Did Pitt blog go over the top with Paterno shirt?

... shuts down after backlash from "Joe Knew"shirts 

Earlier this week, a Pitt blog called ThePoint412 devised an idea of taking advantage of the restart of the Pitt-Penn State football series as a way to criticize the man who ended the series 16 years ago.

The blog offered t-shirts that were very simple: "Joe Knew" on the front, chastising the late coach for denying his knowledge of the Jerry Sandusky pedophile cases. They were selling for $20, so they were popular.

The point of this is that with much of the evidence that came out over the summer, it is obvious that Joe Paterno knew about the pedophile tendencies of his defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky much earlier than he had admitted prior to his death [2001].

The first shirts sold out so quickly that another order was being sold until Thursday.

Tweets Today

The first tweet that indicated that they were canceling the shirts said this:

The Point 412 @The_Point_412

Let it be known that this was done by a group of friends who did not expect this to happen. 0 shirts will be sold. You will never see them.

The second one said this:

The Point 412 @The_Point_412

Unortunately [sic] due to the unfair harassment of one of our friends and negative backlash, we will be cancelling [sic] all shirt orders.

They may have received some backlash from Penn State, but my guess is that some Pitt people were the ones exerting pressure.

Background of the shirt 

Before the grand jury that indicted and eventually convicted Sandusky and later in a Washington Post interview before he passed away, Paterno's mantra was "no one knew."

Evidence from insurance cases in which Penn State is battling with its carrier over who should bear the responsibility for the abuse indicates that there were obvious examples of this as far back as the 70s. It also noted that a number of coaches had seen Sandusky abusing young boys over the years -- but did not tell anyone in the Penn State police office. Not sure if they told the A.D. or head coach.

The PSU police did investigate Sandusky in 1998 and recommended that charges be brought against him, but D.A. Ray Gricar declined to prosecute the case for reasons that he kept to himself. [Then became a missing man and is now legally dead.]

Conclusion 

The game itself should be exciting enough. This was a good rip at Paterno, who said simply that he was not going to play Pitt any longer back at the turn of the century.

That was a sad situation for both schools since it would have continued a great rivalry.

The Nittany Lions do not actually have a true rival today, which is sad.

Nonetheless, we will have four of these games, so be grateful for that.