RIP Joe Pa

Joe Paterno passed away early on Sunday at the age of 85 as he battled hard to fight cancer while trying to preserve his legacy/reputation. It’s just a shame how short his life was once his passion was gone from his day to day life.

Joe, along with coaches like Bobby Bowden, is likely to be the last of a generation that used to be a part of college football – a person who became larger than life not only because what he was able to accomplish on a football field, but because of all the people he mentored along the away to become successful people in athletics and in life. Back in the day, coaches stayed at one institution for the majority of their careers and had an impact like this. Now, that doesn’t mean college football coaches don’t do that today, it’s just that the majority tend to always be on the look out for green pastures since neither they nor their employers have much patience for losing. There’s too much money at stake.

Joe spent a remarkable 62 years at Penn State. He started first as an assistant coach for his old coach at Brown, Rip Engle. After Rip retired, Joe took over for his mentor and catapulted Penn State to an era of success that helped the institution bring in lots of revenue and national recognition for their institution.

However, he did have his faults like every other human being. Ever since the Sandusky tragedy had come out, it brought to light a side of Joe Pa that was never shown before. He was a man that may have been too loyal to Penn State and his football team, deciding to protect that over other priorities. With that said, he made some mistakes and it seemed that he was genuinely remorseful for his role in this tragedy.

I mentioned this on twitter and I’d like to put it out here as well: I really hope his supporters do not make him into a martyr because he wasn’t. At the same time, he wasn’t some evil person either. He was a person who was able to follow his passion in life and be very successful at it, it’s really that simple. Every person makes mistakes and every person accomplishes things in life – his just happened to be in a fish bowl with lots of invested people watching it every day for several decades. I’ve done my share of criticizing Joe recently (and he deserved it) but I also believe that overall his positive contributions to society outweighed the negative…by a lot.

Rest In Peace Joe Pa