What the … ?
Jeremy Pruitt, the former head football coach for the University of Tennessee, is blaming George Floyd’s death and other racial inequality issues for violating NCAA rules and making illegal payments.
After several NCAA violations (that included reportedly handing out literal bags of cash), Pruitt was fired from Tennessee and forced to leave Knoxville as a disgraced coach.
Last week, the NCAA laid down their punishment. The university itself was hit with an $8 million fine, while Pruitt was slammed with a six year show-cause penalty. Wins were also vacated from the Volunteers, as well as 28 scholarships being cut over five years. In total, Tennessee had more than 200 infractions.
Well, if you ask Pruitt about it, he’ll claim he violated numerous NCAA rules because of the death of George Floyd, COVID-19 and mental health, according to documents obtained by the Knoxville News Sentinel. To get even more particular, Pruitt reportedly said he gave a struggling player’s mom a Chick-fil-A bag with $300 in it because of racial inequity and Floyd’s death. (RELATED: Detroit Lions’ David Montgomery Gets Brutally Thrashed By Resistance Band During Workout)
“Then you throw in George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, okay, so you sit there as a white man and you see all of this going on and you can see these kids suffering.”
“… (It’s) pitiful when you sit in a room and you hear grown men, and I’m talking about our coaches too, when they talk about growing up and the circumstances that they’ve been under, because it’s hard for a white man to understand, right,” Pruitt reportedly said, per the Knoxville News Sentinel.
EXCLUSIVE: Jeremy Pruitt told investigators that George Floyd was on his mind when he gave a Tennessee player’s mom $300 in a Chick-fil-A bag, documents reveal.
And he said much more. https://t.co/MLEW1A1Xp7
— Adam Sparks (@AdamSparks) July 17, 2023
… I think I just lost all my brain cells.