Paterno

by Joe Posnanski

  Later he would tell friends and family that he knew, even then, that this would be his last year as a coach. There were a few quiet signs of this, including the simple fact that he allowed me to write a book about him. But he mostly kept such thoughts to himself. First, it was nobody’s business. Second, the last thing in the world Paterno wanted was one of those “We’ll Miss You, Joe” celebrations that he called a “living funeral.” Third, and perhaps most important, he wanted the freedom to change his mind. He would joke with reporters, using a line from Tennessee Williams: “I knew no one was immortal, but I thought I was the exception.”

  He entertained reporters with stories and jokes for more than an hour at the Big Ten Media Days in Chicago. This was Paterno as he had not been with reporters in a long time: at ease and engaging. A year earlier, the Media Days were notable only because Paterno was recovering from a virus and an allergic reaction to medicine, and he looked so near death that newspapers and magazines across the nation began writing his obituary in anticipation of the inevitable. They were not so far off: few people knew that a couple of weeks earlier, when the allergic reaction first struck, Paterno was in such bad shape that last rites were performed. A couple of family members felt certain he would not survive the month. “I thought Joe would live forever,” his son Scott said. “But when I saw him in 2010, and I thought he was going to die, I came to grips with his humanity.”

  Paterno recovered, and his vitality slowly returned. He coached through 2010, and as the 2011 season was about to begin he was as feisty and sarcastic as ever. After going through a short question-and-answer session with the media in a ballroom, he stepped down from the podium, winked at Guido D’Elia, and said, “I didn’t give them nothing.” Later, as he sat at a table with about a dozen writers, he told marvelous stories. “That was the best I’d seen him in a long, long time,” recalled Dick Weiss of the New York Daily News, who had been writing about Paterno for years.

  At the Big Ten luncheon, Michigan State quarterback and Chicago native Kirk Cousins gave a stirring speech about how playing football was a privilege, and that with privilege comes responsibility to “work hard in the classroom . . . to give our all for fans . . . to represent the names on the front of our jerseys . . . to provide a true example of what it means to be a young man.” It was as if the speech had been written by Joe Paterno himself. “It has been a privilege to go to places like Happy Valley,” Cousins said, “and play a team coached by a man who embodies what it means to have a calling in life, and who proved you can have success with integrity.”

  Paterno stood and applauded with everyone else. A few minutes later, while the lunch was going on, Paterno walked over to Cousins. They spoke for a minute, then Paterno headed for the exit. “Time to go back,” he told Guido.

  “But the luncheon . . . ”

  “Time to go,” Paterno repeated. “We’ve got work to do.”

  THE LAST MONTHS OF JOE Paterno’s life were so crowded with devastating events—injury, scandal, getting fired, cancer, and finally death, all in blinding succession—that it would be easy to miss the ripples and small surprises also taking place. Paterno was called to testify in front of the grand jury in January 2011 about his former coach Jerry Sandusky. According to his family and friends, he did not spend a lot of time thinking about what he would say. However, many of those friends and family, particularly Scott Paterno and Guido D’Elia, saw storm clouds ahead. Scott recalled interrogating his father about Sandusky, asking question after question about what he had known and what he had done. He also went through Joe’s files, folder by folder, in an effort to find anything he could about Sandusky. He came away convinced that the only thing Joe knew about Sandusky’s alleged crimes—or remembered knowing—was the vague conversation he had with Mike McQueary. Scott made himself his father’s lawyer, and they met in Harrisburg, where the grand jury was sitting.

  Paterno was on the stand for exactly seven minutes; his testimony filled less than two pages. He was not a target of the investigation. He told the grand jury that an upset Mike McQueary had visited him at home on a Saturday morning and told him in ill-defined terms about an incident involving Sandusky and a young boy in the showers of the Penn State football building. He concluded it was of a sexual nature, though he could be no more specific than that, and he told McQueary that he had done the right thing by bringing it to his attention. He did not remember exactly when he had called Athletic Director Tim Curley, but he remembered calling soon after to report the incident. He said had never heard another rumor about Sandusky, but admitted that things could have been said in his presence that he had forgotten. He had the utmost confidence in Curley to get to the bottom of things. As best anyone could tell, for Paterno that was the end of it.

  When the story of Sandusky’s being investigated broke in the Harrisburg Patriot-News in March, Scott Paterno and Guido D’Elia urged Joe to go public with what he knew. They did not know the depths of the Sandusky story, but they suspected that if it was bad—and they were hearing rumors that it was very bad—Paterno would be in the line of fire. And by the time the story broke, they thought, it could be too late.

  “We begged Joe to just say publicly what he knew,” D’Elia said. “He wouldn’t do it. He wouldn’t throw Tim or anybody else under the bus. He kept saying, ‘Just let it play out.’ In his mind, he had done what he was supposed to do, and he had told the truth about it, and that was that. That’s how he was. Do what you think is right, tell the truth, you’ll be fine.

  “We were so desperate at one point, we thought about going around him to Sue, just to get her permission to release something in the summer, just to preempt anything. If we had done that, if we had gotten out what Joe knew and what he did before the presentment came out, it could have been different. It really could have been different.”

