How Long can Ohio State Keep Meyer

Urban Meyer may be done at Ohio State and people are wondering what he knew about the domestic violence allegations against former assistant Zach Smith. When I started writing this we didn’t know officially if Meyer knew anything, but he has since admitted knowledge of the allegations against his former protégé. Now before his acknowledgement there wasn’t much doubt that the head coach knew something.

History tells us that most men in Urban’s position end up doing the same thing. Especially when you add the layers that this case has. Zach Smith was just not just simply an assistant coach on the staff. Smith was a family friend whose relationship goes back to when Smith walked on to Bowling Green as a player in 2002 for Coach Meyer. Smith is the grandson of former Ohio State coach Earle Bruce who mentored a young Meyer and encouraged him to take the job at Bowling Green.

Meyer previously denied knowing about the 2015 incident between Smith and his ex-wife Courtney Smith. Now knowing about the close family connection that goes way and from Ms. Smith’s interview she let the world know that she told Urban’s wife about the abuse. No person who has ever been married would believe that a spouse would let their significant other have a blind spot like that. Also, what Meyer didn’t count on that Zach’s ex-wife would have receipts in the form of text messages.

So now we are here, where Ohio State has placed Meyer on paid administrative leave. This is a school that fired Meyer’s predecessor because he knew about players selling their stuff for tattoos. That being said the program is very successful, and they are more financially invested in Meyer than they were in Tressel and would like to get out of this without having to pay 38 million dollars and at least 5 million per year on a new coach.

The school would love for all of this to go away as they don’t want to deal with any more scandals in the athletic department. Like the sexual abuse allegations from former wrestlers against a doctor who was supposed to treat them assaulted the young men. Now the school may have to fire a football coach and pay him out. Now you are probably saying they can fire him for cause but if you look at Louisville and Rick Pitino fighting over money and he had a shady shoe deal and a prostitution scandal.

Ohio State cannot trot this man out as their football coach. One of the most highly visible positions associated with any school cannot have a man who blatantly lacked integrity and failed to act in protection of a woman. This is way bigger than football and Meyer may understand that now. What he may have been trying to do was protect a young man that he felt was like a family member. Unfortunately, that same sympathy and family connection was not extended to Courtney Smith. Not sure if he was trying to protect what they had built at Ohio State or didn’t want to harm a family relationship but here we are.

We have seen what happened at Penn State, Baylor and other institutions where it seemed more important to cover up than to act. Zach Smith maybe should have not been hired then definitely fired in 2015. While no one that maybe we should help Courtney and now a University will pretend they are doing the right thing by firing a football coach. Not for his dishonesty but for the fact it got exposed to the public.

Keith B. Holt

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