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Home to a half Mexican who now lives in Silverdale, WA and who supports the Hawks, Sonics and Mariners along with the alma mater (WSU). I also post wacky links, pictures of insanely hot women and what have you (if you don't want to read my ramblings), so enjoy.


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Saturday, November 08, 2003
Real quick, check this story out from the Spokesman-Review. I may be back later with various other comments, but for right now I think this needs to be heard. ESPN.com chopped up the story rather badly, but here is the original c&P'ed since you have to register.



Season of reflection
Former WSU coach Mike Price pursues lawsuit, deals with depression and uncertain future

Carter Strickland
Staff writer

PULLMAN -- MIKE PRICE STOOD ALONE on the hilltop as the wind whipped around him.

Behind Price was the town he had called home for 19 of his 57 years. Here he was a neighbor, a friend and a hero. For 14 years he was head coach at Washington State University. He shared two Rose Bowls with this town. He was a national coach of the year. He was celebrated and adored. Then he was gone. Alabama had called. Price had left.

‘‘It's hard coming back,” Price said. ‘‘It's like I have a hole in my heart. Coming back and seeing all the people, the friends, the players I left. It hurts. It hurts to come back here. This just brings it all back.”

It's been almost six months since Price was fired as the coach of the University of Alabama for what university officials called improper behavior. A subsequent article in the nation's largest sports magazine, Sports Illustrated, detailed that alleged behavior.

The magazine reported that on the night of April 16 and the following morning, Price twice visited a strip club called Arety's Angels in Pensacola, Fla., went to a semi-private dance area, fondled an employee, was reprimanded for his behavior there and later was engaged in ‘‘aggressive sex” with two women in his Crowne Plaza hotel room.

‘‘That never happened,” Price said. ‘‘I never committed adultery.”

Price doesn't deny going to Arety's, but has vehement objections to how his behavior was portrayed.

The article, written by Don Yaeger, also alleged Price had purchased drinks for and propositioned coeds in and around Tuscaloosa, Ala.

‘‘That story destroyed my reputation,” Price said. ‘‘Hurt my family. Hurt me. And it was nothing but lies. There were never (two) women in my room. There was never a sexual encounter. There was no adultery. I never broke any laws. Too much drinking led to poor judgment, that was it.”

Price has filed a $20 million libel suit against Yaeger, the author of the story, and Time Inc., SI's parent company. The case is set to go to court in the fall of 2004. (An earlier $20 million lawsuit against Alabama has been dismissed. That lawsuit claimed denial of due process, violation of civil rights, breach of contract, wrongful termination and fraud. Price may appeal the case.)

Sports Illustrated declined to discuss the specifics of the libel suit. Yaeger has said he stands behind the reporting in his story.

For the first time since the firing and the publication of the article, Price agreed to talk at length with The Spokesman-Review to tell his side of the story and discuss his future in coaching, his family and how his life has changed since he was fired on May 3, 2003.

‘‘There is not a day that I wake up that I don't think about what happened,” Price said. ‘‘And I wonder if it is ever going to go away.”

His guilt still lingers. His depression is just below the surface.

‘‘I got professional help because of the guilt feeling that I had to deal with every day,” Price said. ‘‘I now know what depression is,” he continued. ‘‘It is an actual feeling, a chemical reaction. I have never been depressed one day of my life. And then this happened.”

The Spokesman-Review has also obtained depositions of Price and Yeager. That information combined with transcripts of interviews Price's lawyer conducted with dancers at the club to paint a clearer picture of what did happen to the Mike Price this small Palouse town knew.

The players

They came from everywhere and all walks of life: A lifelong coach who spent nearly his entire life in the Pacific Northwest; a magazine writer who has been under scrutiny before; a veteran topless dancer with two kids and a husband; a small-town Louisiana girl trying to fit into a new job as a waitress; and another topless dancer.

They were thrown together in what has been one of the most highly publicized sports scandals in recent history. Now they are inexorably linked.

There is Lori Boudreaux, who also goes by Destiny Stahl. On April 16, this mother of two was a topless dancer at Arety's Angels. Boudreaux was the first to go public with her story of Price being a customer at Arety's.

