The Ohio State University has a very big bottom. Bottom line that is. And much like its collegiate competitors, that bottom line is fiscal.The phrase “money makes the world go ’round” is embodied in OSU tradition and serves to underscore much of the decision making on and around this campus.Monday, the Lantern reported that All-American, Butkus Award-winning Andy Katzenmoyer, linebacker for our stellar football team, was arrested early Friday and was charged with driving under the influence of alcohol.He is expected to be arraigned today.The Lantern reported, “Although Katzenmoyer is nine months shy of Ohio’s drinking age, he was not charged with underage drinking because ‘the officer felt it would be an overkill,’ said OSU police chief Ron Michalec.”Further in the article Brad Koffel, a local attorney, said the underage drinking charge is not necessary because it would most likely be dropped in a plea bargain.Since when do police officers decide what to charge people with based on overkill? Don’t law schools prepare lawyers to handle issues regarding potential legal probability?Katzenmoyer’s underage drinking charge, as trite as it may seem, was less about the offense and more about an officer displaying street-level bureaucratic discretion favoring a young superstar over ‘Joe Smith’ who gets arrested in a bar for underage drinking.Although he may not have been in possession of alcohol at the time of the arrest, a 0.133 blood alcohol level still renders a person incapable of operating a car according to Ohio law, whether they are a 6-foot-4-inch linebacker or not. Usually, a license suspension is typical. But one must seriously question what plea bargain will be struck with our football star. One thing’s for sure: Katzenmoyer will forever receive a slap on the wrist. That is, as long as he brings in the “bucks.” But, neither he nor our other student athletes can be held responsible.So whose interests are recruiters and “powers that be” actually guarding? Somewhere during the transition from seniors to freshmen, young college athletes are sucked into an ideological fantasy world. That fantasy full of broken dreams and empty promises keeps young men and women hoping that one day they will be the next Michael Jordan or Gwen Torrence. Granted, many do become professionals. Athletics does provide a means to get students into college who may not have come otherwise.Paradoxically, it also keeps them bound by a psychological shackle to the university, as well as major companies, such as Nike.What college athlete can resist the forbidden fruit of Nike offering a thousand, or better yet, a multimillion dollar endorsement deal? College sports figures simply (seem to) want to be successful. They do their best and want to win a championship. And somehow, major moneymakers – including OSU – seem to take advantage of that dream. Whether intentional or unintentional, they remove innocence and love for the game and substitute a belief that the almighty dollar is what is important.Nike has even sank to including high school kids in endorsement deals, luring them even earlier into a rubber-stenched smokescreen, and (indirectly I’m sure) taking young athletes’ attention off of education and placing it solely on athleticism.What happened to education being valued more than sports, or music, or any other activities? What lesson can be extracted?Big business looks out for the interests of big business. And, at the expense of some of its students, OSU seems to be a very big business out to cover it’s bottom. Bottom line that is.
Michael A. Norman may be reached at [email protected]. This column appears Wednesdays.
