Sparty fires Mel Tucker / hires Jonathan Smith

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[RF2044]

Huge break for MSU, to be able to get out of that asinine contract that they knee jerked to him after that one good season. Too bad.

 

[texascpa]

Where's the copy of the contract?

 

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[texascpa]

There are always two sides to a story, and while I understand it is in our nature to jump to conclusions, particularly in matters of sexual misconduct, Tucker's statement leaves a lot of questions unanswered. We were led to believe that Ms. Tracy was heavily involved in the program and that these allegations just recently came to light. Looks like neither were true. It will be interesting to see how this is resolved, but I suspect Tucker has coached his last game at MSU, even if he's done nothing wrong, outside of infidelity.

 

[ForCuseSake]

Huge break for MSU, to be able to get out of that asinine contract that they knee jerked to him after that one good season. Too bad.

What you did there, I see!

 

[Dick_in_MI]

There are a whole bunch of fine points to this situation. It does appear that it was at least partially consensual, although that alone is not enough to exonerate someone. Being consensual in one area for awhile does not give the other party free rein to cross the boundary beyond that into an inappropriate area.

MSU knew about this quite some time ago and only went public when the whole thing blew up. That looks very bad, especially given the Nasser situation (which, of course, also involved failures with USA Gymnastics, our local township police force, and local gymnastics school). SU knew about Hillsman before the public ever did too. There is an unfortunate tendency to look the other way and hope things blow over when it comes to an athletic scandal.

There is a lot of focus locally on who leaked the name of a person who was alleging sexual harassment. That is a big no-no.

I can't believe he will ever coach again, anywhere. I'm pretty sure Quentin Hillsman has ever resurfaced after SU's situation.

Truthfully, I feel sorry for the students and faculty who attend and work for an otherwise fine academic institution. The campus has not totally recovered from the mass shooting and killings, nor has the community. The students and faculty had nothing to do with any of this. Just one more case of a powerful, and wildly overpaid in the grand scheme of the world guy, being in a position where he thinks the rules don't apply to him. And quite possibly an administration who perhaps willingly kept their head in the sand so as not to tarnish an athletic program.

 

[Eric15]

Mel Tucker being sleazy is basically the best thing that could happen to Michigan State. From Day 1 I thought the money they were giving this guy based on such a small sample size was utterly insane.

 

[Capt. Tuttle]

Yeah, they taught us this in kindergarten.

The loss of basic manners will be the down fall of our society.

 

[kmart128]

This woman just seems to be playing victim card... Im sure if she did initiate that night and send pictures then there is proof that it was entirely consensual.

And how do you just not hang up the phone. Her not hanging up is all the proof that Tucker needs that it was consensual.

 

[PoppyHart]

Her "brand" is mud.

 

[qdawgg]

This woman just seems to be playing victim card... Im sure if she did initiate that night and send pictures then there is proof that it was entirely consensual.

And how do you just not hang up the phone. Her not hanging up is all the proof that Tucker needs that it was consensual.

If people still needed proof that victim blaming still exists…….

 

[Cusefan95]

MSU knew about this quite some time ago and only went public when the whole thing blew up. That looks very bad, especially given the Nasser situation (which, of course, also involved failures with USA Gymnastics, our local township police force, and local gymnastics school). SU knew about Hillsman before the public ever did too. There is an unfortunate tendency to look the other way and hope things blow over when it comes to an athletic scandal.

While MSU doesn't want to get dragged through the mud further, they will need to come up with a sizable buyout for Tucker to just walk away. If the plan is to fire for cause and pay him nothing, Tucker has roughly 79 million reasons to fight this and nothing to lose. I suspect this is going to play out similar to the Ollie situation at UConn, with protracted court battles...I will be shocked if Tucker doesn't at least try to pursue a racial discrimination angle as well.

That may play into universities taking their time with situations like this - they want to build a rock solid case prior to terminating for cause. In both both Ollie situation and with Tucker, the public release of information may have forced them to make a move they weren't really prepared for (but now had to make anyway) - and that speeding up of the process will ultimately cost MSU millions of dollars (just like the Ollie situation cost UConn).

I think administrators (or any business leaders) are in a much more difficult and delicate situation when something like this comes up than most people realize.

 

[Dick_in_MI]

They aren’t alleging anything illegal…yet. They are terminating him based upon breach of contract for violating some clauses.