There is Jennifer Eaton -- who also goes by Jessica -- another employee of Arety's, who told The Birmingham News she was one of the women in the room with Price. A transcript from a taped interview with Eaton provided by Price's lawyer disputes that claim.

There is Tracy Brigalia. Brigalia was a waitress at Arety's. She worked there for less than a week before she and the owner, Arety Kapetanis, parted ways. Her last night was the night Price visited the club. Brigalia, again in transcript of a taped interview, said she was the only woman in Price's 11th floor Crowne Plaza hotel room that night. She, along with Price, adamantly denied any sex took place.

There is Yaeger, a part-time writer for Sports Illustrated based in Tallahassee, Fla. Yaeger's work in the past has led to him being part in two lawsuits, one involving an article he contributed to for Sports Illustrated and another involving a book he co-wrote. One was settled for an undisclosed amount. In the other, his name was removed for his testimony.

Finally, there is Price. He believes this one night has tarnished a career that's spanned more than 30 years in coaching. But, he said, not because of what he did. Instead because of what was reported by media outlets, including Sports Illustrated. Although Yaeger's story came out in the May 12 edition, nine days after Price was fired, he said word of the story and what it contained had leaked to administrators.

‘‘I was wronged by Sports Illustrated,” Price said.

‘‘I think we can clearly show that (Yeager and SI) were reckless,” added Stephen Heninger, Price's Birmingham, Ala.-based attorney. ‘‘Now that we have taken a close look at it and investigated it, it is an unbelievable tale of misreporting. It is reckless and malicious.”

Sports Illustrated spokesman Rick McCabe said the magazine was dismayed that court depositions were provided to the newspaper and that the magazine wants the case litigated in the courtroom, not in the press.

Price's story

Mike Price, who was in Pensacola to play in the Emerald Coast Golf Classic, walked out of the restaurant that held the pre-tournament reception and turned right. It was the first of a series of wrong turns on the night of April 16. And all of them led the Alabama coach right down the path of selfdestruction.

Price visited three bars -- and drank at each -- before he and assistant coach Kasey Dunn found themselves in the back of a cab as midnight approached. They discussed where to go next.

‘‘. . . Either we were talking about a topless bar or something like that, and the cab driver again suggested Sammy's,” Price said in his deposition. ‘‘And I said, `I don't want to go there.' . . . he said, `Well, I know where you can go.”'

The cab stopped at Arety's. Price said at the time he had never heard the name before, and had also never been there before. Sports Illustrated alleged this visit was Price's second that day. According to SI, Price also visited Arety's that afternoon.

A timeline provided by Heninger put Price at the Pensacola airport at 4:15 p.m., at the Crowne Plaza Hotel at 4:50 p.m., in his room for an hour ironing his clothes and talking to Dunn, and back down to the lobby to go to the pre-tournament reception at 6 p.m.

Some six hours later, Price said he took a seat at the end of the bar at Arety's. In his deposition, Price was repeatedly asked by Time Inc. attorney Gary Huckaby about his actions at Arety's.

‘‘Did you pay for any dancing by Destiny (Boudreaux)?” Huckaby asked.

‘‘Not that I recall,” Price answered.

‘‘Did you pay for any dancing by Jennifer (Eaton)?” Huckaby asked.

‘‘Not that I recall,” Price answered.

‘‘I don't know who Jennifer and Destiny are,” Price said later in the deposition. ‘‘I don't have a mental picture for what they look like other than the picture I saw in Sports Illustrated of Destiny. If she walked through here today, I wouldn't know who she was.”

In an interview with The SpokesmanReview, Price said he never fondled a waitress as was reported by SI. He also said he was never reprimanded at the bar.

Brigalia, the waitress at Arety's, told Heninger in a tape-recorded interview that Price never did anything out of line at Arety's. He never propositioned her. And never physically came on to her. Eaton, who said she sat a table with Price, corroborated Brigalia's statement.

‘‘When I was there, he was a gentleman,” Eaton said in an interview with Heninger. ‘‘He was very professional, he was, you know, was somebody that was from out of town that was having a good time, having a couple of drinks, but he was not out of hand.”

Yaeger said in his deposition he asked Arety's owner, Arety Kapetanis, for videotapes from the club's surveillance cameras. But by the time Yaeger had asked, they had already been taped over.

