Yesterday Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel addressed personal emails that showed he repeatedly ignored intimately-detailed warnings from a Columbus attorney that past and present Ohio State football players were giving their Buckeye football player gear and awards to an Ohio man in exchange for tattoo work.
(OSU AD Smith tried to stop Tressel’s response to Yahoo reporter’s question)
The emails also warned the current Ohio State football coach that the same man who two current Buckeye football players were associating with, Edward Rife, was under federal investigation for drug trafficking.
Despite the specific information from the Columbus attorney that Ohio State players were repeatedly breaking NCAA rules and possibly linked to a federal drug investigation, Tressel apparently did not report the troubling news to Ohio State officials or law enforcement.
Tressel withheld the information contained in the emails from NCAA officials throughout a December investigation resulting in multiple rules violations involving current Ohio State players and the same Edward Rife cited in attorney emails to the coach 10 months earlier.
At a press conference Tuesday, Tressel repeatedly said that he did not report the emails to anyone because the attorney who sent them requested confidentiality - and that the contents of the emails included claims of a federal investigation possibly involving current Ohio State football players.
Tressel said at the press conference Tuesday of that confidentiality:
“I needed to keep sight of the fact that confidentiality was requested by the attorney, so I followed that.”
The man who sent Tressel the emails was not involved in the federal investigation - which resulted in no charges being filed against Rife - nor did the emailer identify himself to Tressel as Rife’s attorney.
After his opening remarks to the media Tuesday, Tressel was asked by Yahoo Sports reporter Dan Wetzel:
“Jim, you talked about the confidentiality of the situation and upholding it. Did you forward any of the emails to anyone?“
Following Wetzel’s question, Tressel nodded his head in Wetzel’s direction up and down as to indicate yes. Though before Tressel could speak, Ohio State Athletic Director Gene Smith, who was standing next to Tressel, said, “We can’t get into that right now.”
Smith later cited the NCAA’s ongoing investigation into Tressel’s misconduct as why the coach was noted allowed to answer the question.
I have personally confirmed that Yahoo Sports, Sports Illustrated and ESPN has submitted Freedom of Information Act requests to Ohio State to obtain Tressel’s email records. So long as Ohio State does not alter public records protected under state and federal law, we will soon indisputably know if Tressel forwarded the emails.
If he did, that would seem to contradict Tressel’s earlier claims at the Ohio State press conference that his silence was in response to the attorney emailer’s request and a federal drug investigation.
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2:43 pm on March 9th, 2011
Don’t think it’s that big of a deal. He could have just been acknowledging the question.
2:59 pm on March 9th, 2011
Brooks,
Again, I’ve got to ask… Are you going to dig into the Georgia/Ray Drew recruiting violations like you would if it happened at ANY other school? If it was anybody but Georgia you would already be all over it. Don’t be a hypocrite.
3:26 pm on March 9th, 2011
http://blogs.ajc.com/recruiting/2011/03/09/ray-drews-announcement-results-in-5-ncaa-violations-for-georgia/?cxntfid=blogs_recruiting
3:56 pm on March 9th, 2011
Jim Tressel should be given the congressional medal of honor for the way he handled himself during the press conference yesterday. What a stand up guy. To be honest I think 2 games is a little extreme.
4:08 pm on March 9th, 2011
So let me get this straight, an attorney says “This is confidential. Don’t tell anyone”? And yet the attorney is telling that information to someone who previously was unaware of the situation and had no legal right to the knowledge? Sounds like THAT is the violation of confidentiality. Tressel has no obligation to maintain confidentiality. He DOES have an obligation to OSU and the NCAA to self-report if he believes a violation has occurred. It is then up to those organizations to handle it in whatever manner they deem appropriate. And in the case of OSU, it’s always “Nothing to see here, move along.”
4:19 pm on March 9th, 2011
The UGA story is a non-story. They’re secondary violations at best. Two former players were asked to show up at Drew’s ceremony to announce his commitment. Drew had asked Michael Strahan, a guy who has no ties whatsoever to UGA, to attend, but he declined. Again, it’s clear that it’s a non-story and I’m not even a UGA fan.
5:05 pm on March 9th, 2011
I still don’t get how this isn’t on ESPN? I mean, they’re reporting the story (barely), but not showing any of the evidence, or calling for Tressell to be fired? Not one bit?
I have no idea why this isn’t the lead-in story on ESPN, or why they aren’t showing ANY of the emails at all, but thankfully we have Brooks and other reporters and bloggers who aren’t afraid of the truth.