At the end of the day, both sides are simply saber rattling at this point. We all know that eventually a financial settlement settlement will be made and Tucker will go away.

 

[texascpa]

If people still needed proof that victim blaming still exists…….

this isn't victim blaming, this is questioning the actual situation that occurred. Well, maybe, saying "why didn't she just hang up" could be construed as victim blaming, but it could also be trying to understand why someone didn't act a certain way. Saying "she had it coming to her" would be victim blaming.

 

[Cusefan95]

They aren’t alleging anything illegal…yet. They are terminating him based upon breach of contract for violating some clauses.

At the end of the day, both sides are simply saber rattling at this point. We all know that eventually a financial settlement settlement will be made and Tucker will go away.

"Eventually" is the key. Ollie had $11.1MM remaining on his contract, was fired for cause...and was awarded $11.1MM in arbitration. Then as an extra kick in the teeth, UConn paid out a $3.9MM discrimination settlement to avoid a lawsuit. That wasn't exactly a pretty process, and general as monetary stakes increase - battles grow uglier.

I think unless MSU is willing and able to buy him out for north of $40MM, this will go down the same basic path as Ollie but much uglier and vitriolic. If Tucker accepts less than that, I would be very surprised.

 

[Dick_in_MI]

"Eventually" is the key. Ollie had $11.1MM remaining on his contract, was fired for cause...and was awarded $11.1MM in arbitration. Then as an extra kick in the teeth, UConn paid out a $3.9MM discrimination settlement to avoid a lawsuit. That wasn't exactly a pretty process, and general as monetary stakes increase - battles grow uglier.

I think unless MSU is willing and able to buy him out for north of $40MM, this will go down the same basic path as Ollie but much uglier and vitriolic. If Tucker accepts less than that, I would be very surprised.

Tucker is 51 and may want to coach again. Me? If I was handed $40M I would be happy to walk away from having to debase myself to get an 18 year old kid to play for me.

But coaches are often a different animal.

It would not surprise me if both sides settled on a figure and went public with statements that didn’t ruin future jobs for him (after a suitable period of penance, of course. And golf)

MSU- Coach Tucker is a fine man who unfortunately made a mistake and violated the code of conduct clause in his contract. We have no doubt that he will be successful again but we have parted ways. Etc etc etc

Tucker- I am truly sorry for any embarrassment I have caused this fine university. I didn’t realize I was doing anything improper and still am not sure that I did. However, I have vowed to learn from this and agree that it is best that we part ways. I am a changed man and look forward to moving on from this. I won’t be taking any questions, as I have an early tee time tomorrow.

 

[djorange1989]

This woman just seems to be playing victim card... Im sure if she did initiate that night and send pictures then there is proof that it was entirely consensual.

And how do you just not hang up the phone. Her not hanging up is all the proof that Tucker needs that it was consensual.

Worst post ever

 

[baggerbob]

Worst post ever

There are too many of these cases where people who have no respect for doing the right thing and get caught.
Then they try to blame someone else, Franklin from Penn State is an example, after the rapes at Vanderbilt, should never have coached again.
These coaches make big money and their actions influence the players they coach.
They make big money, and should be held to a higher standard.

 

[qdawgg]

this isn't victim blaming, this is questioning the actual situation that occurred. Well, maybe, saying "why didn't she just hang up" could be construed as victim blaming, but it could also be trying to understand why someone didn't act a certain way. Saying "she had it coming to her" would be victim blaming.

Questioning the victim would be putting all the evidence in context to form an opinion. A short tweet like, FB type response that sounds emotionally based comes off as victim blaming IMO. But I see you liked his response, so we’re on different ends of the spectrum in situations like this.

 

[Crusty]

With four grown daughters, benefit of the doubt goes to the female in this case.

We will hear more than we care to before this is over, especially with 79 million at stake.

 

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[RF2044]

I hope we at least kick the tires on OL / DTs.

 

[djorange1989]

That program is a trainwreck, they are worse than Northwestern right now. Speaking of Northwestern, I hope everyone saw that they overcame a 31-10 4th quarter deficit and beat Minnesota last weekend. Made me laugh.

Anyway, will be interesting to see who goes into the portal and jumps off the sinking ship. Guessing they will end up settling with Tucker, he will litigate it as far as it can go and they will inevitably want to move on