Can We Play Football Now?
You know how the end of The Sopranos leaves you really unsatisfied? At a time when you’re expecting to be given a sense of finality and resolution, you’re left wondering with a few key questions remaining unanswered and you just kind of sit there and stare at the TV for 15 minutes.
As I sat and watched President Drake, Gene Smith, and Coach Meyer address the media last night, I felt the same lack of resolution. After hours of waiting for a verdict, we were somehow left with an outcome that (as 11W put it) left no one happy. A 3-game suspension serves as a middle ground in what many hoped was an all-or-nothing predicament.
Perhaps, more than the verdict, the expectation was the problem. There was no way that the investigative team was going to come out and explicitly declare whether or not domestic violence transpired in the Smith household. Ultimately, at least in my eyes, that’s the issue that all of this was dependent upon. If Zach definitively hit Courtney and Urban knew about it, he deserved to be fired. If it was determined that Courtney manufactured these accusations in a plot of revenge, then we could’ve reinstated Urban in good faith and relaxed.
Instead, a middle ground. Urban and Gene screwed up, but not to a degree worthy of firing. The university’s initial statement left me satisfied – neither man is thought to have covered anything up, but the university holds these officials to a higher standard than the bare minimum. An admirable direction for the university to take this. But then Urban opened his mouth and the university released its findings report, and that sense of satisfaction quickly dissipated. Between Coach Meyer’s unapologetic demeanor, the report citing “memory issues”, and reports of him scrubbing his phone, it started to feel a little dirtier. The more I found out, the more it felt like Urban knew – and the “high standards” bit started to ring a bit empty.
As I’ve written previously, I like Urban Meyer. I wanted all of this to be false – both because it would mean no violence took place and because a man I respected as a fan and alumnus would be exonerated. I have a really hard time hearing the narrative that Urban Meyer is someone who enabled domestic violence – we’re still not sure whether or not the accusations at hand have any merit. What we do know is that, whether he abused his wife or not, Zach Smith is a piece of shit. If employing a sleazy coach is worthy of a 3-game suspension, then Urban has to be frustrated that nearly every D-1 coach isn’t facing similar punishment. However, I don’t really care. A university that I love and should feel great pride in has been employing and supporting a man in Zach Smith who clearly is an embarrassment to the Ohio State name. If 3 games without our head coach is what it takes to have Zach Smith no longer affiliated with Ohio State, then it’s a price I’m willing to pay.