  ON THE THIRD DAY OF fall practice, inside the Holuba Hall practice facility, Paterno was looking the other way when a fast little receiver named Devon Smith ran a 20-yard out pattern, caught the ball, and slammed into him.

  Smith checked to see if Paterno was all right, and was assured in no uncertain terms that it wasn’t his fault and he better get his butt back into the huddle. Paterno got himself up. He wanted to shake it off, as he had always shaken off injuries. But he quickly realized his injury was serious. He had cracked his pelvis and hurt his arm. Still, two days later he was back at practice. “I feel great except I’m in a lot of pain,” he told the media, his best effort at a joke. The pain prevented him from walking—for weeks he had to be driven around practices in a golf cart—and the lack of walking prevented him from feeling like himself. He was mad at himself. “I was feeling so good,” he moaned. He would never feel that good again.

  The 2011 season was an odd one even before the tragic ending. Although the team kept winning, there was intense and persistent criticism of Paterno and his unwillingness to retire. There was something surreal about that. Coaches who win football games do not usually have people calling for them to step down, and after nine games Penn State was 8-1, their only loss to an Alabama team that would win the national championship. They were undefeated in the Big Ten. Paterno’s players were still graduating at a high rate; in December (ironically at the same time that Penn State’s interim president would suggest that the school had become a “football factory”), Penn State won the Academic Bowl for scholastic excellence among the best football programs in the nation.

  Still, the calls for Paterno to step down were widespread and fierce. It was true that Paterno seemed out of sorts. He coached from the press box because of his injury, and he hated it; he did not even have time to go down and speak to his team at halftime. He was less available and less forthcoming than ever. Reporters who had long felt slighted by his testiness and secrecy pushed back.

  Though the team kept winning, the ugliness of the games left no one feeling satisfied. Penn State needed a late defensive stand to beat Temple by 4. They beat Indiana by 6 in a deathly boring game that wa
s tied 3–3 at the half. They held on to beat Purdue by 5, and they beat Illinois only when a last-second game-tying field goal attempt clanked against the upright and fell back. There was controversy when Paterno refused to make a decision about which quarterback would start or play the most, and there was general fatigue surrounding the football program. “It probably shouldn’t be this way,” one Penn State reporter told me. “But I think everybody just wants something to change. It’s been the same here for so long that Joe’s sick of us, we’re sick of him; it would be nice to just move on to something new.”

  When Penn State beat Illinois on October 29, 2011, it was Paterno’s 409th victory as a coach. He already had the record for Division I-A, so this wasn’t exactly noteworthy. But he had passed Grambling’s Eddie Robinson for the top spot on the Division I list for victories. It wasn’t an official record, but it gave Penn State the opportunity to celebrate Paterno one more time. President Graham Spanier and Athletic Director Tim Curley showed up to give him a plaque. Paterno sounded tired. The reporters’ questions sounded tired too. It wasn’t much of a celebration.

  Nobody knew it then, but that was the last game Joe Paterno would coach.

  SCOTT PATERNO WAS THE FIRST in the family to understand that the Pennsylvania grand jury presentment that indicted Jerry Sandusky could end his father’s career. This wasn’t surprising; Scott tended to be the most realistic—or cynical, depending on who you asked—in the family. He had run for Congress and lost and along the way tasted the allure and nastiness of public life. He had worked as a lawyer and as a lobbyist. He would sometimes tell people, “Hey, don’t kid yourself, I’m the asshole of the family.” When Scott read the presentment, he called his father and said, “Dad, you have to face the possibility that you will never coach another game.”

  Joe thought his son was making too much of it. But he had not yet read the presentment. Scott had been getting word for weeks through his sources that the indictment was coming down, and that it was unimaginable. But even going over in his mind what might be the worst-case scenario didn’t prepare him for the twenty-three-page firebomb. It told a hideous story of a famous former coach, philanthropist, and community leader who used his access to troubled youth and Penn State football resources to commit unthinkable crimes against children. As Scott struggled through the details—eight victims, charges of inappropriate touching, oral sex, sodomy—he grew angrier and angrier. He had known Sandusky for much of his life. He had showered in those athletic showers as a boy, with Sandusky undoubtedly in the same room. How was this possible? And the angrier he became, the more he understood that his own anger would be multiplied by the explosive reaction of millions of Americans who had never heard of Jerry Sandusky.

  Those millions, most of them, had heard of Joe Paterno.

  “Dad,” he asked his father again, “did you know anything about Sandusky?”

  “Other than the thing Mike told me, no,” Joe answered.

  “Nothing? No rumors? The coaches never talked about it?”

  “No. I don’t listen to rumors. Nothing.”

  “Dad, this is really important. If there is anything you heard . . . ”

  “I didn’t hear anything, why are you badgering me? What do I know about Jerry Sandusky? I’ve got Nebraska to think about, I can’t worry about this.” Nebraska was the next game.

  “I had to do everything I could to not cry right then,” Scott recalled.

  JAY PATERNO WAS ON THE road recruiting when he got the call from Scott. He asked, “How bad is it?” Scott said, “It’s worse than anything.” Jay sat in his car in an Ohio gas station and stared blankly into the darkness.

