A Stroll Down Memory Lane …

Take yourself back to February 2020; COVID-19 was just getting started.  The annual shuffling season for college football coaches was over; the music had stopped and coaches on the move had found their new seats.  And then Michigan State coach, Mark Dantonio resigned his position.  He did not quit to take a job in the NFL or at another school; he just resigned after 13 seasons with the Spartans.

Dantonio was a good coach; his overall record at Michigan St. was 114-57; in his 13 seasons on the sidelines, Sparty went to bowl games 12 times.  I don’t want to overstate this; the Spartans were not “national champion contenders” on a regular basis, but they were a team that had to be taken seriously lest they rise up and bite a team who might aspire to “national championship consideration”.

Sparty was in a bind; they needed a coach and open season for coaching candidates was over.  In short order, Michigan State poached Mel Tucker convincing him to resign as the head coach at Colorado to take the job in East Lansing.  As noted above, COVID-19 was just getting started and that made the 2020 football season a truncated one; Michigan St. went 2-5 in the first year under Tucker.

In 2021, the Spartans came out of the gate quickly winning their first 8 games in a row; they would finish the 2021 season at 11-2 and Mel Tucker was the Big Ten Coach of the Year.  All was well in East Lansing…  In the euphoria of this season, Michigan St. and Tucker tore up his existing contract and replaced it with a 10-year extension reportedly worth $95M.

The 2022 season began with two cupcake wins followed by a bunch of double-digit losses and a final record of 5-7.  The 2023 season once again began with two cupcake wins – – and then things spun out of control.  In September 2023, Michigan State fired Mel Tucker based on sexual harassment charges leveled against him by a woman described as an “anti-sexual violence advocate” who had been invited to speak to the team several times on that topic.  She accused Tucker of inappropriate behavior and specifically she accused Tucker of masturbating while on a phone call with her.  Surprisingly, Tucker did not deny the allegation; he said the activity was consensual; the school suspended him pending an investigation and then fired him for cause soon after the suspension was in place.

It is the “for cause” part of this story that is important because that meant the school was not on the hook for the $95M in that 10-year contract that existed.  Not surprisingly, Tucker has sued Michigan St. claiming that he was wrongfully terminated.  Some of the points made in Tucker’s suit are:

• The school instituted an “improper, sham investigation” that violated Tucker’s due process rights, equal protection rights and his contract itself.  [Aside:  The investigation allegedly began on September 18^th and Tucker was fired on September 27^th; that is indeed a “quick turn-around”.]
• The school was motivated by fear.  Michigan St. had just gone through the “Larry Nassar Debacle” where it seemingly stood by and looked the other way as Nassar physically violated young women athletes for a long time.  The lawsuit attributes that motivation as the basis for the firing making it a wrongful termination.
• Here is how the lawsuit characterizes the environment in the time leading up to Tucker’s firing:

  • • “The dysfunction at the highest level of the University’s leadership resulted in a siege mentality among the individual Board members and members of the administration with each member concerned primarily with protecting themselves and preserving their positions and their careers.”

• And …

  • • “[Administrators at Michigan State] manipulated and misused those processes to advance their own interests in preserving their positions and reputations while engaging in a course of bad faith conduct designed to decimate the career and reputation of [Tucker]. In this, the [Administrators at Michigan State] were wildly successful.”

• The lawsuit also contends that the school conspired with the accuser to file the complaint against Tucker ignoring evidence that his actions were consensual.

Obviously, I am not going to take sides here.  But there are a few elements here that seem a bit off-key:

• I have no difficulty in believing that the folks running the university did not want or need another sexual harassment/sexual violence situation to deal with in the wake of the “Larry Nassar Debacle”.  What Tucker was alleged to have done is clearly “low-rent”, but it is nowhere near the transgressions involving Nassar.
• I also have no difficulty in believing that the folks in the Athletic Department may have been suffering some “buyer’s remorse” after looking at that $95M contract and the mediocre-at-best season in Year One of the contract.
• I have some difficulty believing that the university and the accuser actively conspired to concoct the complaint.  Should that ever be shown to be true, that would make the university look as bad – if not worse – than it would if it had ignored the complaint and just kept on keeping on with Tucker as their coach.
• I have some difficulty with the fact that the lawsuit seeks “unspecified damages”.  I doubt that Tucker wants the job back; this suit is about the uncollected remnants of that $95M deal that was voided.  So, my sense is that this action is merely a forcing function to cause negotiations about how much of that contract Mel Tucker will get to enjoy.

[Aside:  Mark Dantonio’s surprise resignation had a secondary effect on college football.  When Mel Tucker left Colorado in the lurch, the Buffaloes turned the football program over to Karl Dorrell who was not successful and was fired in the middle of the 2022 season.  That left the door open for Colorado to bring in “Coach Prime” and his band of merry-men…]

So, what might be the final settlement number here – – not that it will ever be made public?  I’ll set the OVER/UNDER at $35M…

Finally, this from Kellyanne Conway:

“Sexual harassment is as difficult to prove as it is to disprove.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………