We've got bad apples in Ball State University's Department of Intercollegiate Athletics. Too many athletes and employees are giving the department, and the university, a bad name. For too long, too many stories about wins and losses have been overshadowed by news about arrests, scandals, alcohol, drugs, robberies and alleged racism and cover-ups.
It's unacceptable.
And it needs to end now.
Some of our sports are winning and there are good athletes and employees in athletics. Football won last weekend, women's golf is breaking and women's tennis earned a spot for the ninth straight year on the Intercollegiate Tennis Association's All-Academic Team.
We need more of these positive stories from the athletics department - not the bad news people often complain about having to read in newspapers. If you are a hardworking, trustworthy and responsible member of the department, keep it up.
The rest of you, Ball State doesn't need your problems. Someone, probably President Jo Ann Gora, needs to start removing people who are or have been acting inappropriately. Under normal circumstances, Director of Intercollegiate Athletics Tom Collins would have been the logical person get rid of the rotten people. But, we've said before and we'll say it again, he also needs to be tossed out considering the way he's handled the department and the discovery of his inaccurate r+â-¬sum+â-¬s.
To be fair, other schools also have behavior problems and their own scandals, but overlook the problems because of winning seasons. Others have the athletes who act responsibly so the schools overlook bad playing.
At Ball State, we have both poor playing and behavior. Men's basketball set a record last year - for the most losses in a season. Now two players have been arrested in four days. It's hard to find something positive to focus on, except if it's to ignore the men and congratulate the women's team for earning the best winning percentage in school history last year. (However, the women's team is also dealing with a former star player and current director who was arrested for driving under the influence.)
Ball State administration needs to clean out the athletics department. Keep the good employees and athletes, and throw out the ones messing everything up.
One bad apple can spoil all of them. Don't leave any rotten ones.
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