The Never Ending Apology To Duke Lacrosse

I'm not sure the accused Duke lacrosse players even deserve an apology.

Certainly not apologies via incessant ESPN coverage, press conferences, irrational application of NCAA authority via grants of extended athletic ability or full page ads in the Wall Street Journal taken out last week.



After all, people have charges dropped against them every day. And remember, most people believed the accusations at first. That belief wasn't based on much. Mainly media. And now I guess we're supposed to believe something different just because the media says so.

Reasonable people can differ on this point. But my gut feeling is that something happened. I don't know whether or not what happened was against the law. But I don't feel that the accused lacrosse players are innocent of much.

And to be sure, except for all our respective gut feelings, the lacrosse players aren't definitely innocent. None of us know that for sure. Instead, they are simply guys who had charges dropped against them. At best, they are not guilty. But, certainly "innocence" is not the appropriate label for them from a legal perspective. Cases aren't prosecuted for a variety of reasons (including innocence, btw). But if the accuser declined to testify or if she was deemed unreliable to testify for whatever reason, that is not the same thing as the accused being "innocent." It's a distinction that shouldn't be overlooked.

And consider that the alleged lying whore who accused the Duke lacrosse players has yet to claim her 15 minutes of fame. Not even for the payday that would surely be coming to her for her side of the story. I don't think the networks, the prosecutors or even the accused can claim they declined the fruits of the spotlight.

Former Duke lacrosse coach, Mike Pressler, can't deny he accepted his 15 minutes of fame. ESPN "apologized" to him by awarding him his very own Sunday Conversation segment this past weekend. (BTW, he has a book coming out too.) However, Mike Pressler got exactly what he deserved. He should have been fired. Whatever the lacrosse team did that night, they did as a team. And a coach should have control of his team. No parent sent their son to Duke to get drunk and party with strippers. So, if that happened on Pressler's watch, he was, at a minimum, negligent in his job responsibilities. And when shit happens on your watch at work, you might get fired. So is life. Even though Pressler received a financial settlement from Duke (likely per contract), nonetheless, ESPN felt compelled to give this guy airtime to portray himself as some sort of sympathetic victim. I'm unimpressed.

And it should be said put out there that the accused players brought some of the shame, humiliation and negative attention from the accusations on themselves. Certainly, the initial spectacle was created by the media. However, the accused made a choice to stay in the spotlight. No stripper forced them to hold press conferences or otherwise make appearances on 60 Minutes, Good Morning America or similar programs. The accused conscientiously and unprovoked chose to embark on a legal strategy of trying the case in the media and turning the public against the accuser. Obviously, it was an excellent and successful legal strategy. And I don't begrudge them that. But the accused could have taken on a similarly aggressive behind the scenes defense. But they chose the spotlight and the media shouldn't have to apologize for giving it to them.

Maybe the accused Duke lacrosse players were wronged. It's possible they weren't. But I'm sick of hearing about it. And amidst all the mea culpas, the real lesson might be lost. If you want a date a Black girl, ignore your BET fantasies and just find a nice girl on campus.