Then again, I suppose Tressell could always say he didn’t know about it. I know there’s evidence and all, but hey, it seemed to work out pretty well for other football scandals this year…
5:06 pm on March 9th, 2011
So let me get this straight .This attorney that Tressel was supposedly protecting was giving Tressel information that was of a nature that would obstruct a federal investigation.
If those young men were the subject of a drug investigation
Then why did he tip off these young men that the feds were watching them?
This lawyer should not be protected for commiting a crime.
To top that off Tressel had the ability to report this well before the season started since the investigation was already wrapped up in June Even if he reported this to the school and ncaa officials,Which by NCAA rules he was obligated to do in a timely manner ,he could have allowed the ncaa to determine if the information he gave would interfere with said investigation.
The plot thickens
5:17 pm on March 9th, 2011
Looks like the great Sweater Vest will be going down in flames. Love it.
5:22 pm on March 9th, 2011
I ain’t buying it. The NCAA, never comments on information that they have been given. Tressel knows that. He just tried to cross his fingers and pray……see no evil.
6:39 pm on March 9th, 2011
@Rob:
Was Barry Sanders on a jumbotron at a basketball game a bigger story than the Ray Drew violations? I’m pretty sure there were two seperate articles on here about that.
I’ve seen plenty of “non-stories” on here about issues at other schools. Why not bring UGA’s violations to light just like any other school.
For the record, I know it’s not a big deal. That’s not my point, though.
8:35 pm on March 9th, 2011
@Dro
As for the Barry Sanders Jr. situation, wasn’t that the 2nd “questionable” circumstance between he and Saban/Bama? If I recall, Saban “accidentally” bumped into Sanders Jr. on a visit to his high school and reportedly talked to him when he wasn’t supposed to be talking to him. Perhaps the fact that it was the 2nd “questionable” event in Sanders Jr.’s recruitment to Bama is the reason why it was mentioned here.
8:56 pm on March 9th, 2011
@ Dro
@Dro
As for the Barry Sanders Jr. situation, wasn’t that the 2nd “questionable” circumstance between he and Saban/Bama? If I recall, Saban “accidentally” bumped into Sanders Jr. on a visit to his high school and reportedly talked to him when he wasn’t supposed to be talking to him. Perhaps the fact that it was the 2nd “questionable” event in Sanders Jr.’s recruitment to Bama is the reason why it was mentioned here.
8:57 pm on March 9th, 2011
Sorry for the double post. For some reason the first post didn’t show up 20 minutes after I posted it so I posted it again thinking it must not have gone through.
4:38 am on March 10th, 2011
If Tressel forwarded the e-mails in January, upon request, shaking his head is understandable.
The bigger question I haven’t seen anybody address is why Ohio State hadn’t sent in the NCAA report before being scooped by Yahoo? After all, in their own letter to the NCAA, they claim the last interview they conducted was on February 8.
I find it hard to believe that a report with not all that many moving parts to it would take a major university more than a month to complete.
To me, that sends up a red flag that perhaps they were engaged in a cover-up by wiping Tressell’s computer clean. This would make it impossible to detect if he had indeed forwarded the e-mail that was not acted upon by someone else within their admin.
After all, if he did forward the e-mail in a timely manner, and it wasn’t responded to, you’re now looking at a lack of institutional control charge and some serious repercussions.
9:42 am on March 10th, 2011
I believe that there is a coverup here. It seems that certain coaches and schools seem to be exempt from any scandel or any situation that arises. That being said there should be some repercushtions coming forth no matter who is involved. Seems the bigger the school or coach is it is only a slap on the hand. I believe that both the coach and the school should be dealt with, with severity.
1:44 pm on March 10th, 2011
To the fool who asked Brooks about looking into Ray Drew / UGA…….Are you serious????????? This did not involve a current player….coach or anything! All that happened was 2 EX players went to his announcement! Even though this was a minor secondary violation….UGA reported it as soon as it happened! You are comparing apples to oranges!
11:51 pm on March 10th, 2011
@eric
You call it “apples” and “oranges”, I call it “secondary violations” and “secondary violations”.
I know the Georgia thing is no big deal. The only point I’m trying to make is that if it happened at Alabama, Auburn, USC, etc., there would have at least been mention of it on this site. I’m not saying this should get UGA in NCAA trouble, I’m just saying why not even mention it?
and @Rob:
The 1st Barry Sanders “incident” (which was no violation) had it’s own little article on this site as well.