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I've seen a bunch of people say this and I'm still not sure how these events are related to one another.
I'm slightly torn on this topic. Urban has handled this situation in an objectively terrible way. Blowing the protocol on something like this is bad enough as it is. Schools go out of their way to make the responsibilities of a coach abundantly clear on matters pertaining to domestic violence. He very likely knew this and abused his power to help a friend.
But there seems to be more going on here than the media will allow for. My initial reaction to the press conference was that Urban's just arrogant , but in hindsight, the utter contempt he seems to have for the victim, as suggested by his answers, makes me wonder. It had the feel of a guy fighting a battle with his hands tied behind his back. I don't offer that as an excuse so much as an observation; he seemed to feel genuinely wronged by the whole thing, and while he might be out-of-touch, his demeanor throughout this saga has never really been consistent with someone who's trying to hide something.
We still don't know exactly what he knew and when. It's easy for us to say he should have fired Zach Smith. It's probably harder when you have a preexisting relationship with that person - people are predisposed to believe people they know, and that becomes especially so when you're exposed to his side of the story everyday. People underestimate this bias when they draw sweeping conclusions about a person's motives. Easier to be manipulated by somebody you have to look straight in the eye.
Reporting mandates can be somewhat flimsy. They're supposed to protect people from their own judgement, but that invariably becomes impossible when you're weighing the validity of allegations that have already been vetted by law enforcement.
The fact that domestic violence charges are so hard to file makes this even trickier. It's not much of a stretch to think that a football coach might conflate the lack of an arrest with innocence. To the extent that an independent panel never had the chance to examine the evidence is largely Meyer's fault, and if you think he should lose his job for that, I will not argue. However, I can empathize with someone facing a predicament that forces them to choose between loyalty and PR, especially when you're leaving yourself open to remorse either way. I think it's OK to demand better from the people involved here without losing sight of the fact that this wasn't a capital crime. The grandstanding from the usual suspects in the media is just a bit much - we can acknowledge our country's domestic violence problem without turning our football coaches into first responders. I feel the same way about criticizing coaches for things that their players do - at the end of the day these are adults that should be judged independent of whoever they may associate with.
