Even if you believe that taking away scholarships is a reasonable punishment, why are you punishing the NEXT coach. Say coach A is caught breaking the rules and is fired. Wouldn't it be a better deterrent if the NCAA took away the scholarships from the next school he coaches at. Why punish the new HC, who has done nothing wrong?
I want to comment on this last point. Punishing the coach under whom the violations occurred is something on which the NCAA and the relevant professional leagues should indeed collaborate, With Paterno dead, the point is moot, but in the case of old friends Pete Carroll or John Calipari, the NCAA and the NFL or NBA respectively should agree on multiple year band from coaching equal to at least the term of probation or sanctions levied by the NCAA.
Pete Carroll trotted off to the Seattle Seahawks for more money while USC took a huge hit for his transgressions. These leagues are inextricably linked through the draft and can collaborate on coaching employment conditions as well.
As to the last sentence in Patfanken's post, the NCAA is not punishing the next coach. It is "punishing" the institution and its Board that looked the other way while young boys were raped by a grown man on their premises for more than a decade.
Bill O'Brien is a voluntary employee, is being paid $2.3 million in year one with escalators and incentives.
Inside Bill O'Brien's Penn State contract - Big Ten Blog - ESPN
"Punishing" Bill O'Brien is a relative term at over $2 million per year and if the guy wanted to walk, I'm sure the Board and Acting AD would accommodate him. They are not exactly in much of a position to play hardball with a guy who agreed to take on the task of mopping up the mess.
The student athletes in the PSU football program are not being punished either. They are getting a free education whether they play or not, and being given complete freedom to attend another school without sacrificing a minute of eligibility.
Stay tuned. The US Department of Education is investigating this travesty, and there are three criminal trials to go for Curley, Shultz and Spanier. And we haven't even seen the first salvo in the civil suits.
If just one of those guys had dialed 9-1-1. Spanier, Shultz, Curley and Paterno all had the opportunity to do the first thing any junior high principal would have known to do if he or she was told a football coach was molesting a boy on campus.
Those guys weren't qualified to run a day care.