‘‘But did (Kapetanis) tell you that she had watched it and what she saw on it?” Heninger asked.

‘‘She didn't tell me that, no, sir,” Yaeger said.

After an hour-and-a-half at the club, Price said he left and thought Dunn was right behind him. He got into a cab and believed Dunn was also getting into the cab. When he turned to the middle after getting in the door, Brigalia was there.

‘‘From what I've been told, she asked me for a ride in the cab,” Price said.

Price does not remember the cab ride back. Or the exact details of how he and Brigalia wound up in the coach's hotel room.

Price said she is the only woman who was in his room. Price said he did not engage in any sexual activity with her.

‘‘... I remember walking in the lobby. I don't remember the elevator ride up, walk down the hall, putting the key in the door,” Price said in his deposition. ‘‘I don't remember that. All I remember is sitting on the bed and putting my head down. And (Brigalia), maybe she was in the room then, out in the hall. I'm not sure.”

Price said he woke up in the same clothes he wore the night before, ‘‘black pants, white shirt and a charcoal-black kind of black-and-white tweed sport coat. ... And my glasses were still on.”

Brigalia said she did not recall the circumstances that surrounded her leaving the bar. She did tell Heninger, in another taped conversation, that she never spoke to anyone from SI.

She also corroborated Price's story about who was in the room.

‘‘Now, were there ever two women in the room?” Heninger asked Brigalia.

‘‘No sir,” she answered.

‘‘Do you even know what `Roll Tide' means?” Heninger asked. (SI reported the women in the hotel room started screaming ‘‘Roll Tide” and Price yelled back ‘‘It's rolling baby, it's rolling.”)

‘‘No . . . no . . .,” Brigalia said.

‘‘Did you ever tell anyone at Sports Illustrated or anyone at all that there was aggressive sex or a threesome or anything like that in Coach Price's room that night?” Heninger asked.

‘‘Never,” she answered.

Jennifer Eaton, another dancer at Arety's, was the other woman who initially claimed to be in Price's room. She has since told Heninger she fabricated the story.

‘‘... Did you go back to the room with Coach Price that night?” Heninger asked Eaton in a recorded interview.

‘‘No I did not,' she replied.

‘‘What made you tell the Birmingham News and Yaeger that story?” Heninger asked.

Eaton said that on May 1 she went to Arety's to cash a check. When she arrived, reporters were waiting to talk to her. Eaton said Kapetanis, Arety's owner, told her the reporters were convinced Eaton had been in the room with Price.

‘‘. . . Finally (Kapetanis) told me that they were convinced it was me and that she almost wished that it was me because she would rather have somebody like me representing that bar than Destiny (Boudreaux).” Eaton told Heninger, ‘‘and I told her I wasn't there.”

Eaton said she was continually harassed by the media throughout the day.

‘‘. . . and I got tired of being harassed,” she said. ‘‘So I told them, `OK fine, I was there, the man was nice, he was a gentleman, nothing happened.”'

‘‘But you were never in the room?” Heninger asked.

‘‘No, I've never been in the hotel,” Eaton said. ‘‘I can't even tell you what the inside of the lobby looks like.”

Eaton said she was ‘‘just taking what she heard from everybody else to make it sound like a feasible story.”

According to Yaeger's deposition, the writer never spoke to Brigalia, the one woman who has acknowledged she was in Price's room. Yaeger said he extensively interviewed Kapetanis, Boudreaux, Gary Hodge (a bartender at Arety's), Amanda York (an employee at Arety's) and Kimberly Pope (another Artey's employee). Yaeger said hespoke to Eaton the morning after his deadline had passed.

From his various interviews, including one with a confidential source, Yaeger wrote in his story that Price had ‘‘aggressive sex” with two women. According to his deposition, when he interviewed Price for his story on May 4, Yaeger believed one of those women was Eaton.

Later, after his story deadline had passed, Yaeger said Eaton told him she did not have sex with Price.

In his deposition, Yaeger said he questioned his confidential source after the story was published and asked, ‘‘... is it possible that Jennifer (Eaton) was not the person in the room? And my source indicated that it might have been somebody other than Jennifer (Eaton).”

