https://deadspin.com/stop-excusing-tom-izzo-s-assholery-1833497588
"If you’ve ever been yelled at like this, or had your feelings hurt in some other way, you know that it can be a slow burn. The pain can last for
years. Not everyone can just shrug it off, the way wingnuts demand. Being hurt by hurtful things is not a moral or physical failing. You also know that you may not be quick to disclose being hurt to others, especially when you know it could result in embarrassment, or even more hurt. You might internalize that pain and perhaps blame yourself for the whole thing, even though you don’t deserve it. Like other successful coaches, Izzo can pretty much do
whatever the f--- he wants, including roiding out at men a third of his age. And the system he operates in, even at a bastion of horrific scandal like Michigan State, treats his methodology as NORMAL. Acceptable. This is a
rite of passage boys must go through to become men, and you shouldn’t question it. The players DEFINITELY shouldn’t."
This subject sure has hit a nerve … I'm a bit nervous replying here, but I reply in spirit of good faith ...
The person who wrote the comments quoted by BoJack in post #14 sure was angry. The last part of their comments was: " … Or maybe you’re [
Izzo supporters] just too lazy to think of other ways of going about instruction. You’re f---ed, and WE’RE f---ed because you [
all of us, apparently, who don't interpret Izzo as a monster] think being f---ed is the answer to everything."
There's a lot of pain in that, and I don't know enough to argue it isn't justified in the person who wrote it, but it does feel like there's some serious projection goin on there.
I developed an impression of Bob Knight as an unrepentant, abusive, egomaniacal bully. There were credible reports of him hitting and choking players. I don't know the full story on Knight, but I know I had a visceral reaction to being near him or listening to him in certain press conferences, and I absolutely rejected what sounded to me at the time like "end-justifies-the means" support from Indiana fans. Is Izzo the bully that I thought Knight was? I guess he could be, but I haven't been exposed to enough information that makes me feel that way about Izzo, and there is much more counter evidence out there to support Izzo's care/concern for players than I heard for Knight.
I surely don't condone bullying-as-coaching or as teaching, and I seriously doubt that most Izzo supporters think bullying is appropriate. It's amazing how we can look at the same pictures and see such different things. I think the bug-eyed Izzo pic is striking, but it doesn't tell you anything more than that Izzo was deeply angry in that moment. Tells you nothing about where the passion was coming from or how it was perceived by Henry.
There are some things you can tell from looking at one picture frame and some you can't. Gotta be real careful not to patch the pic into a ready-made narrative, even if the pic seems to fit. I agree with all the opinions Berg88 offered in post #17, except that I don't believe players had to restrain Izzo, in that Izzo would have attacked Henry or would not have backed off of his on volition. My interpretation was that the players did put their hands on Izzo and were looking more to restrain him generally, so he would calm down generally. The game was still in progress, the coach had more than made his point, and everyone needed to get back to trying to win the game. The coach had gone farther than he needed to and was wasting time and energy for everyone at that point.
Agree with Berg88 that Henry could not be considered free (or maybe even capable of) sharing his true feelings to this point, but that doesn't mean that what Henry said might not be exactly true of his feelings and won't remain true years in future.
For now, we just can't know. Couple of other things that I think
can be said right now, though:
- If you are a top level college coach, then you probably are very driven, very passionate and at least somewhat obsessive. [What would the exceptions rather than the rule be for top performers in coaching or playing in any physically competitive sport? No, this isn't an endorsement of abuse or a free pass for lack of self control...]
- It's probably the exception rather than the rule that you could be a high level college coach and never lose your !!!! where people can see you or comport yourself in a way that a bug-eyed angry pic of you couldn't be caught. [How many top level coaches are there for whom who you can't Google up an unflattering, out-of-control-looking pic? I Googled "angry coaches" and … boy there's lots of pics. Are they all abusers?]
- Coaching college basketball, where the playing space is intimate, personal, continuous and fast-paced (that takes place in front of huge audiences in real time and with both adult and young adult futures + $$ at stake) is a far cry from the dynamics of teaching math or coaching gymnastics, or most anything else. Definitely there is teaching involved in all coaching, but academic teaching and college coaching are far more different than they are alike -- there isn't/shouldn't be anything like the intimacy/emotion/complexity that necessarily is involved with college basketball coaching going between a classroom teacher and a student.
- I do think Izzo went farther than he needed to with Henry (and I hope he would choose to dial it back, if he was able to redo it), but I didn't see abuse (JM-current-HO) in the videos that I saw, taken in context of the impressions I had before seeing them, along with consideration of the subsequent accounts of Izzo offered by people who've been part of his world.