And now a special presentation from the Joe Paterno School of Undying Public Support and Unconditional Love entitled, "Suddenly Mediocre? Joe, We Hardly Knew Ye."

	Nolan Richardson's departure from Arkansas ultimately came down to the team's record.

Nolan Richardson is out as men's basketball coach at the University of Arkansas -- or not, depending upon how his lawyer does at "contesting" the university's decision to exercise the buyout clause in Richardson's contract -- and one of the elements in the mix is race.

To be perfectly specific, Richardson, who long has believed that his having dark skin prevents him from being accepted by the white-controlled media as a genuinely superior coach, was bought out just a few days after an incendiary news conference at which, among other things, he pointedly noted that none of the reporters in the room bore much of a resemblance to himself.

And thus, in the wake of the buyout, came the very swift suggestion that Richardson was in fact being canned for exercising his right to press the race button in connection with his own very successful career.

It's one explanation, of course. Here goes another: Richardson is, indeed, being fully discriminated against.

Based on race?

Based on record.

This brings us, quite naturally, back to Joe Pa, who is almost certain to go down as one of the most nationally treasured men ever to coach college football in America. Significantly, his stature did not prevent Paterno from being spit-roasted through most of the 2001 season, as his team staggered out of the gate and struggled all year to find some footing.

Not Paterno's seemingly unassailable career nor his national championships nor his trademark eyeglasses protected him from getting ripped from coast to coast -- in his case, raising the dread spectre of ageism. In fact, he was being discriminated against.

Because he's old?

Because his team was lousy.

There could be a lesson here. I have no doubt that Nolan Richardson's race, his family history and his personal background all have shaped his career in enormous ways. I also have no doubt that the people surrounding the Arkansas basketball program -- boosters, fans, media members -- are utterly within their rights to wonder aloud whether, at 13-14 this season at the time of the buyout, Richardson still was delivering the kind of program they wanted.

It's the great American way, questioning that kind of "authority." It doesn't have to make perfect sense; it doesn't have to be supported by the weight of history; it need not be freighted with questions of what is ultimately fair or proper. It's sports. We do this.

It is the national pastime to question Phil Jackson's substitution patterns or to wonder whether Don Shula has lost touch with the modern athlete or simply to declare that, winning record or no, Jimy Williams was the exact wrong guy to manage the Red Sox.

No one is exempt, no one. If Nolan Richardson were a man claiming to have been denied a fair shake, it'd be one thing; but this was a man with 17 years in the same college basketball job. That alone defies almost every available set of employment odds at the NCAA Division I level.

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And just as Richardson earned that 17-year tenure by his performance, so should his current performance be accepted as a perfectly valid standard for judging what comes next. ”

And just as Richardson earned that 17-year tenure by his performance, so should his current performance be accepted as a perfectly valid standard for judging what comes next. It is utterly within reason for anyone to look at this season's underwhelming record, look at the talent coming through the system, and ask questions about the direction of the program. They may do so out loud, on talk radio, in Frank Broyles' office, in print.

The fact that Nolan resents it, in the end, just has nothing to do with it.

Richardson's case is unquestionably a complex one, bound up in any number of issues. It was clear that the coach already was actively questioning whether he should remain in the job; in fact, the university chancellor said that a week before issuing his public proclamation that if Arkansas would "go ahead and pay me my money, they can take the job tomorrow," Richardson was speaking privately of exactly such a scenario.

Now Richardson's lawyer, a civil rights specialist, is saying that Richardson's case represents a termination, not a buyout, and thus is appealing through the university system. Under the terms of his contract's buyout clause, Arkansas is to pay Richardson upward of $3 million over the next six years. Depending upon how Nolan's attorney does, that figure could escalate dramatically.

But it won't change the essentially unhappy ending here, and that's the true shame. From junior college to the University of Tulsa to Arkansas, Richardson has compiled a truly impressive career mark. At the Division I level, he has averaged 23 victories a year over 22 years. It's a record that is beyond reproach.

Of course, you could say the same thing about Joe Paterno and be right. You could say that Dennis Erickson returned the concept of expectation to Oregon State, or that Steve Lavin inherited a UCLA program that was close to disintegrating, or that Bob Davie racked up a perfect graduation rate for his players at Notre Dame.

You can say all of it, and it will never so much as budge the essential truth that, in sports, it's all fair game, including the part about what anybody has done for you lately. We reserve the right to question all of it in the sporting public, and we reserve it without the slightest intention of entertaining our other options. That much, at least, is black and white.

Mark Kreidler of the Sacramento Bee is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.