Meyer back soon ?

The question here, ultimately, is whether or not Meyer reported Smith's conduct up the chain of command.

If Meyer in fact did so, and OSU was correctly appraised of the situation, there would be very little justification for Ohio State to fire him "with cause".

Mind, this looks bad and will without question be used against Meyer on the recruiting trail - between Aaron Hernandez and the myriad of misbehaving children he had at UF, and this latest bit with Smith - it can easily be spun that Meyer does not maintain or enforce off-the-field discipline in his staff or locker room, and as such there are some sketchy characters about - but beyond the PR black eye I don't know that lying to the media is a firing offense, as long as Meyer took appropriate action within the guidelines of OSU's conduct policy and the guidelines set forth by Title IX. Which is the real question here.

Though - again - it looks real bad.

tabbyplague®

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As I posted earlier...

Aug 21, 2018, 2:28 PM

No matter what Ohio State is not going to come out of this looking good.

Scenario 1: Urban reported Zack Smith's alleged abuse up the chain in 2015. That begs the question - What action did Athletic Department and University take? If they did something - what was it? What changed in the situation that resulted in Smith's firing three years later in 2018? Without further explanation, this scenario (Urban reporting it to the AD in 2015) appears that the University sat on the allegation (or did very little) and only fired Smith once the allegations hit the media. Not exactly a good look as one might infer that nothing would have happened to Smith if it remained behind closed doors. Either way OSU looks like a bunch of hypocritical dip$h*ts willing to sweep domestic violence under the rug as long as they didn't get caught. Someone at OSU (athletic Director?) is gonna have to take the fall for the 3 years of inaction and the University will do all they can to save face.

Scenario 2: The University was unaware of Zack Smith's alleged abuse in 2015 because Urban did not tell the AD and violated the terms of his contract and title IX. The fact that Urban knew about the allegations is not up for dispute (he admitted as much in his lame statement released a couple weeks ago). This is the best case scenario for the University but the one that die hard OSU fans will not like. If this is the case, I see no way the University can excuse Myer's behavior and not punish him. If the University goes light on the punishment (i.e. couple of game suspension, dock some pay etc...) then the press will have a field day. If the University fires Meyer - a lot of idiot OSU fans will be in up in arms but most of the press will commend them for taking such action.

Regardless, OSU is tainted by this whole mess and Urban Meyer has had the band-aid ripped off his lying face to expose his true character. What amazes me is that Urban and/or the University wanted to give cover for a lower level position coach of questionable character. They could have quietly let him go in 2015 for "undisclosed" reasons instead of waiting 3 years when it was a forced firing due to the negative press.

The one bit of luck for OSU is that the recent Maryland story and their idiot coach is taking a lot of the press' attention away from the Zack Smith/Urban Meyer issue right now...