Fri Jun 12, 2009 9:56 am EDT
Headlinin': Trojans break their Spartan silence
• Trojans speak! Three years in, Southern Cal finally issued its first public statement on the ongoing investigation into the Reggie Bush/O.J. Mayo illegal benefits scandals, sending athletic director Mike Garrett and another administrator online to say nothing in particular. "Video statements" from the pair produced the following revelations:
• "We have no idea how long this investigation will continue."
• "No one is more anxious to bring this process to a conclusion than we are."
• "We take these allegations very seriously."
• "What we have to protect is the integrity of the athletic department."
One item not lifted straight from Damage Control 101: "About 50 people" have been interviewed by the NCAA and/or the Pac-10, with USC officials sitting in on every one except a few "from which we were excluded" by the request/demand of certain accusers.
As usual, leave the public speaking to Pete Carroll, who faced the boosters Wednesday without his usual stage partner, disgraced basketball coach Tim Floyd:
"This is me saying nothing," Carroll said ... Then his trademark candor slipped through: "I noticed, no basketball highlights tonight."
I mean, you can't expect the Humanitarian to just say nothing.
• Bruins, however, will wear nothing. Meanwhile, across town, the L.A. Times' Adam Rose was on the ground Wednesday night, inside yet another reason you should have ponied up for out-of-state tuition -- UCLA's traditional Undie Run:
Man, even the obvious nerds in L.A. are kind of cut. Maybe I should stop buying Bud Light for all my meetings ...
• Victory from retroactive defeat. Rubbernecking back to the violation beat: As expected, the NCAA officialized the probation/vacated wins rap against Alabama Thursday, eliciting either shrugs, frustration or minor hand-wringing across the board. (No one says, "Awesome job, NCAA.") Former Tide players may have been "shocked" to have their triumphs wiped from the books, but generally, if the sanctions aren't exactly a good thing, it is clear that they don't affect Alabama's ability to compete going forward.
The Birmingham News' Tide blog details the 21 'Bama wins that are now losses (at least until the inevitable appeal). That same post also provides the quote of the day, in which commenter "Alabama 88" sums up the real headline as far as most Tiders are concerned:
Big deal. No scollies lost..... Bad news for the Barnies. No vacating ANY wins vs. AUA.
Indeed, because Alabama didn't have ANY wins vs. Auburn during the years in question, on the field or in the books. Leave it to Iron Bowl hatreds to respond to news of victory turned to defeat by turning completely unrelated defeats into victory. What a country!
But my favorite reaction to the NCAA's fluffy hammer this week comes from the Boulder Daily Camera's Neill Woelk, who actually references the following scene from the 1971 quasi-classic "Big Jake" as his model for a new era of "frontier justice" by the NCAA:
Contrast Woelk's pent-up vengeance with the slightly more laid-back response to departmental scandal by the Miami Herald's Joseph Goodman, who sums up Florida's legal woes thusly:
You've got to have thugs to win football games.
Generational and geographical gaps, will your wonders never cease?
• Just doing a little field work. I'm sure it's only a coincidence that, just hours after Goodman's column went online, Miami native and Ohio State signee Jamaal Berry, maybe the most celebrated Buckeye in OSU's incoming class, decided to put the theory to test:
Berry, an incoming freshman running back who turned 18 on May 22, was arrested early yesterday in his hometown of Miami, according to court records. He was charged with possession of more than 20 grams of marijuana.
The charge is a third-degree felony, the least serious under Florida law, and is punishable by up to five years in jail and a $5,000 fine.
Twenty grams isn't quite Ramonce Taylor territory, but it is a lot. If Berry avoids the more serious penalties, he's still likely to miss the start of OSU's summer quarter (in which freshman usually enroll) and spent his first year, at least, deep inside Jim Tressel's doghouse.
Quickly ... A pair of Washington State freshmen were arrested -- though not yet charged -- on suspicion of stealing a pair of bicycles, as well as the hacksaw they used to cut them free. ... Florida's attorney general's office complains that the NCAA's secrecy in response to a Florida State appeal violates state law. ... Incoming defensive end Justin Chaisson, who had felony charges for allegedly holding a screwdriver to his girlfriend's neck and throwing her in a car reduced to misdemeanors last month, is listed on Oklahoma's pre-camp roster. ... Jake Locker is a quarterback for now, but may sign with the L.A. Angels to secure a future in baseball. ... Meanwhile, Locker's coach nailed the NCAA's recruiting exam (again.) ... Mark Richt clams up. ... Tennessee receiver Gerald Jones goes under the knife. ... Here's a scheduling idea that should trickle up: I-AA powers Appalachian State, McNeese State and Montana have agreed to six-game, home-and-home round robin through 2017. ... And it looks fun, but it's really tough growing up Samoan.
