Yesterday Ohio State Athletic Director Gene Smith announced that multiple Buckeye football players, including Terrelle Pryor, Dan Herron and DeVier Posey, had been suspended for five games in 2011 for, in part, receiving extra benefits in the form of tattoos.
During his remarks, Smith said of the situation:
“There are no other NCAA violations around this case. We’re very fortunate that we do not have a systemic problem in our program. This is isolated to these young men, and isolated to this particular instance.”
One former Buckeye football player though disagreed with that statement a few hours after Smith’s comments.
Following Smith’s press conference, ex-Ohio State player Antonio Pittman, who played for the Buckeyes from 2004-06, Tweeted:
This osu tattoo stuff is silly. Cats been gettin hookups on tatts since back in 01
After Pittman’s entry was retweeted by numerous followers, including media members, he deleted the Tweet.
If Pittman is telling the truth, apparently the practice of tattoo-related, extra benefits has been going on for nearly a decade in Columbus.
With prominent media members retweeting Pittman’s revelation, one wonders if the NCAA will follow up on the ex-Ohio State running back’s claim.
Follow Brooks on Twitter for real-time updates.
12:59 pm on December 24th, 2010
Brooks, you are usually thorough with your investigation - but not this time. Seconds after Pittman tweeted that, he said he was just retweeting what a fan said (as a joke) - he didn’t include RT part because it would have gone past the character limit. Just someone that doesn’t know how to use twitter properly - not a source of credible information.
1:40 pm on December 24th, 2010
VN,
You forgot that his account was hacked too.
2:29 pm on December 24th, 2010
Brooks,
Difference is he literally said that in the next tweet seconds later.. not hours/days later when people started calling him out on it. Pretty huge difference - and you should acknowledge that in your article. Otherwise you are just taking it out of context to induce page clicks - a pretty cheap practice that I would hope you are above doing.
1:48 am on December 25th, 2010
NCAA is looking into players not paying cover charges at bars after suspending K-State player. They will have to cancel the 2011 season in all sports if they dig deep or just ask anybody with a brain.
2:04 am on December 25th, 2010
Anyone saying that Pittman deleted the “RT” is full of S*#@. Twitter allows a 140 character limit. That tweet only contained 82 characters. So he had 58 characters to spare if he was retweeting. He no need to delete the RT. VN is not thorough with his investigation….obviously doesn’t know how to use Twitter properly. EPIC FAIL!!
10:38 pm on December 25th, 2010
VN you’re an idiot. Thats no where near 140 characters. Pittman is just an idiot. Get over it. Cats prolly get hook ups all over Columbus.
5:09 pm on December 26th, 2010
VN,
I figure that the NCAA will find out that OSU athletes have been getting a number of “fringe benefits” from Columbus establishments for quite a while. After all, Maurice Clarett magically ended up with a car from a lot owned by the brother of Jim Tressell.
The problem with sports fans is that they always want the rules followed and teams punished right up until their own team gets caught. So I bet you are an Ohio State fan VN.
11:06 pm on December 26th, 2010
Horray, Horray….Ohio Stae in trouble. I bet the program will fade away right? right?….no
Go ahead and have fun with this. Team will be down a bit to open the season given the departures then finish strong and of course beat Michigan but no real accomplishment there.
Then…… the next year and beyond … same ole Buckeyes 11-1, 12- 1 BCS Bowls, NC game and plenty for the jealous to chime in about!
9:43 pm on December 28th, 2010
No cover charge and free tats and that’s an NCAA violation? Look… I get what you’re trying to do. But fact is, if I’m known to be a badass, I get free stuff. That’s life. You can’t punish them for getting free entry and free tats. Free merchandise? Certainly. Money, sure. But intangible favors? Come on. Next thing you know, it’ll be a penalty to use your status as a star athlete to sleep with hot girls.
10:16 am on December 29th, 2010
The tattoo of Antonio Pittman’s brother on his left arm that is shown in the article was not even done in Columbus. He got his tattoo done in Akron, OH at Tattoo Alley. I was with him when he got it done and when he PAID for it. This is stupid.
1:42 pm on December 29th, 2010
Dear KP,
I am Antonio’s brotha. He didn’t pay for the tatt. Cats been gettin hooked up for years. Peace out.
8:08 am on May 27th, 2011
The SMU fans sounded amazingly just like tOSU fans do now several years later, and that is the biggest part of the problem. You must realize this stuff is wrong and (in the case of college athletics) where there is a lot of smoke, there is probably an unseen forest fire. Just like SMU, everyone else is seeing it except the tOSU fans. Wake up and raise the alarm now, before you end up just like SMU. The pressure is too great on the NCAA right now to let even a small infraction pass. Don’t be surprised if tOSU ends up with major penalties, just because the NCAA needs to re-establish their authority and tOSU is offering up a full course meal for them to practice on.
1:26 pm on May 31st, 2011
OSU cheating = death penalty