It can be a convenient photo op due to wild rumors AND the rumors can be untrue (or greatly exaggerated).
(Re-posting from the OTHER Frost's wife thread...)
The way I see it, there is probably some kernel of truth to most message board rumors. A KERNEL. So something like (complete guesses based on reading through weird threads for the past couple years):
- Frost and the coaches were generally goofing around too much, drinking beers and playing Golden Tee after hours and acting like they owned the place, which led to an unfocused approach and slow/nonexistent progress on and off the field
- Frost's wife, who is: much younger than he is, completely uninterested in the limelight, has no family or roots in the area, suddenly got thrust into being the First Lady Of Nebraska while being a brand new mom, PLUS the job isn't going as planned to say the least, her husband is stressed as fuck and miserable and probably rarely home, all of which leads to insane family stress
- Frost and the yes-men are seen more and more like they're not taking the situation seriously enough and are more interested in shenanigans and running the town, hell maybe he even messed around on his wife
- "Insider" fans get angry/restless and start exaggerating the behind the scenes shenanigans online to try to up the pressure and spread dissent
- The game of telephone goes full force, and by the time the stories get passed around enough things like "Beers and Golden Tee in the football offices" becomes "Wasted and rowdy at every golf course in Lincoln," "Frost and his wife are having marital issues" becomes "She left with the kids and took them to Florida because he got another woman pregnant," and "Frost and his friends are too interested in being out on the town" becomes "Frost and his friends are doing coke and running a sex club in a secret kitchen office at Gate 25"
- Those rumors spread from message board to message board, then from message boards to real life conversations, then from real life conversations to people working in the Athletic Department and, most likely, Frost's own family. You see this phenomenon happen all the time in politics and the media by the way, someone spreads a rumor, then when the rumor catches on and spreads around and people are talking about it they can say "well now I heard it from a whole different source, PEOPLE ARE SAYING it, so it must have some truth to it..." even though people are only saying it because the rumor spread around.
- The rumors get loud enough that Frost and his wife both hear them over and over and it becomes a life-altering disturbance in their lives so they break out of their privacy-shell and decide to walk off the field together with their son as a feel-good moment.
I don't know, maybe it's all true and we have absurd debauchery happening all throughout our athletic department. Maybe there is a logical reason zero witnesses in the entire city of Lincoln have been able to provide any evidence beyond "the word around town." Or maybe this part of the internet is just fucking gross and people shouldn't mindlessly spread completely dubious stories around just because they're scandalous enough to make their insides tingle.