Urban Meyer set record straight on Aaron Hernandez

huKSer said:
WoodyHayes1951 said:
He doesn't seem to get to much credit for "molding" Tim Tebow. Tim and his parents usually get the praise.
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You mean the under aged Tebow that was involved in stopping Hernandez from getting into a bar fight?
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The whole underage thing is kind of stupid. You can still be in a bar if you're a minor that's not a crime, not to mention you have no idea what time of day it was. They may have just been having dinner.

 
I thought Stewart had a decent take on the situation.

My comment involves Urban Meyer. The whole Aaron Hernandez fiasco has dredged up Internet chatter about Meyer's tenure at Florida and how it appeared to be a situation where the inmates were running the asylum. Could that have been a case where a win-at-all-costs mentality prompted Meyer to gloss over some of the moral responsibilities that should have been inherent in his job?

-- Steve Smith, Burlington, Wis.

First of all, anyone who thinks Meyer, as a football coach, would somehow have had the ability to change the course of history and prevent Hernandez from devolving into an alleged sociopathic murderer by disciplining him differently at Florida is just piling on the coach. Ty Duffy of The Big Lead wrote an excellent piece to that effect. The 31 arrests during Meyer's tenure in Gainesville have been well documented. It's not a flattering number, though it's also hardly unprecedented for a major college football program.

Meyer also has a long history of giving troubled players second and even third chances. You may recall Marty Johnson, the former Utah running back who Meyer allowed to return to the undefeated 2004 Utes despite two DUI arrests. Johnson later wound up in prison following more DUI arrests after his career. I also know that Meyer was haunted by the 2007 overdose death of Avery Atkins, a former Florida cornerback who Meyer had dismissed the year before following two domestic battery arrests. "I can't let go of saying, 'Is there something else we could've done?'" Meyer told Sports Illustrated's S.L. Price in 2009.

I was not inside the walls of Florida's program from 2005-10, so I can't speak to whether "the inmates were running the asylum." I can, however, relay an anecdote from my visit to Ohio State in April. I was allowed to sit in on a weekly life-skills seminar the entire team and staff attended. The players all had notebooks. At the beginning, Meyer quizzed random players about topics ranging from money management to job interviews. The guest speaker that day was former Buckeyes star Chris Spielman, who recounted how he dealt with the tragic death of his wife, Stefanie, in 2009, and implored the players to become good men and husbands. Obviously, Meyer can't force a 19-year-old to pay attention to one of these lectures, nor can he control what they ultimately do with the information. And I don't know what goes on inside Ohio State's program the rest of the week. But I can confirm that, at least for an hour each week, Meyer does more than pay lip service to his "moral responsibility." That doesn't excuse the arrests or his sometimes inconsistent disciplinary decisions. But at the very least, it humanizes a guy who, for whatever reason, seems to draw an incredible amount of ire over the wrongdoings of other people.
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Coqui said:
Mavric said:
Landlord of Memorial Stadium said:
Coqui said:
I take it Pelini is under fire for a guy charged with DUI as well as assaulting a police officer?
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A notable difference being that Alfonzo never got into trouble whilst here; not once.
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That, and he hasn't killed anyone....
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So it's ok, as long as it isn't murder?
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Landlord of Memorial Stadium said:
A notable difference being that Alfonzo never got into trouble whilst here; not once.
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Mavric said:
Coqui said:
Mavric said:
Landlord of Memorial Stadium said:
Coqui said:
I take it Pelini is under fire for a guy charged with DUI as well as assaulting a police officer?
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A notable difference being that Alfonzo never got into trouble whilst here; not once.
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That, and he hasn't killed anyone....
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So it's ok, as long as it isn't murder?
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Yes, that's exactly what I said. Just like you can see in the above quote ... wait...
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"He hasn't killed anyone" specifically says that's a differentiating factor.

Wasn't this talking about the molding of fine upstanding adults? So as soon as the bowl game is done, they can revert back to thuggish tactics and it's not the coaches fault?

(For the record, I really don't believe it's Pelini's fault, just like I don't believe it's Meyers fault.)

 
Coqui said:
"He hasn't killed anyone" specifically says that's a differentiating factor.

Wasn't this talking about the molding of fine upstanding adults? So as soon as the bowl game is done, they can revert back to thuggish tactics and it's not the coaches fault?

(For the record, I really don't believe it's Pelini's fault, just like I don't believe it's Meyers fault.)
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I don't think it's Meyer's fault either. To even suggest it is preposterous. But is there not a "notable difference" between DUI/throwing a punch and killing (possibly) multiple people?

 
Mavric said:
I don't think it's Meyer's fault either. To even suggest it is preposterous. But is there not a "notable difference" between DUI/throwing a punch and killing (possibly) multiple people?
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Yes. It means Hernandez is more of an idiot.

 
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The difference isn't just in the one instance, Hernandez vs. Dennard. It's that over a third of his championship roster has been arrested. I don't get what's so hard to grasp about that.

 
When Bo suspends a player for only half a game for trying to tear someone's eyeballs out of their head, then we'll talk. Urban Meyer had obvious disciplinary issues at Florida. Obvious ones. Not sayin they'll carry over to Ohio St (hopefully he learned for the better), but to argue the issue and difference between Bo Pelini and Urban Meyer as disciplinarians is irresponsible and ignorant. If Meyer was still the coach at Florida, your opinion right now would be the same as ours. Him being the Ohio St coach currently however is clouding your vision some. that's ok though. It'd be expected. I would be guilty of it as well.

 
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