  Still, Jay and others in the family clung to some hope that people would realize Joe had been fooled like everyone else. After all, Joe was not a target of the investigation. Two other Penn State officials, Curley and Schultz, had been indicted on counts of perjury and failure to report. Shortly after the presentment came out, there was a story in the online edition of the Harrisburg Patriot-News with the headline “Paterno Praised for Acting Appropriately in Reporting Jerry Sandusky Sex Abuse Suspicions.” Multiple sources told reporter Sara Ganim that “the deputy state prosecutor handling the case said that Paterno did the right thing and handled himself appropriately in 2002 [later changed to 2001] and during the three-year investigation.”

  This, in the end, was what the family believed: That Joe Paterno had been told a vague story about a former football coach he didn’t like or trust. Then, following the law and university policy and his own guiding light, he had reported what he was told to Tim Curley. This was what he was required to do, and, knowing the circumstances, they believed this was what he should have done. He had not been charged with lying to the grand jury. (When he was fired, the Pennsylvania attorney general’s director of communication Nils Frederiksen talked to ABC.com and called Paterno “a cooperating witness, an individual who testified and provided truthful information . . . who has not been charged.”) If Jerry Sandusky was guilty, then hundreds of people had been fooled: child care professionals, law enforcement officials, coworkers at his charity, parents, judges, close friends of Sandusky, and many others. Those closest to Paterno believed that when he went public with what he knew and what he did, most people would understand he was fooled like everyone else. Joe Paterno believed the same thing.

  Of course, there were those among the Paternos and their closest friends who wished Joe had followed up with more vigor after reporting to Curley and made sure there was a resolution. Penn State’s official response—not to call the police and merely to ban Sandusky from bringing children on campus—was sickeningly inadequate if McQueary had seen and described a rape. Many of the people who had come to admire Joe Paterno believed that, no matter his own legal role, he should have made sure the incident was reported to the police.

  “But, to be honest, that’s just not how Joe was in the last years,” said one of the people in his inner circle. “He was not vigilant like he used to be. I think a younger Joe would have said to Tim after a few days, ‘Hey, what’s going on with that Sandusky thing? You guys get to the bottom of that? Let’s make sure that’s taken care of.’ But he didn’t understand it. And he just wasn’t as involved as he used to be.”

  As reported, interoffice emails suggest Paterno had been told more about Sandusky than he recalled and had followed up, at least unofficially, with Athletic Director Tim Curley. When some of the emails were released, there was a strong backlash against Paterno; many would believe he was involved in a Penn State cover-up. Paterno did not deny his own ineffectiveness—he spoke about it with deep regret—but he strongly denied any ill intent.

  On the Saturday that the grand jury presentment went public, Graham Spanier came to the house, sat at the kitchen table, and read to Paterno the statement he was going to release. Paterno told him the statement would do more harm than good. “I just didn’t like it. It struck me as a mistake.” Spanier released it anyway.

  The allegations about a former coach are troubling, and it is appropriate that they be investigated thoroughly. Protecting children requires the utmost vigilance.

  With regards to the other presentments, I wish to say that Tim Curley and Gary Schultz have my unconditional support. I have known and worked daily with Tim and Gary for more than 16 years. I have complete confidence in how they have handled the allegations about a former University employee.

  Tim Curley and Gary Schultz operate at the highest levels of honesty, integrity and compassion. I am confident the record will show that these charges are groundless and that they have conducted themselves professionally and appropriately.

  Paterno was right. The statement, particularly the part about “unconditional support” for Curley and Schultz, would set off a media already motivated to wonder what the heck was going on in Happy Valley.

  ON SUNDAY, GUIDO D’ELIA RETURNED from an out-of-town trip and went to the Paternos’ home. Like Scott, like millions, D’Elia had felt overwhelming rage w
hen reading the presentment, and he had come to the conclusion that Joe would probably lose his job. Those feelings were confirmed when he learned that the university had cut off communication with the Paternos. There would be much back-and-forth later about who stopped talking first, who would not return whose phone calls, but in interviews almost every member of the Paternos’ immediate family said that they tried to start a dialogue with the university trustees and were rebuffed. Sue Paterno said she called a couple. Mary Kay said she called three. And so on. Nobody responded. D’Elia saw the break as a terrible sign. The media intensity was slowly building to a boil. “And when that happens,” D’Elia said, “there has to be a scapegoat.”

  The Paternos decided to release a statement. It revealed their state of mind at the time: what Joe knew, when he knew it, what he tried to do about it. It was substantially the statement that several of Paterno’s advisors, including D’Elia, had wanted him to release back when the story first broke. D’Elia deduced that it was probably too late now.

  If true, the nature and amount of charges made are very shocking to me and all Penn Staters. While I did what I was supposed to with the one charge brought to my attention, like anyone else involved I can’t help but be deeply saddened these matters are alleged to have occurred.

  As my grand jury testimony stated, I was informed in 2002 by an assistant coach that he had witnessed an incident in the shower of our locker room facility. It was obvious that the witness was distraught over what he saw, but he at no time related to me the very specific actions contained in the Grand Jury report.