The father of heralded high school recruit Xavier Henry won't be taking a job as the director of basketball operations at Memphis. Yet, the fact that it was even a possibility is a baffling loophole in the NCAA's draconian recruiting regulations.

Xavier Henry is Rivals' No. 1 ranked shooting guard in this year's high school class. He signed a letter of intent with Memphis in November, but was recently released from it by the school after John Calipari took the head coaching position at Kentucky. Now, Xavier, and his brother C.J. (who was a walk-on in Memphis last year) are deciding whether to stay at the school, follow Calipari to Kentucky or play at their father's alma mater, Kansas (which heavily recruited Xavier last year). Complicating the fact is that C.J. has said he doesn't want to sit out a year as a transfer, so the Henrys are petitioning the NCAA to grant him an exemption.

Rumors had been swirling for the past week that the Henry's father, Carl, would become the director of basketball operations at Memphis, a hire which would, by chance, coincide with his sons announcing that they were going to play for the Tigers. But Carl told the Lawrence Journal World yesterday that this wasn't the case.

The Henry recruiting saga has been a circus, but the question remains: how is it not against the rules to give a cushy job to a recruit's father? There are rules about when a coach can call, text message or email a recruit. There are rules about how many hours a coach can watch a guy play in the summer. There are rules dictating how many visits can be made to a certain campus. But there's no rule that prevents the corrupt bargain of rewarding a job to a kid's father in "exchange" for the kid going to play for the school? (Exchange is in quotes, because I'm sure it'd all be a wink-wink deal.)

This is not new, by any means. Danny Manning's father got an assistant coaching job at Kansas when his son was a sophomore. Mario Chalmers' father took the same position at Kansas that Henry's dad was rumored to be taking at Memphis. And high school/AAU coaches of big recruits coincidentally get positions at schools that sign their players (including those of Michael Beasley and John Wall, recently). How is this legal?

It shouldn't be. The NCAA needs to put an end to this practice immediately. It's hypocritical to regulate nearly everything else in the life of a recruit, but to ignore the fact that schools can reward family members or coaches with jobs in exchange for an 18-year old signing on the dotted line.