Ohio State head football coach Urban Meyer is currently on administrative leave until the conclusion of an ongoing investigation that was initiated after it was discovered that he knew of spousal assault accusations against now former assistant coach Zach Smith.
Meyer is 73-8 in his seven seasons in Columbus, and his teams have finished in the top six of the AP poll in six of his seven seasons as the Buckeyes' head man.
In related news, Buckeyes fans are rallying around Meyer to get out in front of Meyer's potential firing. As of early Monday afternoon, a Change.org petition to prevent the National Championship winning coach from being canned had collected over 28,000 virtual signatures. This petition (which, let's be honest, doesn't take much effort to add your name to) comes in addition to a demonstration that will take place outside the team's football stadium.
Whether that rally receives a great turn-out, or is one of those sad events with an attendance that you can count on hand, remains to be seen, but comments made by the event's organizer appear to be setting a low bar.
"This will be a brief rally. Nothing but positive words for our coach," said that person (Jeff Hamms) on Facebook on Sunday night. "That's all this is about. This has nothing to do with any of the domestic violence situation with [our ex-] coach. This is simply to lift up Urban Meyer. That's it."
Hamms did concede that not all Buckeyes fans are on board, but said that 95 percent of the feedback he's gotten has been positive.
Meyer's current situation came about after Courtney Smith, the ex-wife of the aforementioned Zach Smith, told reporter Brett McMurphy that Meyer knew of a domestic violence incident in 2015, but failed to act on it. A week before Smith said that, however, Meyer said he was unaware of that and never had a conversation about it.
On Friday he backtracked on that claim, and stated that he reported the 2015 incident by following proper protocol. He apologized, and said he wasn't "adequately prepared to discuss these sensitive personnel issues with the media."
Zach Smith also stated that he'd feel bad if Meyer lost his job over his conduct.
"If the pressure builds on this to the point where Urban Meyer would lose his job, that's a crime on everyone else," Smith said, according to ESPN. "That's not a crime on him. He did nothing wrong. He didn't know about half of the allegations or most of the allegations that are being thrown out like there is some serial abuser here. The ones he knew about, he handled the perfect way."
Anyway, the rally is set to take place outside Ohio Stadium on Monday night.
