The case of Tim Beckman against his former players isn't going away. After the initial Twitter rampage from former Illini lineman Simon Cvijanovic, a statement from Tim Beckman, and a teleconference held by Illinois AD Mike Thomas, the story still lives.
On Tuesday, the Illinois student paper spoke to a handful of former Beckman players both at Illinois and Toledo. In short, they didn't find much. Former Illini defensive back Nick North lodged the same sort of complaints that Cvijanovic raised, saying the Illinois staff pushed him back on the field too quickly after injury and that Beckman repeatedly tried to kick him off the team. “For two weeks I took a drug test every day,” Nick said. “He was blatantly trying to find something to kick me off the team.”
Beyond that, the Daily Illini spoke with three former Toledo players under Beckman, two who said Beckman consistently threatened to yank scholarships and another who quit the team after getting bypassed on the depth chart.
As far as shock and awe, it doesn't surpass the initial reaction Cvijanovic's rant created. But it has inspired these types of tweets:
Because of this, Beckman has released another statement:
Where does this go from here? It's tough to say. But one thing is certain: the longer this story swirls in the news cycle, the worse it looks for Beckman.