Maurice Clarett clearing his name.

[Durango53]

Maurice Clarett said he "took the fall" for the school during a 2003 NCAA investigation and that he's talking now because he wants to "clear his name" with National Football League owners and general managers.

Clarett says that while he was at Ohio State in 2002 and 2003 head coach Jim Tressel, as well as certain members of his staff and boosters, provided him with improper benefits. He says he covered up Tressel's improprieties during the NCAA investigation and afterward, Ohio State "blackballed'' him from the football program.

Clarett also says he likely would have been ineligible for Ohio State's national title season of 2002 if the football staff had not "aligned'' him with an academic advisor whose goal was simply to keep him eligible. He says the academic advisor enrolled him in Independent Study courses and also put him with hand-picked teachers who would pass him whether he attended their classes or not. He says his advisor also introduced him to a tutor who prepared outlines and told him what to write for assignments.

"What would have become of Ohio State if I said everything?'' Clarett told The Magazine. "Half the team would have been suspended, and it would have been worse for everybody. I was like, 'Why don't I just take it?'"

So you are such a stand up guy huh. Took the fall for the whole school??? :hmm:

[rockin500]

nice how he waits a coupla years. :hmm:

I hope he breaks a leg. :)

[Special_K19]

What a ****ing asshole. I am incesned right now. I hope he never steps foot on a football field ever again. What an idiot.

I'm watching Andy Geiger, OSU's athletic director, speak right now. He says that yes, before Tressel, the program was in horrible turmoil, but most of those claims are false. This is Clarret trying to get back at OSU for what he feels was the university slighting him, when he himself made some poor judgements.

[00_Agent]

I have to say . . . when I was at PSU, I knew guys that didn't have to go to class, and who were given things such as cars to drive around and other amenities not available to your, ahem, normal student. This kind of thing happens, as I'm sure most of you can imagine. I'm not defending Maurice Clarett necessarily; I'm sure he's not the good samaritan he claims to be, taking the fall for the whole school. He probably is just trying to piss people there off. But I wouldn't be surprised if the claims were true anyway. It goes on everywhere.

[Special_K19]

I think some claims are true, mainly all the boosters involvement, but I immediatly discounted anything he said about Jim Tressel. I can't speak highly enough of the man. I'm sure it's hard to imagine what I say about him until you experience it first hand. But Tressel is a very religious man and stands very strongly by his convictions. He's a rarity in college and pro sports in that sense. Tressel would never do anything to harm the integrity of his school, his name, or his players. Clarett made poor judgements, but to try and bring down the name of Tressel is absurd.

[rockin500]

you know, the more i read about it (and hear about it) the more i think that clarett cannot be making everything up. If he is, he could be a major fiction writer. i mean, there is just too much level of detail for someone to just make up. I wouldnt think clarett is smart enough to make up that much stuff up.

The truth probably lies somewhere in between the two sides. no side is clean in this IMO.