Baylor: Still Not Enough

You can now add the football coach to the list of people being reported fired at Baylor University for the rape scandal.

This should've been the first one, to be blunt -- you have a prima facie case against him, he is responsible for the conduct of his players.  I am so sick and tired of "What do they have to do?  Babysit them??"  If you're going to actually employ or have as a player such an animal, frankly, YES YOU DO.  You have a responsibility to your team, whatever "franchise" it is, and (especially in this case) the safety of everyone else around to take whatever steps become necessary to ensure that these people don't literally become menaces to society (such that this is possible in the Sport of Brain Damage and CTE).

When you have a half a dozen football players who are basically either already in prison, headed there, or being covered up to prevent the first two, the coaching staff should go with them under the crime of "accessory" or "aiding and abetting".  At some point, when you have a pattern of this kind of behavior, it is clear that it's not just "a few bad apples".

A large-scale investigation was handed to Baylor's remaining staff today (current word is that Ken Starr will be "reassigned").  The report is published, you can find the PDF file here:

1. The investigating party found "a fundamental failure by Baylor to implement Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (Title IX) and the Violence Against Women Reauthorization
   Act of 2013 (VAWA)."  
2. Baylor's responses to reports of this violence "were slow, ad hoc, and hindered by a lack of institutional support and engagement by senior leadership."
3. And there was no recourse under student conduct:  The report "found that the University’s student conduct processes were wholly inadequeate to consistently provide a prompt and equitable response under Title IX".

The document then goes into detail into almost 15 pages of charges against just the football program regarding conduct which could get the University fundamentally shut down with respect to it's disrespect of female students under Title IX.

You really need to read this document.  You need to for several reasons, but I'll give one more just for the obvious:  As people well know, Baylor is one of the few colleges that has actually been able to crack into a more successful program in the only two relevant college sports.

Well, we now know why.

Baylor University (like several cautionary tales before them) created an environment that the athletes were inmates that basically ran the asylum.  As such, their success on the field (and on the court as well) can be tied to a systematic pattern of student and administrator misconduct, and it all basically needs to be nullified.

I found a second .PDF file giving the recommendations to Baylor as to what it needs to do, and most of it is dry stuff:  "Hey guys, follow Title IX" and all that shit.

I like the "apologies and appropriate remedies" one.  This includes financial, probably to the tune of at least eight figures against the victims.

But I have one "appropriate remedy", and there is only one in this case.  THE COMPLETE ABOLITION OF THE BAYLOR ATHLETIC PROGRAM.

This goes back almost 15 years.  Baylor had been an also-ran for many years in the relevant college sports.  In 2003, Patrick Dennehy disappeared and was found murdered by a Baylor teammate.  Further research into Dennehy's presence on the team indicated that Baylor University was engaged in a myriad of violations:

• Dennehy and another player were illegally paid their tuition by the coach (he "resigned").
• The coach was engaged in a series of lies about Dennehy, ranging from posing as his father to portraying Dennehy as a drug dealer!!
• The murderer's wife exposed a massive situation of drug use within the program.  Players routinely failed drug tests for marijuana, but this was never reported.
• The coach was tied to further violations at SMU when the football program was killed by the NCAA (this was the only reason further sanctions weren't given).
• Meals were paid for by coaches.
• Numerous other smaller violations were found.

Basically, by this point, you had cause to shut down the Baylor basketball program -- but The Show Must Go On.  The team probably would've been Death Penaltied for 2005-2006 (and was eligible), but the damage to the monetary worth of their conference meant that Baylor was forced to play conference games only for that season.  Baylor had been to the NCAA tournament once in a half-century.

While we're here, let's add the women's basketball program to the mix.

In 2012, days after the women's team made history and won forty games undefeated to win the national championship, the NCAA found over 1,200 impermissible phone calls within the men's and women's basketball program.  Lesser penalties were imposed.

About the same time the men's program was beginning to get into trouble, the women's program had reached the NCAA Tournament for the first time in a quarter century.

And then let's circle back to the football and show how devastating some of this garbage is.

The scandal, at the very least, covers the 2009-2016 time period.

From the moment it joined the Big XII in 1996 until this reign of terror began, Baylor was a 1-4 win team.  All of a sudden, about the same time this rape spree and coverup began, the team has gone to six consecutive bowls, winning three, and having their most successful years in four of the last five seasons.

It's time to shut down the Baylor athletic program.  Not just the football.  The university is completely fucking incapable of running an honorable dog show, much less an NCAA athletic program.

It's time to seriously consider shutting down Baylor University, period.  With this pattern of complete lack of regard of human life, dignity, and decency, on at least two different occasions now (if not more! -- I'm lumping this entire 2009-2016 fiasco into one.), we're getting near Penn State levels at this point.

Since the NCAA has no fucking spine, I fully expect about as far as this will go is maybe a two-year bowl-ban and other restrictions.  But the NCAA has no business adjudicating college sports anymore in the first damned place.