Wednesday, December 01, 2004

Introductory Kinesiology?

The attached Advocate article apparently closes the book on a sordid bit of Louisiana history. Ms. Owen, who appears principled and courageous, had the unfortunate temerity to challenge the monster that is the LSU football program. This being Louisiana, she was immediately terminated and had her life threatened.

www.2theadvocate.com/stories/120104/new_lawsuit
001.shtml

I have no comment on the case per se- other than can anyone honestly be surprised to see the words “academic fraud”, “death threat”, and “NCAA violations” in any article about Tiger sports? Also, what is worse? Ten players taking "Introductory Kinesiology" or in fact failing "Introductory Kinesiology"?

This part of the reason why Nick Saban gets paid the big bucks- to handle phone calls like this:


Uh, coach. You know those ten guys taking 'Introductory Kinesiology'? The health class no one can fail? Well... uhmmm... they're failing it. But its okay, I've arranged for an off the record 'tutoring session' that the teacher doesn't know about so they can pass without the teacher knowing about it. That's okay too, because the majority of them are 'learning disabled'. Oh, to insure the teacher's silence, maybe we should threaten and fire her?

However, if I were LSU, I would perhaps have paid the money- rather than admit in open court that a majority of the numerous football players in question were “learning-disabled”.