Zach And Urban
[Eric Upchurch]
So I guess we should talk about this now:
COLUMBUS, Ohio – Text messages I have obtained, an exclusive interview with the victim and other information I have learned shows Ohio State coach Urban Meyer knew in 2015 of domestic abuse allegations against a member of his coaching staff.
Courtney Smith, ex-wife of fired Ohio State assistant coach Zach Smith, provided text messages between her and the wives of Ohio State coaches – including Urban Meyer’s wife, Shelley – showing Meyer’s knowledge of the situation.
Meyer said last week during Big Ten Media Days that he had no knowledge of two alleged domestic violence incidents in 2015 with former assistant wide receivers coach Zach Smith that were investigated by the Powell (Ohio) Police Department.
Meyer said had he known, he would have fired Smith in 2015 – three years before he did last week after I reported the alleged domestic violence.
If you haven't been following this story, it goes like this:
- Earle Bruce has a child, who has a son in turn. This person gets named "Zach Smith."
- Smith listens to "Bawitdaba" nonstop for 28 years.
- Smith gets hired at Ohio State because nepotism and proceeds to go on a series of childish rants on twitter. His coaching acumen appears to consist of yelling "hashtag zone six!" at his charges, who respond by dropping balls so emphatically their hands also fall off.
- Smith has a series of domestic violence charges during this period starting in 2009, when he threw his pregnant wife into a wall, with additional police involvement in 2015 and this year.
- Reporter Brett McMurphy exposes Smith shortly before Big Ten Media days, prompting a series of questions from reporters to Meyer; according to Courtney Smith, Zach's ex-wife, Meyer lied about his knowledge of the situation.
- Smith gets fired.
The above article is damning and should be read in its entirety. Smith's abuse was scary and persistent; a text exchange between Courtney Smith and Shelley Meyer asks whether Smith has a restraining order—which is read as obviously necessary—and says "he scares me."
Unless Urban Meyer can make the case that his wife decided not to tell him about the years of abuse Courtney Smith was enduring—and that every OSU coach's wife made the same decision—this is a case of an institution knowingly employing a serial abuser. This isn't against the law. It's not against NCAA rules. It should be unacceptable in the court of public opinion, and you'd hope that would be enough to drum other folks out of their jobs up to and including Meyer.
I'm skeptical this will happen. OSU was readying a full-throated defense of Jim Tressel ("I just hope he doesn't fire me") when it became clear that directly lying to the NCAA four times would inevitably result in a show-cause that would terminate Tressel whether OSU wanted to or not. Without a similar sword hanging over OSU's neck*, their choice is to either disrupt their football golden era or follow the example that Meyer provided—downplay, hide, dismiss, survive. I got a dollar on the second playbook.
*[McMurphy thinks there might be Title IX issues. As we've seen at MSU—why are our rivals all so awful—those take years and rarely touch the levers of power.]
August 1st, 2018 at 12:24 PM ^
Lot of OSU fans prepping to win gold in Mental Gymnastics this fall.
Urban just didn't want to do anything to hurt their marriage, didn't think it was his place. ;)
It was his religious side, was just trying to follow the word of god.
but what about that Grad assistant thing in Fla?
A majority of the comments over at 11warrirors are insane. Various levels of victim blaming and justifications for why Meyer lied on camera about not knowing.
I wouldn’t say majority. In fact there’s a lot of level headed people saying things along the lines of “let this play out” and “if true, he should be gone”. Both correct takes at the moment.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:07 PM ^
Not that we can afford to ease up the vigilance. There are more than a few obnoxious twits here and elsewhere saying it's things like education and integrity that hold Michigan back, and we should abandon all principles in a scorched-earth pursuit of national titles.
Second, Beilein and Harbaugh have demonstrated integrity on more than one occasion, but the school is more than just those coaches, and UofM has a serious issue of institutional secrecy.
This is OSU's problem, but I feel no schadenfreude, and I'm uncomfortable aware of just how many people here -- including high up the org chart -- would have us go down the same road in a heartbeat.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:55 PM ^
"Not that we can afford to ease up the vigilance. There are more than a few obnoxious twits here and elsewhere saying it's things like education and integrity that hold Michigan back, and we should abandon all principles in a scorched-earth pursuit of national titles."
Amen.
I spoke to some friends over the fourth, alumni, who were angry at Harbaugh over the trips. 'Just win! Stop all the other stuff.'.
I can't understand that.
I'm so happy that he does those trips, and encourages his players to work, and do extracurriculars. Having a good football program is about so much more than the W/L stat.
