The Spirit of '83. Why The Paterno Library Is More Important Than A Statue.

When I think about Joe Paterno, the first

thing that comes to my mind is that he wanted to have an impact far bigger than simply football.

I would argue that he wanted to help Penn State become even greater than a "football school" and to place an incredible focus on academics and the development of people.

If you're a fan of Penn State and Joe Paterno, you are familiar with his 1983 speech to the Board of Trustees.  After winning a National Championship and being regarded as the number 1 team in the country, Paterno plainly argues that Penn State needs do more in specific areas.  He wanted to focus on facilities such as the library to attract scholars and stars and allow the people who come to Penn State the opportunity to reach their full potential.

He talked specifically in that speech about the need for more racial diversity among the entire faculty and a more inclusionary atmosphere for ideas.

What Paterno so elegantly put forward that day, was the idea of moving not just one department, or one athletic program forward, but the entire institution.  The entire community.

And for the most part, that is what happened.  State College and Penn State boomed in the 80's and 90's.  For a lot of people within the community, as well as fans of the program nationwide, a major source of inspiration would be Paterno.

And that is where we find ourselves again.

Penn State athletics, and the school in general, has made some very serious and positive strides.  The recent success of the football program will take the headlines due to the popularity of the sport, but across the spectrum, we have seen an uptick in performance.

But there is still work to be done.


As the news broke yesterday about the Paterno estate and Penn State coming to agreements to move on with their relationship, I thought about how positive that news was.

I thought about Joe and how he would have loved to see people come together once again to move this community forward.  That it was more than just about him, but about ALL the people who make up Penn State and State College. 

However, it did not take long for some to voice their anger toward a particularly divisive issue.

The statue of Paterno that had been taken from the stadium after the crimes of Sandusky shocked the world and it became clear that the statue was a lightning rod of controversy.  People forget now, but due to the nature of the case and raw emotions being exposed, there was a very real threat of violence and unrest built around the statue.

For some, that statue means a lot.  I think for a few, it means almost everything.

I think for some, the return of the statue is what is needed in order for Penn State to admit it was wrong and completely validate the way that person might feel, if they happen to feel that Joe was treated unfairly.

I think for others, the return of that statue is offensive to those that try and report sexual abuse and are turned away and not believed. 

On both sides there are people who would become very willing activists to turn the life of Paterno into something that is only what their side wants to believe.

I do not believe in either case, the outcome is positive for the community or positive for anyone involved.


In this moment, I think Joe would rather not let his memory be boiled down into statues and things of that nature.  I think he would find it petty and silly.

Certainly there are more pressing questions at Penn State such as staff diversity and investment into facilities and faculty.

I like to think that Joe, a staunch believe in academics and sciences, would rather people come to the library that bares his name and read a book on morality by Immanual Kant or Plato.  To visit the heart of the school itself and learn all that they can about the world and not just their own viewpoint of the day.  He encouraged dissent in the pursuit of something better for everyone. 

Yes, the library. The one that he mentioned in 1983 as being one of the most important pieces to developing Penn State.  A place where people might exchange ideas and philosophies in the pursuit of a better and more humane world.  To me, no place is more fitting for a man who meant so much to the university than to be at its spiritual center.

For me, I grew up in Penn State and Joe's shadow.  I think he stood for a lot of great things, but I think like anyone else, he was flawed.  I think he is right to be remembered at Penn State, and he should be remembered in context.

If the previous statue is to be returned, it should be in a building that preaches the peaceful thoughtfulness and exchanging of ideas.

No place will allow that context to be more fulfilled than a library, a literal archive of knowledge.

It also shifts the focus of the man from being a merely a football coach, to being a person essential to Penn State and its community as a whole.


We are in the midst of another moment, just like 1983.  Our wrestling program has been the standard bearer, winning 8 team National Championships in the past 9 years.  Women's Volleyball has won two.  The football team has returned to national prominence and is now competing for a championship.  And now the basketball team has seen what years of sticking with a program and coach can do and have climbed into the discussion of one of the better up and coming programs in all of basketball.

We have an opportunity again.

We have an opportunity to build and become one of the leaders in this country in respects to turning out great men and women in all fields.  To turn Penn State into an amalgamation of academics and athletics that is second to none.

If you were to attend Penn State, teach at Penn State, work at Penn State, or visit Penn State, you feel as though you are in a community and at an institution that cares about you.

It is clear from the announcement from Sue Paterno and Penn State that they are ready to move on.

I am ready to unabashedly support the Paterno library as a lasting tribute to an incredible human being that cared greatly about other people and the education they got while they were under their care.

I am ready to completely support an academic and athletic culture at Penn State that pursues a diverse community of people and ideas.  I will support an institution that invests heavily in pursuits pertinent to the challenges of today and helps create an atmosphere where the world's best and brightest can meet and become better for it.

We have a moment in time, right now, to continue to capitalize on the momentum that we have built for ourselves.  We have an opportunity to attain peace and move forward with one voice.

We have an opportunity to be our best once again.

We can do this.

My Superhero

It was the Summer of 1996.  I was entering the seventh grade and beginning to form a sense of identity about myself as an athlete.

I was bigger and faster than most kids in my grade, or at least I thought I was.  I'm sure there were guys that were taller or stronger.  I'm sure there might be some that were faster.  At seventh grade, I was already roughly 6' tall and 200 lbs.  I could dunk a volleyball and felt I could hold my own with any kind of foot race.