Yaeger said he had one confidential source concerning what happened in Price's hotel room.

Price's attorney, Heninger, believes that source is Boudreaux. Yaeger gave Boudreaux $200 for her time and a taxicab ride, the writer said in his deposition. Boudreaux confirmed that transaction in her taped interview with Heninger.

In the deposition, Yaeger would not reveal the name of his one source for what happened in the room. ‘‘Mr. Yaeger, who told you that ultimately both Jennifer and Destiny met Coach Price back at the Crowne Plaza?” Heninger asked in the deposition.

‘‘I don't recall,” Yaeger answered. ‘‘My guess is that that is a combination of the fullness of information I had gathered, the confidential source I had spoken to, the claims that were being made by Jennifer Eaton to other employees. . . . ”

‘‘Do you have more than one confidential source on the activities that occurred in the room?” Heninger asked.

‘‘I have one confidential source on those activities,” Yaeger answered.

Yaeger said he also spoke with the person who drove his confidential source to the hotel after Price had already left Arety's with another woman.

According to a transcript from Heninger's interview with Boudreaux, she said she was a source for Yaeger but was not present in the hotel room.

‘‘I never told anyone I was at any hotel room with anyone,” Boudreaux said. ‘‘But, the way they made it sound was that I was the source that was present. . . . No, I was the source that talked to the girls that were present, that's all I did was tell (SI) about knowing what happened, what those girls told me.

‘‘I'm the one who told him that there was ... the two girls that were in the room,” Boudreaux later said in the interview.

‘‘So, you told Yaeger what they said about aggressive sex and `Roll Tide Roll' and all that stuff?” Heninger asked Boudreaux.

‘‘Right, that's what I heard, not what I saw, not that I was there ... just what the women ... what my friend Tracy (Brigalia) had told me and Jessica (Eaton) said she just danced for him and slept with her clothes on,” Boudreaux said.

Later Boudreaux added: ‘‘But Tracy told me that she said, `No Lori, that's not at all how it happened' ...”

Yeager said in his deposition that he believes in the veracity of his story.

‘‘I believe that the confidential source was in the room and I believe that there is a pretty solid chance that Tracy Brigalia was in the room,” he said.

Future prospects

Mike Price is now out of the sport he spent most of his life in. From the time he was a child he roamed the sidelines following his father, a coach.

Price feels the Sports Illustrated story could hurt his chances of landing another coaching job. The two-time Rose Bowl coach is actively pursuing coaching vacancies around the country.

‘‘Coaching is all I ever wanted to do,” he said. ‘‘It's all I've ever done. I think I have a calling. I think I can still motivate and lead people. I'm open to anything college or the NFL.

‘‘There are some better fits for me in coaching jobs. Ones that just make more sense and where geographically I know the area.”

Price said his firing has given him a better understanding of what can happen to someone who believes he suddenly has everything. And an understanding of what a night of drinking can do to a person's career.

‘‘I think I was star-struck a little bit,” he said of his move to Alabama. ‘‘I don't really know if that's my personality. But everybody is waiting on you hand and foot, patting you on the back and that whole experience was new to me.”

Price was swept up in the here and now. He allowed his ego to consume him at times. And allowed alcohol to undermine what had been his dream job.

‘‘Any time drinking causes you a problem, you have a drinking problem,” Price has always maintained.

Price does not feel he is an alcoholic and believes he has overcome any problems alcohol may have caused him and wants to get back into coaching.

‘‘I just don't want to go out this way,” he said.

Price spends Saturdays now as a fan of the game he was once entrenched in. He sits in the stands most games at Martin Stadium. He watches every Alabama game on tape. Same thing with the Cougars.

He has put together a resume, a tape and a highlight book readying himself for any job opportunity that comes along.

And he has been able to dedicate more time to his family and wife, Joyce.

‘‘That is one thing that I found out about,” Price said. ‘‘I know what true love is and (Joyce) respects and loves me and has been completely supportive as the boys (Aaron and Eric) and Angie (his daughter) have,” Price said.

Those are the people who have reminded Mike Price he is not all alone on that hilltop.

etch-a-sketched by john at 3:42 PM