I guess I’ll field this question, though there is a small voice in the back of my head yelling “It’s a trap!”. First and foremost, college football is a business. As such , I tend to view things a bit different. Meyer is good for business. He runs a top 3 national program. He (surprisingly) does a good job at bringing in higher character recruits, has a high graduation rate for players, and provides many tools for success after graduation. You don’t hear much of lying to recruits about position or playing time, but he does employ over-signing techniques and you see more and more medical redshirts as a result. As a whole, the program is run very well. There is always shadiness in college football, and I am sure OSU is no different in this regard, but it is par for the course in comparison to other top programs.
As far as recent events, I am somewhat in the middle of most opinions. I don’t believe personally that an employer is to blame for an employee’s domestic abuse. And in this case, I don’t think Urban deserves blame for covering up abuse or enabling it. It’s a matter for the police solely. Universities are not equipped for criminal investigation. The cops were involved 9 or 10 time with the Smith’s, with no DA charges being filed.
As for his actions, however, he clearly is showing that his ego is more important that being truthful. He continues to shirk responsibility and shows little remorse. He clearly took steps to minimize the impact of the investigation by deleting text messages. In addition, ZS was not a good coach and should have been fired on the merits of his performance years ago, with or without the obvious baggage. He was a disaster waiting to happen. Meyer is solely responsible for decisions to keep him on staff, and for that deserves applicable blame.
So how do I feel? I think he is a sketchy guy but not to the extent that social media and blogs want to make it out. College football is a business, and OSU made a business decision to keep him based in his job performance. If he was an underperforming coach, he no doubt would have been fired, but that speaks more to job performance. I think he does the job he is paid to do very well, but I don’t respect his character. I wrote a book here, but this is my perspective take.