I was a bigger football fan than I was a basketball fan.  I loved the gladiator-ness of football with the helmets, the hitting and tackling.  I found the idea of raw physicality, speed, and agility intriguing, especially since it seemed that my body was hurtling towards a larger than average body and frame that might make for a good player.  I honestly thought I could be one of those people.

However, the first opportunity to "prove" this for me would be in 7th grade basketball where, for the first time, cuts could be made, and there would be a chance that I may not get to participate in a sport that I had fallen more and more in love with.

Until this point my favorite NBA player had been Shawn Kemp. While he was on the Sonics, and I watched him play, I saw a specimen of an explosive athlete that was exciting in the way that he played. I wanted to do the things that he did, play above the rim and handle the ball with skill and flair.  I honestly think if Kemp had been able to control his urges better, he might have been a LeBron type player before LeBron.

Then Kemp got traded to Cleveland, got rather rotund and decidedly less explosive, and I was without a real rooting interest in the NBA.

And THIS is when I would be introduced to Kobe Bryant.

My parents had just gotten DirecTV, and the internet would come soon after.  We got a monthly physical TV guide book (they had those in '96), and Kobe made the cover, with the headline "Michael wasn't this good at 18."

You see, I was one of those kids that did NOT love Michael Jordan.

For my entire life, I had been told by the media of the time, friends, and seemingly every adult, that Michael Jordan was the best basketball player of all-time and perhaps the greatest athlete of all-time.  For years I was told just the idea that another player could ever be as great as him was unfathomable. 

I had a problem with these assumptions.  It made it seem like Jordan was so far beyond everyone else that they didn't matter in a team sport, and that it diminished everything anyone else did.

I had a problem with them because it completely discounted the possibility of a future where someone else could do things as well as the past, so why bother trying?

I loved the players that dared to try and be the next great thing.  The players that wanted to catch the ghosts of the greatest players of all time.

And no one exemplified that to me more than Kobe Bryant.

Now, I was already a voracious reader, devouring books, periodicals, comics, whatever contained an interesting story.  But now I was entranced by the real life story of a prodigy that came into the NBA from my home state and had a chance to become something incredibly special.

I read everything I could on his life in newspapers or Sports Illustrated, or ESPN the magazine.  I read the beat reports from the L.A. Times, the Sacramento Bee and the Dallas Morning News.  I watched his highlights anytime I could find some time on the internet. 

I read stories of his upbringing in Italy, his high scores on the SAT that would enable him to attend any University on his intelligence alone.  His maturity for a high school kid was mentioned by everyone, as was his almost supernatural confidence in himself and his future.

There was just something about the way he played the game that made you feel like you were watching something truly incredible.  Here was a kid, dominating against guys that were much older, but didn't back down.  More than that, it felt like everyone knew he was just getting started.  His blend of size, quickness, skill, and intelligence that he already had at 18 seemed like he would be destined to become one of the greats.

When I watched Kobe, I felt like I was watching a myth of a person become reality.  The skill, athleticism, work ethic.  It was a story of a legend.

As his career started and my life continued, I'll always remember where I was when certain things happened.

When he experienced all of his highs and lows, I was often experiencing my own.

When Kobe came in the league in 1996 he won the dunk contest.  I made and started on my seventh grade team.

In the summer of 2000, Kobe would win his first Championship.  I would start as a junior for my high school's varsity football team.

In 2002, The Lakers completed their three peat.  I would become a walk-on at Penn State football.

Oddly enough, even the struggles of Kobe mirror my own.

When Kobe was charged with sexual assault, I went through my first real encounter with disappointment when I felt I had to leave the Penn State football program to focus more on my studies and to give up on the dream of football being a real avenue for myself.

When Shaquille O'Neal was traded, and Kobe found himself trying to figure out his game without Shaq, I found myself struggling to form my identity without football. 

When Kobe found himself again in 2008, I had done the same.  Finding a job that I loved with a group of people I genuinely enjoyed working with.

In his final game as only he could, he gave everyone what they wanted one last time in a 60 point out of time performance.  It seemed to sum up everything about him in one night.  Two months later, I would be married to my loving wife.

To me, Kobe is personal.  And I've put off writing about him because he's so personal to me.  He was my hero since age twelve, when a young boy is allowed to have them.  I don't think my writing can ever do the justice he deserved when it comes to specifically inspiring me.  How his existence allowed me to dream through him.  How he allowed me to imagine the impossible through him.

I cried for the first time about two hours after hearing the news, just like I'm crying now as I write this.  It was the kind of tears that just can't stop and be held back even though you know it changes nothing.  They come no matter how hard you try to tell yourself,  "No."

But eventually, those tears subside, and you begin to think about all the good you have in your life that was brought before those tears started, and all the things that can happen in the future.

Right now, I think about the basketball program in my backyard, so to speak.   Penn State men's basketball program is going through something that I think is pretty special.  It is a team that, now, many think has a chance of advancing in the NCAA tournament.  It is led by senior Lamar Stevens, who hails from Philadelphia and also idolized Bryant and no doubt has his own unique Kobe stories.

I like to think that right now, if Kobe were to pick a team that exemplified him, he would pick this Penn State squad.  A squad that was talented, but still worked hard.  A team that might have failed before, but has learned from those failures.  A team that might be flawed, but might still be every bit a champion.

I will miss him, but I will not stop loving the positive things he brought to me and other people.