Michigan State’s fallout hits the Magic, Mike Bianchi writes.
Even the Orlando Magic and their G-League team have been sucked in by the massive tentacles of the most heinous sports scandal in the history of our country.
This in itself should show you how despicable, detestable and disgustingly derelict in their duties the leaders at Michigan State have been in investigating sexual assaults among not only demented team doctor Larry Nassar but also their own football and basketball players.
In the wake of an ESPN.com report that Michigan State mishandled a rape case in 2010 against Adreian Payne and fellow former Spartans player Keith Appling, the Magic waived Payne from the G-League team in Lakeland on Saturday without any further comment.
Of course, they didn’t really need any further comment. The Magic’s actions speak volumes as to how toxic this scandal has become.
To distance themselves from it as quickly as possible, the Magic waived a player who was accused but never charged with a crime nearly eight years ago.
This should tell you all you need to know about the monumental fallout involving Nassar, the notorious team doctor at Michigan State and USA Gymnastics who was sentenced on Wednesday to 40 to 175 years in prison for multiple child-sex crimes against some of the country’s top female gymnasts.
Baylor basketball coach Scott Drew, who has seen leaders in his own athletics department lose their jobs amid an enormous sexual-assault scandal, was reticent to talk when I broached the Michigan State scandal following the Bears’ 81-60 loss to Florida Saturday.
“Any time you see something like this happen,” Drew said, shaking his head, “all you can do is feel for the victims.”
Magic officials obviously were swayed by the story of one of the alleged victims on Friday — the day an in-depth investigative story
on ESPN.com was published. The story was not only about Nassar’s sexual abuse but the pervasive culture of sexual assaults by athletes at Michigan State.
Among the examples cited was a female student accusing Payne and Appling of rape back in 2010. ESPN.com unearthed a police report taken during the investigation in which Payne admitted he could “understand how she [the accuser] would feel that she was not free to leave” the apartment during a sexual encounter.
Good for ESPN.com and good for all the other media outlets that have worked so diligently and doggedly to unearth yet another case of powerful people turning a blind eye to sexual-assault victims. In this era where the term “fake news” is randomly thrown out by politicians to discredit unfavorable media coverage, let us remember that journalism is still comprised mostly of hard-nosed, hard-working reporters who oftentimes are trying to uncover unthinkable corruption in our world.
After 156 women came forward to say they were abused by Nassar, Michigan Assistant Attorney General Angela Povilaitis stood up in court and pointed out who the real heroes were in this sordid, sickening trail of sexual misconduct and institutional neglect. She singled out reporters at the Indianapolis Star — the newspaper that dug and dug and dug until it unearthed the ghastly skeletons buried beneath the surface at USA Gymnastics and Michigan State.
“We as a society need investigative journalists more than ever,” Povilaitis said in court. “What finally started this reckoning and ended this decades-long cycle of abuse was investigative reporting. … Without [the] Indianapolis Star, [Nassar] would still be practicing
medicine, treating athletes and abusing kids.”
Nassar, of course, is a despicable human being, but those who enabled him and allowed him to fester into the monster he became are also culpable. That’s why this should be considered as the most abhorrent sports scandal in modern American history.
This is even worse than Penn State officials ignoring the warning signs of former football coach Jerry Sandusky sexually molesting little boys. That scandal brought down one football program. This scandal is bringing down the leadership of the entire sport of gymnastics, the entire university at Michigan State and perhaps even the NCAA itself.
The president and every board member at USA Gymnastics have agreed to step down, as have Michigan State’s president and athletics director. And depending on whether or not they turned a blind eye to sexual-assault allegations among their players, Michigan State basketball coach Tom Izzo and football coach Mark Dantonio could lose their jobs as well.
In addition, NCAA president Mark Emmert, according to a report by the Athletic.com, was
informed of sexual-assault allegations against Michigan State athletes as early as 2010.
When is this madness going to stop?
When are the leaders at our institutions of higher earning going to start taking crimes against women seriously?
When are coaches and administrators going to start protecting the victims instead of protecting the brand?
When Mike White, the basketball coach at the University of Florida, was asked Saturday why this keeps happening and how it can be prevented, he pointed to a sign inside UF’s basketball training room.
“If you see something, say something,” the sign reads.
If only officials at Michigan State and USA Gymnastics had only heeded this advice, they would still have their jobs and dozens of little girls and young women would still have their innocence.