Editor: I don’t know who to blame, Jared Sullinger or Thad Matta. What message did they send to the rest of the team? “Hey guys, I will be making millions this time next year, but you go play hard today on national TV and I will try and coach you during timeouts!”

It sure did not seem like he was wracked with back spasms that take two weeks to heal (I am a back doctor, by the way).

If Ben Roethlisberger of the Steelers can show his teammates that he is a team player with much more of a serious injury than “back spasms,” then so can Sullinger. Maybe a nice hot whirlpool bath would help!

— Grant P. Evans, Reynoldsburg

Grant: What I know about back problems isn’t much beyond my own herniated disc (L4-S5) of a few years ago, but I’m thinking there’s a big difference between vigorous clapping at a game of basketball and the actual playing of the game. Besides, why take risks in December that could affect March?

Ray: Who is in charge? I’m wondering if Thad Matta is allowing too much slack with his players. During many of the basketball games this year and last, Jared Sullinger could be seen not only shouting instructions and leading cheers from the bench (normal), but joking with the coach. Then, more recently, during the Kansas game, Jared was in a huddle with the team and no coaches present — even though he was held out of the contest.

Even more revealing, in the (Thursday’s) Dispatch, Sullinger is quoted as saying that it was his decision to come off the bench, since he was not starting. And in reference to starting Evan Ravenel instead, “He deserved to start, so I told coach Matta to start Evan and have me come off the bench.” Is it Jared’s role to tell the coach how to substitute?

There is an old saying used in the military: “Familiarity breeds contempt.” Perhaps Matta might heed it.

— Don Denton, Westerville

Don: In my mind, there are plenty of areas where one can question Matta’s tactics, including his soft early-season scheduling (before this year, anyway) to his tendency to forget his bench. But I would never nick Matta’s relationship with players. Most seem to love playing for him, and the pipeline certainly seems to be flowing.

Editor: It’s like the Beatles’ song Let It Be. I’m referring to the firing of coaches Woody Hayes, Jim Tressel and Joe Paterno. Laud them for their coaching records and off-the-field contributions!

The media has a worse record for dissecting one incident in each case and destroying the career and credibility of those coaches. They are the pillars of Hall of Fame coaches, bar none! I applaud them and am proud of their integrity.

I abhor the media, who are a bunch of worthless instigators.

— Art Tiburzio, Gahanna

Art: I’ve been called worse, I suppose. As for integrity, it sure seems to have found a place in the eye of the beholder.

Sir: Penn State’s coach emeritus Joe Paterno has lived a crisis-filled life. Yet the news of his falling and breaking his hip is very disturbing.

In a strange but true way I came to know Joe when I drove a bus for COTA back in the 1970s. One Saturday morning my foreman said, “Go get your bus and pick up Joe Paterno and his team and take them to the Horseshoe, then stay there and take them to the airport and stay with them until they depart.”

After I picked up Joe and his team at the motel, I headed south down Olentangy River Road. Joe was standing at the front of the bus with his right leg down on the first step, by the door, drinking from a quart-sized paper carton of milk.

I said, “Joe, if you’re interested, that’s God’s little acre there on the right.”

“What’s God’s little acre?” he asked.

“Woody’s practice field,” I replied.

He said nothing more until after the team exited the bus, then he turned toward me. He held the carton of milk and crushed it in his left hand. “That’s what I think of God’s little acre.”

I said, “You’re a class act, coach.”

“Yeah, I know,” he said, and then he went in and whipped the Buckeyes.

Joe Paterno was a swell coach and a great American. But he must feel rejected and betrayed by his school and his superiors. And for all the good he did before they came to part, ’tis a sadness I feel for this man and his broken heart.

— William J.M. Wallace, Columbus

William: Thanks for sharing a great story. Who knew? Not that JoePa drank milk, but that he was once strong enough to crush a carton.

Ray: The riot that broke out at the end of the Cincinnati-Xavier basketball game should be reason enough for the NCAA to finally crack down on trash-talking in all sports. Civility and sportsmanship have long since been abandoned in not only American sports but in our society as a whole.

Xavier’s Tu Holloway was quoted as stating after the game that, “We’ve got a whole bunch of gangsters in our locker room.” Is this really the image the NCAA and our universities want to project to the youth of America?

— Steven H. Spring, South Charleston

Steven: ’Twas not a shining moment in American sports, no. And not all that surprising, sad to say.

Write me at 34 S. 3rd St., Columbus, 43215, or e-mail sports@dispatch.com. Please include your hometown and telephone number, which will not be published.

Ray Stein is sports editor of The Dispatch.

rstein@dispatch.com