It’s been two months since Jim Tressel stunned the college football world with his Memorial Day resignation, but the fallout from the scandal that cost the beloved head coach his job continues.
Thanks to an public-records request by the Columbus Dispatch as well as other media entities, Ohio State Friday released new documents relating to the early portion of Tressel’s tenure at the school, including the coach’s personnel file. The Dispatch writes that, according to the documents, “Tressel was cited for failing to report NCAA rules violations and failing to quickly and accurately complete compliance-related forms.”
(Oddly enough, “inaccurately signing compliance forms” was one of the first nails in Tressel’s coaching coffin.)
Specifically, Tressel was reprimanded in September of 2003 by then-athletic director Andy Geiger “for not paying enough attention to the cars that athletes drove and reporting any unusual circumstances” to the compliance department or others in the OSU administration. Of course, the football program came under scrutiny earlier this year for vehicles that were purchased by players and/or their family members as well as the multiple cars driven by former starting quarterback Terrelle Pryor.
The Associated Press reports that on an NCAA-OSU evaluation form from that time, and contained in the same document dump the Dispatch notes, Tressel was given an unsatisfactory rating in the areas of “self-reporting violations” and in “timely and accurate completion of phone and unofficial visit logs”. It should be noted that Tressel was rated as “excellent” in the other 10 categories on the evaluation form, categories that included, but were not limited to, areas such as “beating Michigan*”.
(*Not really. Probably.)
Interestingly, the Dispatch writes that “Geiger had a history of admonishing Tressel and the other coaches after violations, both major and minor”, while also noting that Tressel’s personnel file “reflects no letters of admonishment after Smith took over” for Geiger during the evaluation period that ended in 2006. ”Smith”, of course, is Gene Smith, who became OSU’s AD in April 2005.
The records released today by the school only go through 2006, and the school has given no reason why evaluations for subsequent years were not released even as they were a part of the public-records request.
Ohio State, as well as Tressel, is scheduled to appear in front of the NCAA Aug. 12 to answer The Association’s Notice of Allegations, with the hope being the self-imposed sanctions will be enough to appease the sport’s governing body.


