whoever said Kobe Bryant, great call. He's gone from a petulant brat who cheated on his wife at best and raped someone at worst to sweetness and light.

 

He does that on TV. Real-life Tommy is a suspicious, incredibly profane, often nasty and manipulative little man about whom little good is said.

 

Good question. This sounds vaguely like the fanboy whine, "Our team never gets any credit" in reverse.

About Paterno: I don't cover college football, I've never met Paterno. But I must confess I get a kick out of his grouchiness and arrogance from afar. I understand fully that it's probably a pain in the ass to cover PS because of him, but I can also appreciate his feistiness when people are constantly asking him when he's going to leave. As big a dickhead as he must be for the beat guys, he's also a fascinating character from this distance. He strikes me as this crazed old man who is holding a giant university hostage.

I suspect that's one of the differences between the national coverage he gets and the feelings of those who toil on the beat daily.

 

Holding it hostage? Geez, the guy got his team to the freakin' Rose Bowl. I have no up-close knowledge of what's going on in the Happy Valley, but from here it sure seems like Joe ain't exactly chopped liver yet.

 

It hasn't always been as rosy as it was this past season.

There's a story that the university president showed up on Joe's doorstep a few years ago to suggest he step down, and Joe basically shooed the guy away. Since then, nobody bothers him. They can't even get him to agree to an order of succession.

From what I understand, Joe does very little hands-on coaching these days. He swoops in to close the deal on special recruits, but otherwise the heavy lifting is done by the staff.

 

Isn't that the way Bear Bryant used to do it?

 

Not necessarily... Bear died well before the same age Paterno is now... so his ghost just haunts Bammers, instead of the real thing...

 

I didn't mean Bear got that old, rather that he had his minions do what Smasher called the heavy lifting.

 

how 'bout if he were never born? how would he stack up then?

 

I heard that Urban Meyer was once fired as the QB coach at a FCS school in the mid 1990s