The Emperor's New Clothes Redux

Can we even begin to compare what we're learning about Manti Te'o and his fake girlfriend to anything we've ever seen in sports?

Probably not.

Can we compare the spin that is already being put on the story to anything we've experienced before?

You bet. And not too long ago.

Much as Ohio State did with the Jim Tressel scandal a year and a half ago (yes, that guy who was run out of Columbus on a rail, and greeted with a standing ovation by the Buckeye faithful last November), Notre Dame officials had a choice in how to approach, or not approach as the case may be, the story regarding Te'o.

And, much like Gordon Gee and Gene Smith's party line, as delivered by AD Jack Swarbrick Notre Dame's decision was to get behind their beleaguered face of the university 110% (don't bother, I know you can't do anything more than 100%; drives me crazy too but think it fits here).

Two decisions had to be made. First, once they became aware of the fact that the heart-wrenching story regarding Te'o's relationship with Lennay Kekua, (whom he allegedly met at a Notre Dame-Stanford football game his freshman year, who he called his girlfriend, who met with him in Hawai'i, who he said (after her fake death) that he had talked to every night for four months and who had fallen to sleep with her over the phone many nights, who was first seriously injured in a car accident, then stricken with leukemia, who was supposedly released from the hospital to the congratulations of Te'o via Twitter and his father by phone, who then died the same day, or the next day, or two or three days after his grandmother died was completely false, what should they do?

Well, they did nothing. For three weeks. Until their hand was forced by the on-line publication of the article on Deadspin.com about the hoax, they did nothing. Other than conduct their own "independent" private investigation that apparently concluded (as Notre Dame did) that Te'o was the victim of an elaborate, cruel hoax, they did nothing. Not even contact "the authorities". Not that that's anything new for the Irish brass.

The cover photo for the Deadspin story. Hope they don't mind.

The second decision was what to say once the time was right. Or their hand was forced. And that determination was to paint Te'o as the victim and adopt his version of the events absolutely.

To be clear, I am unconvinced at this point that Te'o was in on the hoax, or that it was orchestrated by him to gain even more publicity and public sympathy. But it is unavoidably true that Te'o at best embellished the supposed facts about his relationship with this non-person. 

And yet when, confronted at the press conference about the hoax, about Te'o's descriptions of his "meeting" Kekua, Swarbrick, alternatively displaying knowledgeable familiarity with social media ("Catfishing") and attempting to pass it off as something with which he had little acquaintance, stated that he was convinced that what Te'o meant by "meeting" Kekua was meeting her on-line ("like all the kids say these days" was the implied qualifier). 

Trouble is, there's this description of Manti and Lennay's first meeting, in print, for all the world to see:

It never felt like a chance meeting, although it probably appeared that way from the outside looking in.

Their stares got pleasantly tangled, then Manti Te'o extended his hand to the stranger with a warm smile and soulful eyes.

They could have just as easily brushed past each other and into separate sunsets.

Where else could the information in those sentences have come from other than Te'o (or Kekua, who, in case I need to remind you, doesn't exist)? Or, even if we assume it was entirely the writer's fabrication (which, judging from those sentences, is probably better utilized in romance fiction), where was the statement from Te'o correcting the inaccuracy -- pointing out that he and Kekua had never actually met in person?

And that doesn't even begin to explain the supposed meetings in Hawai'i, the night-long phone calls, Te'o's father stating that Kekua's "death" led to the realization that Lennay could have been his daughter-in-law but that that chance was now gone (do you seriously say that about someone whom your son has never "met"?).

No, I'm sorry. The there are too many tales of real meetings to now slough off Te'o's references as social media jargon. They are what they are. And insisting that they are something they are not lends nothing to the story and further endangers Te'o's and the school's reputations. The Emperor has no clothes.

Whatever Te'o says in the next few days about his imaginary girlfriend, and perhaps more importantly what he says about what he did and didn't say, it had better be the truth. Because, sooner or later, the truth will be revealed.

The Emperor's New Clothes in the Digital Age

"But he isn't wearing anything at all!"

While reading articles this week about OSU football coach Jim Tressel's resignation and an op ed piece in the New York Times about the Syrian government's attempts to squelch the use of the internet by that country's dissidents, I was struck by how similar, and similarly naive, the reactions of both have been to media in the digital age.

Much as the emperor's tailors hoodwinked him into believing that his fine garments could only be seen by those smart enough, or worthy enough of his station, to see them so too both the Ohio State administration and the Syrian regime seem to think that despite the explosion of communication technology and instant news, whether via Facebook, Twitter, or on-line publications, it's still business as usual when it comes to the dissemination of information.

"You only need to know what we tell you," they seemed to say, "and that should be good enough." Unfortunately for both, however, news is not something that can be easily controlled these days, whether via a press conference or security checks asking dissidents if they "have a Facebook" on their laptops.

Today there are millions of children itching to expose the emperors for what they are -- naked posers. And they're increasingly willing to do it at the cost of their careers, or even their lives.

While this is somewhat understandably lost on the despotic government in Syria, the naivete of those in charge at Ohio State, particularly its President Gordon Gee and its Athletic Director Gene Smith, both of whom are among the highest paid college administrators in their positions in the country, is astonishing.

Tressel's transgressions certainly aren't -- after all, he's been cheating for 20 years now. Perhaps the only surprise is that, with that much practice at plausible deniability, he finally got caught.

As news slowly leaked out that Tressel knew of his players' NCAA infractions, failed to inform the administration or the NCAA about them despite his obligation to do so, and then lied to the NCAA on reporting forms about the absence of violations, Gee and Smith were faced with two choices: realize that the jig was up and try to salvage some part of the football program's (not to mention the academic institution's) reputation; or pretend that Emperor Tressel really was wearing the finest sweater vest ever created, invisible to all who weren't worthy of seeing it.

That they chose the later course, and the way that they did it, bowing and scraping at the Emperor's feet, makes for great, though squeamish, theatre.

Not much doubt after that about who was running the asylum, the lengths to which the OSU administration would go to hold on to Tressel, or the fact that Gee and Smith had gone "all in" with the strategy that they could convince the press that it was time for everyone to move on, nothing more to see.

It wasn't Facebook or Twitter that ultimately took down Tressel, and presumably left Gee and Smith to try to cover their tracks by forcing his resignation, but rather Yahoo, Ohio State's own student newspaper, The Lantern, and Tressel's damning emails.

While the editor of The Lantern hasn't actually been harmed yet for his journalistic integrity, not surprisingly he has been threatened. And, no, not even this University of Michigan fan would go so far as to compare the ruthlessness of the Syrian government to Buckeye Nation. But the similarly naive approach to the dissemination of information in the digital age is certainly there.

The lesson that should be learned, maybe not for Gee or Smith, certainly not for Tressel, is that "the news" is increasingly an amorphous being with a life of its own. It can no longer be controlled or even managed, only explained and ultimately acknowledged.

We may be facing a similar situation in our state as information and rumors slowly leak out about WVU football's Dauphin Prince's (Dana Holgorsen) escapades at a local casino, and perhaps elsewhere. One can only hope that Mountaineer A.D. Oliver Luck, who appears to be very bright and media savvy, will take a different approach than Smith and Gee did, although the early signs do not look good. At least odds are that Luck won't wear a bow tie at his press conference, if there is one.