Slick Rick

Although the beginning of college football is only a week away, we can't seem to get away from stories about the college basketball coaches in the state of Kentucky. In the past week, we've seen current Kentucky coach, John Calipari, be stripped of wins; former Kentucky coach, Billy Gillispie, get arrested for a DUI; and Louisville coach, Rick Pitino, give one whale of a press conference about his current legal situation. Pitino is currently involved in an investigation in an alleged extortion attempt against him by a woman who claims she was raped by Pitino on two different occassions.

Now, I don't intend to provide the entire story involving Pitino and the woman who is claiming she was raped by him, because I don't think I could get all the information out before college basketball season starts. However, the basic elements of the story are: Karen Sypher claims to have been raped by Pitino six years ago, Sypher claims Pitino paid one of the members of his staff to marry her in order to keep her quiet, Sypher claims Pitino paid her $3,000 to pay for an abortion after Pitino impregnanted her, Sypher tried to extort Pitino out of $10 million in order to keep quiet about his sexual encounters with her. And Karen Sypher is now being charged with extortion by the FBI and none of her claims against Pitino have been seen as credibile, so it doesn't appear any charges will be brought against him. Still, Pitino has admitted that he did have a sexual encounter with the woman in a Louisville restaurant, but he claims the encounter was consensual for both parties. Following this craziness?!

So the issue I want to get to is the decision of Rick Pitino to call a press conference on Wednesday about all these events and stories. Basically, it ended up being a six minute rant showing how Rick has gone off the deep end. Despite being discouraged by the University of Louisville and his lawyers, he came and out and talked about the hell his wife has been through in the past seven months while a woman tried to extort him during the tournament. Yes, it clearly must have bothered her that her cheating husband was being extorted during some basketball games. Also, he talks about how we need to get away from this story about his personal life and get onto more important things, like the economy and basketball. Sure Rick, people are losing their jobs all over the country but let's make sure we think about Louisville's chances without Terrence Williams and Earl Clark this year! (<-which aren't good, by the way). Pitino also mentions that he was told by the university, the authorities, and his attorney to keep quiet because it's an ongoing investigation, but he's tired of being quiet and he's decided to talk. So Rick, you're not following the advice of your own employer, attorneys, and the prosecutors of the case? Smart move!

There are a number of other ridiculous comments ("a long laundry list of people who passed away today") Pitino makes during his press conference, but I'll post the video here (courtesy of ESPN) so you can see it yourself. It's quite obvious to see that the situation at Louisville has turned into an absolute trainwreck for the university and for Rick Pitino. And although Pitino asks people to ignore the reports and stories that come out from now on, how can we turn away when people are having meltdowns like this?!