Would you want to be a long term MSU fan, with a great story of coming from mediocrity to being a legit power, but always with that bad case of 'scandal heartburn' in the back of your throat?
Would you want to be an OSU fan, with a legitimately great team, but always knowing that your head coach at least tacitly allowed a woman, and possibly her kids, to be endangered by a violent abuser?
I wouldn't. No way.
I think we'll get to powerhouse status in the B1G again. But so far, it looks like we are doing it the right way.
I do think, 100%, that we need to cut down on the secrecy. That always worries me a bit. But so far, so good.
Responding to emphasize your point: the school has a secrecy problem. Brian and others ran into it with the Dave Brandon FOIAs and I have heard complaints from outside the athletic sphere on the same point. The more people know and can put pressure on those connected to the school to do the right thing, the better.
If I was allowed to participate with you upvoting folk, I would. Well said, Dragonchild.
"at least now it is public knowledge that Urban Meyer is a bad human"
Hasn't it been public knowledge for a while? He's been doing this type of crap since his Florida days, then when that stuff started to catch up to him, he faked heart problems and goes to OSU. Did people actually think that he magically became a good person?
no but now there is concrete evidence
August 1st, 2018 at 11:50 AM ^
AFAIK based on me working for a school, there are Title IX issues and OSU should be worried about that if Meyer knew and did nothing and other coaches knew and did nothing. Don't forget Shelly Meyer is an employee of OSU too. Then again, football > laws and morality.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:06 PM ^
To elaborate...Title IX applies to students AND employees of academic institutions. It also covers domestic abuse outside of the academic institution. Report not just suspected victims, but also suspected perps. During training we were taught tons of examples - If a student said I am beating my younger sibling to a pulp at home and the sibling goes to another school I have to report it, which makes me think the Meyers do have a Title IX investigation coming their way.
We are told that if we hear or think something might have happened we always must report it up the food chain and not doing so is an offense that will get you fired. We are told better safe than sorry - report it up the food chain, etc...
So OSU employees Shelley and Urban Meyer knew another employee was doing domestic abuse and didn't do anything. I think this would have to be reported and acted upon.
Anyone else have more specific info?
August 1st, 2018 at 12:12 PM ^
While this makes sense, Urban did say he reported it up and claimed that he was told nothing really happened.
I'm in the boat that OSU will do nothing and just hope it dies down.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:40 PM ^
how could he have reported it if he stated he no knowledge of it?
The problem is this, what did he report? He just lied to the media about what he knew and when he knew it. Did he lie about reporting it? Did he lie about what he knew in his reporting? Did he report it in 2018 and not years ago when he knew?
They'll find some grad assistant or admin person who he reported it to that they can scapegoat and fire.
Then do nothing else unless it's absolutely required by authorities, and stonewall them if it is.
Not saying this is impossible, but this is highly unlikely for a couple of reasons.
#1 Title IX law clearly indicates that there are certain designated people that report Title IX violations to. I can't tell a custodian and then wipe my hands clean...there are usually only a few people you can report to, to fulfill the law. So if someone falls on the sword for Urban it won't be a measly Grad Assistant.
#2 Urban has already told and been caught in his lie at the BigTen media day. If he goes back and says that he reported it at the time...it becomes less believable that he wouldn't have just told the truth to the media at the BigTen media day.
Can't verify it, but a Buckeye on Cleveland.com is claiming that there are only 2 people that he can fulfill the Title IX requirement of reporting suspected abuse to. So if someone falls on their sword for Urban - they have 2 options...and this assumes you can explain his lie to the media day rather than just saying he told the right person.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:20 PM ^
Agreed - Title IX investigation is guaranteed. Would not shock me that both Mr. & Mrs. Meyer resign from their jobs within a matter of days. Urban's wife is especially vulnerable given the text messages and years of a collaborative cover-up. She would no doubt get fired.
Have you followed any of MSU's shenanigans? If Izzo can get out of that with no actual punishment then why expect anything to happen to Urban? Izzo played rapists and had a grad assistant coach on his staff who punched a woman in public and kept his job on Izzo's staff.
The ncaa is a joke man.
It's absolutely awful what happened at MSU, but as sad as it is, with the NCAA, it seems like the bigger fish gets attention. We got hit with that stupid over practice ru;e and it was everywhere because we're Michigan. Sparty can have the biggest chip on their shoulder, but in the big scheme of universities / visibility to the NCAA, they're not on par with Michigan or OSU. There will be much more media eyes on OSU's allegations then MSU's and public / media will keep a close eye. I have a hard time believing OSU will be able to just sweep this under the rug like basically MSU did. It's just awful for the victims no matter what the circumstances.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:17 PM ^
Yep, his wife knowing and (as far as the public knows) doing nothing seems to be the most likely part to get a reaction from the institution, as it likely improper in some capacity - there's Title IX and there's potentially a duty to act on her behalf as a nurse employed by the institution with knowledge of another university employee's physical abuse.
