sean spencer

It's over. Mark Dantonio has retired, which is a bit of a bummer since I really could have used another couple years of beating the brakes off him while he brought in recruits snatched away from colleges I'm pretty sure aren't real. The timing of the latest salvos in the Curtis Blackwell lawsuit kind of look like the cause:

Blackwell's lawyers allege:

►Dantonio orchestrated employment for the parents of two MSU football players, with mega-donor Bob Skandalaris, whose name is on the football facility.

►Dantonio had Blackwell accompany him on a Metro Detroit home visit of an unnamed five-star recruit, when Blackwell, in his role as director of college advancement and performance, wasn't authorized to conduct off-campus visits.

Dantonio said in his Jan. 10 deposition that Blackwell never did any home visits because it would've been an NCAA violation. He did recall Blackwell once traveling with him to see a recruit, but that Blackwell remained in the car.

In his filing, Paterson said Blackwell "is prepared to provide the court with an affidavit attesting" to the visit of the five-star recruit, which can be "verified by the former five-star recruit and his parents, who were also present during the recruiting visit."

Paterson and Blackwell declined to provide the recruit's name to The Detroit News.

As for the first claim, Dantonio, in his Jan. 10 deposition, said he never directed Blackwell to talk to Skandalaris about employment for family members of "high profile recruits," but he acknowledged that family members were hired — and all were approved by MSU's compliance department, Dantonio said.

Although this might have been in the works for a while but Dantonio wanted to hang on so he could cash in a 4.3 million dollar bonus he was due a month ago. Just a couple month ago he was blathering on about "completing the circle", so I think Blackwell did it.

If not, well… tomorrow is signing day. If so that's the way Dantonio really should have gone out: collecting a reward by being disingenuous.

My dude just tweeted the typical statement about how he'll always be a part of the program, the program he loves so dearly, the program he just charged a cool $4.3 million to resign the day before Signing Day

lol https://t.co/WoMJrjiwXJ

— Jerry Hinnen (@JerryHinnen) February 4, 2020

Dantonio was a good football coach. He also had absolutely no scruples. It didn't matter if you pulled a gun on someone, broke a guy's jaw with a sucker punch, had a disturbing pattern of sexual assault, drove a car while "super drunk," or literally got out of jail two days before a game. Y'all were playing. A square jaw, a little public faith, and some wins over Michigan meant it didn't matter.

It was rough justice that Dantonio's breakthrough recruiting class would be his undoing when Auston Robertson, the guy with the pattern of sexual assault, reported three of his classmates for rape. It's really sad that MSU football had to dole out that much damage to innocent bystanders for anything to happen, and then it seems like the only reason it did happen is because football recruits finally refused to go there if they had any other options. MSU, the institution, continues to not give a shit about anything other than winning games and cover the administration's ass.

At least in this case the comeuppance was righteous.

[After the JUMP: money talks]