Rick Pitino: Why We Shouldn’t Root for him in March Madness

Rick Pitino is a nice man. We should all aspire to be like him. A model citizen, a person who shows us the right way to live, Rick is a guy you want to emulate to be remembered for your positive impact on the world.

Not really. None of that is true.

He got caught doing some bad things in the past. Really bad actually.

A few years ago he suddenly left the Louisville program saying he didn’t do anything wrong. But I kind of suspect he did. Lying is something Rick would do. To get more talented guys to come play for his team, he cheated. Cheating to get ahead is a Rick Pitino value.

Now he’s in the tournament again, coaching Iona. Wouldn’t you like to know who in the Iona athletic department vouched for hiring Rick to coach the basketball team?

“But what about his past indiscretions and NCAA recruiting violations?” someone like the president of the university asked.

“Never mind that,” said the athletics department official. “He’s taken four different teams from four different schools to the NCAA tournament. If we hire him he’ll take our school to the tournament. That will help Iona’s brand, get us known better nationally, and bring in better basketball players, which will help us win more games and make more money for Iona.”

So they hired Rick. They compromised the integrity of the university for some basketball-generating revenues.

But was that hire worth it?

Rick’s not a trustworthy dude, a first-team all greaseballer. We all are in some ways, but Rick is more sleazy than most of us. He’s proven it more than once. He’s done some things that I don’t even think are appropriate to print here.

Plus he’s arrogant and acts like he’s impressed with himself and feels he’s special and smarter than the rest of us. Rick thinks highly of himself, which is especially noteworthy given what we all know about him that is reprehensible. Sure he works hard but so do lots of people. But Rick thinks he’s a special basketball coach. The title of his book is “Born to Coach.” Maybe it should have been called “Born to Cheat.”

The problem with Rick is he let his ambitions get so intense that he did some lame and selfish things to get where he wanted to go. Should we respect him for winning lots of basketball games? Not really.

Should we be impressed with all the bad acts he committed? No.

Should we root for Iona to advance in the March Madness tournament?

I don’t think so. He’s not the kind of guy you would tell your son “Hey, son, I want you to grow up and be like that guy, Rick.” Nor would you tell your son “that’s the kind of person I would want to be your basketball coach.”

That’s an important litmus test. If you wouldn’t tell your son to grow up and be like a certain person, there must be something about that person that’s unimpressive and unworthy of emulation.

Rick Pitino has won a lot of basketball games as a coach.

But I don’t think he’s won a lot in the game of life.

In the final analysis, he’s just a loser who will be remembered most for his over-inflated sense of self-importance, flawed character, and unimpressive actions.