The reason for the dismissal of Chris Jones from the Louisville basketball program is now public, and it isn’t very pretty. According to multiple reports, Jones — who had some issues in the past — texted threats to a woman because she messed up his room. Because of this incident, Jones was dismissed from the program and his former coach, Rick Pitino, told the press that it was time for him to grow up. Well, that’s where part of the uncomfortable discussion needs to begin.
It is easy for Pitino and the school to just rid themselves of Jones for bad behavior. The move isn’t too difficult, won’t be met with any backlash from the public, and happens to be the quickest fix possible for any potential scandals at the university. I mean, no one will argue against making someone like that just go away. No one.
Any form of violence against women, physical or verbal, cannot be tolerated. That’s always worth reiterating, but something more needs to be said here: If coaches are paid in part to coach a basketball team as well as be leaders of young men:..
… how does just ridding themselves of seemingly troubled young people help the young people they themselves brought in? Isn’t molding them supposed to be part of the student-athlete experience?
The answers to those two questions are as follows:
Question 1: It doesn’t.
Question 2: It isn’t.
What it does is separate all things Louisville as far from a bad situation as humanly possible, and as easily as possible — and I’m not sure how comfortable we should be with that.
Consider the histories of the people involved with this situation. Pitino will always be linked to Karen Sypher — what happened in that dark period of Pitino’s life did result in some bad jokes, and was certainly not as bad as verbal threats to a woman, but he was involved in some adultery in a restaurant chain that became public knowledge. That is part of why his only statements (as of this writing) about Jones feel icky.
Following Louisville’s win on Monday night Pitino said in the presser:
Unfortunately, we’ve got to move on. They’re like your children. You don’t like to see anybody be hurt. But there’s also accountability and doing the right things. He didn’t. He didn’t. Now, he’s got to get his life together, get on with life.
I have two kids. When they are old enough to mess up on a decent-size scale I promise you that their punishment won’t be a banishment from my house.
Pitino is right too, though. There is accountability and doing the right things. Like, you know, not cheating on your wife. By speaking about accountability, only to then say that Jones’s failure to do the right thing somehow results in his life getting back together only by removing him from any sense of structure in his life, is rather hypocritical.
I’m not trying to go on a far-too-late anti-Pitino rant, either. What he did years ago was wrong; he paid the price in the form of public scorn; and the university stood by his side. Oh, yeah. That last part. That’s another part of what is troublesome here.
Louisville stood by Pitino during a rough patch in his life. He acted on an impulse, had to explain some very uncomfortable things to his family, and the entire country knows he cheated on his wife. Still, the university backed Pitino by not ridding itself of him! Pitino also happened to be a grown adult at the time of his mistake, compared to a much younger Chris Jones.
Then again, replacing Pitino would have been much harder to do than letting go of just another player in a long line of guys Pitino brings in to help the basketball program be as good as it has been during his tenure.
However, there is the argument to be made that Chris Jones had other second chances; that the school stood by him through other (mostly undisclosed) issues; and that this was Jones’ last straw in a cup that was once full of them. Those people are probably right in the truest sense of running out of second chances.
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Speaking only from experience, I have had my fair of second chances in life — more than one of them, too. We are talking about multiple second chances that have been given to me over my life, mostly between the ages of 16 and 22. Without them I am unlikely to be in the place I am now — a wildly unsuccessful low-level college basketball blogger.
Bad (but true) jokes aside, I didn’t learn from those mistakes and second chances by being shown the door. I learned by still being granted the opportunity to stay involved in a structured environment, which is a benefit no longer afforded to Jones.
I just don’t understand how Jones can learn and grow from this incident. All he definitely knows now is that messing up can mean that people will distance themselves from you for the sake of their own protection.
Maybe I’m being far too crediting to the person Jones might be or might eventually become with the right guidance. There is certainly something to be said for tough love. It could actually be the thing that works out for him rather than the structured environment. I can’t even pretend to know the answers to this larger situation and, honestly, Pitino is in a far better position to deem what is best for Jones as a person.
But is that what this move is about?
Was Jones dismissed from the team to help him learn as a person, or was it to protect the program, or was it simply because he messed up on such a hideous scale that there were not other actions that could possibly be taken?
Universities, coaches and the NCAA will tell you that they are there to help educate and mold young people. They do that while they pretend that basketball and football aren’t big business, and that the interests they truly care about aren’t their own. How can all of that be true, though, if the solutions to problems are to leave people behind after they mess up? Isn’t making mistakes — followed by learning from them — part of growing up?
Eh, I digress. I suppose you are allowed to mess up on a large scale in the realm of amateur athletics. Well, as long as you have seven Final Fours and won a national title two years ago. If you’re an erratic point guard, though, don’t expect the same standard to apply to you.
Chris Jones, very much in need of counseling and help, is left to wonder where he’ll find what his life so urgently needs right now.