She is also a nurse and has to report.
August 1st, 2018 at 11:50 AM ^
The "la la la can't hear you" school of public relations almost always works; you can bet it will here.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:03 PM ^
It didn't work here, at least.
It depends on the public, which in this case is OSU fans, so. . . uh. . . yeah, it'll work.
Vis a vis collusion and cover-up among the OSU football program and its win-at-all-costs philosophy, the pathologically irrational fanbase, the administration, the local cops and prosecutor--what we have here is multiple times more insular and fucked up than what happened at MSU. You could torch the entire city of Columbus and Urban Meyer would be the only one still standing.
August 1st, 2018 at 11:51 AM ^
Zero Tolerance.
Unless it's your guy.
Or he helps your baseball team win.
Or he's a good coach.
If Art Briles can get job interviews, Meyer's skillset will keep him employed despite his being a horrible person.
August 1st, 2018 at 11:52 AM ^
Greg Schiano new head coach at Ohio State? But no, nothing will happen.
August 1st, 2018 at 11:52 AM ^
But Harbaugh is Catholic, so(checks notes) he wants to meet the Pope and stuff. Excellent
August 1st, 2018 at 11:53 AM ^
This obviously isn't important in the scheme of things, but just whatinhell is "Bawitdaba"
August 1st, 2018 at 11:54 AM ^
Were you in a coma for the entirety of 1999 and 2000?
August 1st, 2018 at 12:14 PM ^
I don't like the song and I literally haven't heard it for years and now thanks to Brian it's stuck in my head. This is worse than that MIDI Hail to the Victors they played on the troll site.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:17 PM ^
Give Don a break. I remember it all too well and I never knew the title of the damn thing (beyond "that one Kid Rock song").
Yeah, I kind of thought the title was "My Name is Kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiid Rock"
August 1st, 2018 at 12:23 PM ^
Apparently it's something by that douchebag with the long straight hair and dumbass hat. If I've ever heard a Kid Rock song in my life, I wouldn't be able to identify it.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:28 PM ^
Just went to the link to it downthread, and nope never heard it before. Judging from the 30 seconds I was able to stand, JFC you people.
August 1st, 2018 at 11:56 AM ^
Kid Rock song. THE Kid Rock song, really.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:04 PM ^
I felt a little bad cracking up when reading an article on this topic but that line from Brian is hilarious.
August 1st, 2018 at 11:54 AM ^
If Urban coached a non-revenue sport, he would be fired by I dunno, 5 PM?
But he doesn't, so the fanbase will mostly rally around the flag and circle the wagons and whatever other cliches you want to use.
It's kinda like the standing ovation from the Izzone for Izzo in reaction to the ESPN article... during a teal out to support Nassar's victims.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:07 PM ^
I went over to 11W just to see how they were reacting. A couple of fans willing to say Urban should be fired, but way more want to yell at one of their bloggers Ramzy for a tweet saying he knew everything and didn't do anything.
They'd rather see their blog fall than their coach/program.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:12 PM ^
Ramzy's tweet is pretty gross, for the record.
It says that he knew, everybody knew, and that they wrote around it for six years. That while they didn't have the texts and photos McMurphy got they heard the rumors and didn't bother investigating, basically.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:38 PM ^
I saw that and was pretty amazed, because (1) despite his poorly-chosen allegiances, he seems like he's generally a pretty good and intelligent guy, and (2) as Brian mentions, Smith was a horrible on-field coach, so why wouldn't Ramzy want to expose Smith and force him out?
August 1st, 2018 at 12:49 PM ^
Because it hits Urban.
August 2nd, 2018 at 12:53 PM ^
A boss shouldn't get in trouble if one of his underlings does something bad, so long as the boss takes the appropriate steps to discipline the underling. The only way in which the boss becomes responsible is if he covers up for him.
Because he didn't have the expertise to conduct such an investigation properly, and because he feared the consequences for his actual job. The guy is a blogger, not a reporter. I don't blame him for being reluctant to stick his dick in a meat grinder, just hoping no one is pissed off enough to turn the handle.
Brian, 11W, and the amateurs at the Daily have broken news pretty regularly. I don't buy this excuse.
August 1st, 2018 at 12:13 PM ^
True, but in all fairness if I had to choose between Michigan football success and Mgoblog...I would probably be really sad whilst reading Maize n Brew, TTB and WoverineWire
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