Is it fair to single out athletes for their mistakes? NAY: Let’s stick with mild coverage of off-field missteps

When a student-athlete misbehaves on the playing field, the response is obvious: You discipline them publicly. Maybe it’s through a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct call ? or two minutes in the penalty box ? or a flagrant foul (especially if a player acts as badly as a certain member of the Orlando Magic). Whatever the means, the end result is the same. You discipline them publicly.Off the field, the situation is different. The media often does not report the names of student-athletes whose foibles occur outside the lines. And this policy of privacy is as fair as the policy of public humiliation during a game.Whether we like it or not, student-athletes are covered in the media for one and only one reason: They play a sport for a local school. And they are covered solely based on their ability to launch a pigskin through the air ? dribble through two defenders to the hoop ? or hit a fastball out of the park. As individuals, they may be the next Mother Teresa or the next Bernie Madoff – but that is immaterial to the reason they are covered. So, if a soccer player hauls down an opponent in a game, he or she gets a yellow card, and their name will likely get reported in a game story. If the same soccer player gets caught for underage drinking at a friend’s house, the incident may still get reported, but chances are the player’s name won’t be included.Those with a righteous-indignation streak may not like this. And if student-athletes are allowed to escape punishment from their missteps off the playing field, I wouldn’t like it, either. But this isn’t the case. The Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association (MIAA) does a pretty good job of policing student-athletes on and off the field. For instance, those who drink, smoke or use drugs risk eligibility for future games. They might also incur the frustration of their teammates, who have to work harder to compensate for the absence of suspended players. And of course, they would have to deal with letting down their ultimate “team”: their families.There are also logistical challenges to publishing the names of student-athletes for their off-field trespasses. If 25 student-athletes get busted for drinking, do you report all 25 names? If 50 students get busted ? and only 25 are student-athletes ? do you report the 25 athletes and let the other 25 enjoy anonymity? Do we scrutinize the rosters of teams in all sports, or only those that play on Thanksgiving Day or in crowded courts or rinks? How many kinds of sins get your name in the paper – is it only drug and alcohol abuse we’re talking about, or would it extend to parking tickets, late cell-phone bills and overdue library books?It was the great William Shakespeare who gets the final word. In “Richard II,” the English nobleman John of Gaunt must watch his son get banished by King Richard. Even worse, it is a punishment that Gaunt himself agreed to. Then he regrets his acquiescence and tells the King: “You urged me as a judge; but I had rather/You would have bid me argue like a father./O, had it been a stranger, not my child,/To smooth his fault I should have been more mild.”Rich Tenorio is the Item’s sports copy editor.