Free Ohio State Football Tickets the benefits and the scrutiny --- some interesting points
While it's known that Universities across the country give free football tickets to players, which are normally used for friends and family members, it's interesting to see how many Ohio State players used their tickets for non family members. The article states the players never touch the tickets, and the compliance department questions all receipients on details of relationship, their dealings with one another ... etc.....
It's hard to believe that anyone could back Ohio State's compliance department when you see some of the people who received tickets. It's an NCAA known rule that tickets cannot go to anyone who has business dealings with a players, and it came public that the compliance department regularly sent players to Aaron Kniffin at Jack Maxton and Jason Goss at Auto Direct. Then, how would the compliance department say they didn't know the players dealt with them when they were given free tickets??? That's a violation right there against Ohio State's program and compliance department.
"Ted Sarniak, Pryor's mentor, was given tickets to 36 of the 39 games the quarterback played in as a Buckeye -- the most given to a non-family member. Sarniak's wife, Kathleen, had tickets to 21 games. Messages left at Sarniak's business, Jeannette Specialty Glass, in Jeannette, Pa., were not returned."
Let me guess.... Pryor never gets any money from Sarniak ... who is a millionaire????
Interestingly ... Tressel is given 40 free tickets per game ... I wondder where all of those tickets go?
Story Link http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2011/06/free_ohio_state_football_ticke…
Whew, I thought all the ohio state stories were done. Glad I got my fix
It's just another sign that the compliance department at OSU was basically completely inept and has admitted that they purposely violated NCAA regulations. Not proof of inappropriate benefits, but there was no investigation or checking things oiut by compliance there.
In and of itself, nothing much, but it's another paint stroke in the picture.
Could you in the future--or even by editing this post--make it clearer which part of your post is a quotation from the article? Because it's kind of difficult to tell. Either place quotations marks around the quote or--better yet--highlight the material that's a quote and click on the quotation button.
Sarniak is known--at a minimum-- to have paid Pryor for summer jobs. So, there is a violation right there.
Actually, though, it's the tip of an iceberg.
The NCAA had better insist on knowing the content of all those text messages, phone calls and emails between Tressel and Sarniak. Also, they had better be more transparent this time, in the disclosure of their investigation---unlike the last one with Clarret.
I'm not saying you're wrong, but do you have a link to a story about that? I haven't seen it yet.
Also, on the second part of your post: why isn't OSU reporting a breach of FERPA on Tressel's behalf if that information is privileged, as they claim it is to all of their FOIA requests. Shouldn't it either be a) confidential, in which case Tressel violated federal law or b) covered by FOIA in which case OSU is violating their state law by not releasing it?
Outstanding point. It would seem that if they are ever having to defend this stuff in a court of law (which isn't actually likely to happen), they would have to pick one or the other- I believe it's very similar to equitable estoppel, which says a party can't make one claim/fact representation, and then make another that directly contradicts it throughout the course of litigation. They've got to pick one or the other. I surmise they'd report Tressel as having violated FERPA if they have to pick one or the other. But...actually, since Tressel isn't their employee anymore, they don't necessarily have to. And I'm not sure that a FERPA violation is actually an NCAA violation; they are two different governing regimes. It seems odd that one could violate the law and not violate an NCAA bylaw of some sort, but I guess it's possible.
Well I doubt a FERPA violation equals lost scholarships, but it adds "violated federal law" to Tressel's outstanding resume.
I have no idea if they are required to report a privacy violation by a former employee, but I was under the impression that if OSU kept up the redacting a FOIA lawsuit was getting more and more likely. At some point it's a straight cost-benefit analysis by the AP or ESPN or the Columbus Dispatch with them deciding how much money they're willing to risk on the chance that there are more serious violations they could scoop.
It's actually very likely that Pryor and perhaps Sarniak will have to answer to tax evasion claims. While not OSU, that may result in the same info.
Regarding point one, the link below from mgoblog notes that Pryor had a summer job from Sarniak. I don't kno how long that continued in the open, after Pryor came to OSU. But, it was a clear indication that Pryor "did business" with Sarniak.
Regarding point two, you make a very interesting point, which I had not thought of. I agree with you. Possibly, however, OSU is trying to squirm out of the bind by claiming that Tressel's calls were "personal" and therefore not subject to disclosure. I believe they made that claim for a number of Smith's and Tressel's calls. But I really wonder if their claim can hold up. Are they just trying to play for time, hoping that the NCAA will close off the investigation prematurely and ignore a lot of the "loose ends?"
http://mgoblog.blogspot.com/2008/01/who-is-ted-sarniak.html
The "personal" excuse doesn't work. FWIW, whenever anyone uses a business or public university education email account or cell phone (text) there is generally no expectation of privacy in those communications, and normally there is an employee handbook expressly covering that. As to OSU, that's important b/c the FOIA allows discovery of nonprivileged communications. There is no reasonable claim that could be made regarding Sarniak and privilege. The only thing that could potentiall prohibit that material going public would be FERPA or on Ohio equivalent, but to my knowledge Sarniak has never been a guardian only a "mentor"/employer/etc. It should come out, eventually.
I think what further hurts their "personal calls" claim is that calls were deemed "personal" by Smith and Tressell... They were allowed to go through the call records and determine themselves which should be considered personal.
Seems like a reasonable way of doing things.
/s
way before the rest of the world. I think Sarniak's connection to tsio will be HUGE in the end.
http://mgoblog.blogspot.com/2008/01/who-is-this-corvette.html
Apparently the rules have changed from the mid-80s but back then, comp tickets were only allowed to go to family members. When the ticket form was filled out, the person's relationship to the player had to be written on the form.
challenge to OSU's failure to release the requested documents?