In light of all the negative publicity that San Diego State has received this week, the question among Aztecs fans is this: Should athletic director Rick Bay be fired?
The answer here is a definite no.
There are those who think the easiest way to solve all of San Diego State's problems is to get rid of the captain of the athletic department's ship.
But a simple solution does not solve a complex problem. It would only make it worse.
Those who want to run Rick Bay out of town ought to look closely at his record. It is not perfect, but it is pretty good.
It is not easy to keep a Division I athletic program afloat when you are not in the loop of the Bowl Championship Series, which receives almost all of the television money.
This is a classic case of the rich getting richer.
Schools within the BCS ---- the Pac-10, Big 12, Southeastern Conference and the Big 10, to name a few ---- will continue to have more money to spend.
Each year, it gets tougher for SDSU to compete. The athletic program is around $1.4 million in debt right now; it would be worse without Bay's expertise.
If someone new was brought in as AD, the thinking here is that it would set SDSU back financially ---- something the school can't afford.
Bay's specialty is raising money. He's good at it. In 1998, for instance, SDSU's total fundraising was $1.6 million; in the 2002 fiscal year, that number doubled to $3.2 million. Corporate money has gone up from $596,000 in '98 to $970,000 last year.
He seems to be a pretty good judge of coaching talent, too. Bay realized that football coach Ted Tollner, a nice man, was not going to get it done here. So instead of rehiring him, he took a chance on Tom Craft.
Bay is also the man who lured Steve Fisher into town. Both are going to bring further credit to the university.
Many shook their heads when Craft was named the football coach. But anyone who saw the way Craft put together a team knows that good things are ahead.
For the first time in school history, this Aztecs football staff went head-to-head with BCS schools in the recruiting of top athletes ---- and came away with a recruiting class that might be the best ever.
All because Bay had the guts to go with a junior-college coach.
Bay willingly takes responsibility for anything that happens in the athletic department, which is what a good leader does.
The audit by the California State University's Chancellor's Office, an 11-month procedure that was released last week, was critical of the athletic department in many areas.
Among the infractions: trading athletic equipment for personal gain, improper record keeping, mismanagement of state funds, students verbally insulted, and a working atmosphere where employees were afraid to speak out for fear or reprisal if they saw an infraction.
When you add the fact the football team was put on NCAA probation for holding open, out-of-season workouts, it looks like Bay was asleep on his watch.
If you cut through the report, there is one major area that was mismanaged ---- the equipment room, run by Steve Bartel and overseen by associate athletic director Vance Redfern, who is no longer with the university.
That is the crux of this embarrassment.
If anything, Bay trusted their judgment too much.
One of the biggest problems that Bay faces is a strong state employees' union that makes it virtually impossible to fire anyone. Bartel falls into that category.
Before you hang Bartel, remember ---- this is not something new among college equipment managers.
Selling and trading and using equipment as barter has been a standard practice at many universities for years. It doesn't make it ethically correct, particularly when one does it for personal gain.
When you are dealing in what has always been a gray area, the color of right and wrong and doing what is correct often gets blurred.
As the top man in the athletic department, Bay oversees 125 individuals. Anyone with management experience will tell you that is lot of people to handle.
Yes, Bay has a dozen mid-level managers to help out, but with that many people, much can go wrong. Much did go wrong.
But Bay has a record of leadership to be allowed a chance to get it done right here. Then, if he fails, let the growling begin.
I think he won't fail.