Rick Pitino: Lowlights of a scumbag’s career

Let me get this straight: The FBI investigation into NCAA basketball coaches paying players doesn’t bother me that much – Hey, at least some players are getting paid for their work! You can argue that student athletes get a free college education and that’s worth a lot, and I agree. But the NCAA, its colleges and coaches make a lot more than these kids do; the NCAA has been run by criminals and thieves who have fed off these players for decades. I will not get into that today; instead, I want to talk about the best thing that has come from this investigation: the fact that recently dismissed ex-Louisville head coach Rick Pitino will no longer be able to influence impressionable kids.

Sure, there’s no doubt that Pitino has won a lot of games, but if I’m sending my son away to college to play basketball, I would like his coach to be a man that I know will take care of my son. Rick Pitino, with his thousand-dollar suits and slick-backed haircut has always looked like a mafioso wannabe. Pitino has been a man that time and time again has proven to have no moral compass. I thought today, as we celebrate this scumbag losing his job, that it would be a good time to look back at Pitino and remind everybody what we’re dealing with here.

Career lowlights for Rick Pitino

Shameless use of 9/11 tragedy for sympathy

In the September 11th destruction of New York City’s Twin Towers, Pitino’s brother-in-law Billy Minardi was killed. Of course you feel bad for any family that has to go through something like this, so you ask how does this make Pitino a scumbag? Get ready; it’s a long story.

Coach Rick Pitino told police he had consensual sex at a restaurant with a woman named Karen Cunagin Sypher in 2003, at this time Pitino was married, but wait! it gets worse! He also said he later gave the woman $3,000 when she said she wanted to have an abortion but didn’t have health insurance, that’s a standup guy right there and that big contract that the University of Louisville gave him came in handy paying for that abortion.

Sypher claims that Pitino raped her, an allegation that the coach denied. Her credibility has been questioned by law enforcement officials due to inconsistent facts and only coming forward with claims of rape after she had been charged with attempting to extort money from Pitino. So at least for Pitino it looks like he didn’t rape the woman.

Pitino had apologized for the incident and he remained at Louisville. University President James Ramsey said it is time to move on and that Pitino is “our guy.” Yes she said that! Because we want the face of our program to be Rick Pitino! Really?

During his public apology for the incident(s), Pitino said, “I came here at a very difficult time. When 9/11 hit, you needed a community to get you over it. In New York City, it was easy because everybody knew the devastation of that and they got each other over it. In Louisville, the impact wasn’t felt like New York City, but I needed the community to help me get over it. The university officials and my friends and loved ones have helped me through this very difficult time.”

It was not the first time Pitino referenced the 9/11 attacks in regard to the Karen Sypher case. He brought claims of extortion to the FBI in March of 2003 and later said, “But if I can get through 9/11, I can get through anything in my life, and I got through 9/11, and there’s nothing ever that’s going to come close to that.” He really compared this to 9-11 and 3,000 lives lost!

Pitino’s brother-in-law was killed in the attack on the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. I cannot imagine the pain that a family would feel after such a tragic incident. However, I think it is a subject not suited for reference when talking about adultery. Pitino used the death of his brother-in-law to defend himself against the indefensible.

Pitino’s family comes first to him (Just kidding!)

Pitino has a long history of tossing his loved ones aside on his way to his attaining success. A Sports Illustrated article from 1996, written by William Nack, discusses the death of Pitino’s son, Daniel, by congenital heart failure.

While Rick’s wife, Joanne, mourned the loss of Daniel and prayed not to leave the home she had once shared with her sickly child, Pitino went against her wishes and accepted a job with the New York Knicks. According to the article, Joanne said that day, “I can’t believe he’s doing this to me again. Remember this is after his *son* died!

“We just got here! How can he ask me to pick up and leave again? I’ve been through this too many times. I can’t believe, after all I’ve been through this year, that he is asking me to [move] again.” But, Rick Pitino was only worried about himself as usual.

Stripper-Gate

I’m sure it’s recent enough that you remember the last scandal before this one and this one holding up to Rick Pitino’s moral character included strippers and prostitutes. For this incident, the NCAA Committee on Infractions issued its report on the scandal. Pending appeal, the NCAA has placed Louisville on four years of probation; suspended Cardinals Coach Rick Pitino for five ACC games in 2017-18; and — perhaps — set the stage for Louisville to vacate its 2012 and ’13 Final Four trips and the 2013 NCAA championship if it is determined those teams were using ineligible players.

As always, scumbag Pitino is playing dumb and acting like over the four years it was happening that he had no knowledge! Of course, nobody believes this tiny little man who has no conscience whatsoever. What makes this even worse was the fact that several of the recruits were still minors! I guess if it would have gotten bad and a stripper or prostitute got pregnant Daddy Rick would have paid for the abortion.

Will Pitino get another job?

He shouldn’t, but in this day and age you just never know. Pitino is an adulterer, a bad father, he had minor recruits and players getting sex from prostitutes and still at the time of day I am writing this he has been put on administrative leave! Why wait on firing him? Louisville might as well take all of the trash out at once and get head football caoch Bobby Petrino out the door as well.

The Louisville Cardinals’ once proud tradition has been tarnished beyond belief; a program built by John Wooden disciple Denny Crum may be in ruins by the time all is said and done. Where does the blame lie? Nowhere but in the administration who were so worried about keeping up with Kentucky that they allowed a man like Rick Pitino to thrive.

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