Dr. Saturday
Matt Hinton
Dr. Saturday is a college football blog edited by Matt Hinton. Email him tips and feedback.
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18 Comments
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College football could take away the scholarships and perks and you know what? Young men would still clammer for the chance to wear the armor and take to the battlefield anyway. Should college players get stipends or something to make things a little more balanced? Sure. But payed, no way.
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I propose a salary cap that would not include the money used for athlete scholarships. This cap would be for all of the scholarship athletes at a University. Maybe something like 5 million a year. This would really level the playing field for all schools in FCS.
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.. negotiate paid contracts with players of all sports that have a professional equivalent - leave the scholorships to the pure athletic students (table tennis, volleyball, gymnastics)
.. set a maximum value for a contract, and deduct tuition from it. That way if the athlete wants a full education, they'll take classes and still have money left over. If they're only on campus for someplace to hang between seasons ( the one and done crowd), so be it.
.. set a maximum for each program at any participating school - NOT to be adjusted for school size, conference, or division). Maybe then education will finally mean something - who knows even Cal Tech might field a basketball team.
.. set a maximum time limit for a contract - say seven years after high school graduation - period; no extensions for military service or playing pro in some other sport.
.. each contract is renegotiated after every school year (with scholarships available for enrolled students who suffer career injuries). An "up or out" provision makes room for incoming talent.
.. develop a "Steinbrenner" rule, forbidding the boosters from augmenting the contracts.. eliminate the hypocritical sinecures, featherbeds, kickbacks to families and other toxic, unethical practices.
Inevitably, the USC's and Texas's and other deep pocket schools will rise to the top, Going pro should make the heretofore cupcake games more interesting. Who knows - if the contracts are competitive with other minor league opportunities, there wouln't be such a rush to the pros as underclassmen, but more staying on campus to develop maturity and game savy (and no more embarrasing scenes like that between Pete Carroll and Mark Sanchez). At least the hypocracy will be gone.
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2. last year, such actions by the ncaa would simply not have happened.
3. therefore, the current ncaa infractions committee, names and backgrounds available online(none of them are ncaa beaurocrats), have earned a tentative awesome and righteous.
4. of course, the really big test is how they deal with usc, the school that has been breaking the rules, stonewalling(including that recent joke video non statement), and laughing at the public and the ncaa and their own alums.
5.after all, both alabama and florida state actually self reported and cooperated at a certain point and they both got hit with forfeiture of wins and other penalties and probation( do it again and you get the death penalty).
6. with usc, along with the forfeitures of games, go a national championship, a heisman or 2 or 3, banning petey and mikey( mikey is not searching for any answers. mikey actively participated in the violations and the coverups based on the evidence we have seen) and quite a few members of usc's athletic department from college sports for life, and many millions in forfeited tv and other revenues.
7. after a complete house cleaning and a few seasons without bowl games and fewer scholarships, usc will be back winning fair and square.
8. usc athletics never had to cheat to win. that program was cooked up by mikey and petey and other members of the usc athletic department and a few booters, without consulting the usc community.
9. the rumours that big jake(the ncaa infractions committee) was dead were true until the members of the current infractions stepped in and started flushing the corruption out of the ncaa rules enforcement beaurocracy.
10. if we see from them what everyone knows should happen, the current members of the ncaa infractions commitee just might qualify as a reincarnation of big jake.
11. the garbage that mikey and petey have been selling ever since mikey hired petey is simply not selling these days, even to usc alums.
12. petey never gave a damn. petey was just doing this all for the money and the ego boost. mikey just got jaded and really thought that he could pull off the coverups. after all, usc owns the la da and the la city attorney and ncaa investigators and pac 10 were, in the past, usually willing to take payoffs.
13. however, mikey and petey and their circle forgot 3 crucial factors: 1. the integrity, courage, and tenacity of yahoo sports, 2.some members of the public who had brought down enron and mci worldcom and who had the weapons to strike economic terror into the hearts of corrupt ncaa and conferences, and 3. the feds getting involved.
14. stay tuned for the next episode of la confidential 2009. will petey and mikey and those who cooperated with them just leave floyd like letters and pop up in costa rica or brazil? will the usc community throw out these trojan horses before real devastation hits usc the institution?
15. has the naked city relocated to los angeles?
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2. john wayne, who played big jake, after not getting his appointment to the usc naval academy from his local congresman, not because he lacked excellent high school grades, but because he came from a poor family with zero political connection, took what he thought was a full athletic scholarship to get an education by playing football at usc.
3. well, like many football players, especially at usc, john wayne was injured.
4. when he showed up for classes after the injury, the powers that were at usc informed john wayne that he would not be attending any classes without paying full tuition, which usc know that john and his family did not have.
5. fortunately, john wayne got noticed by john ford and became a great movie star.
6. john wayne's fame, of course, attracted the usual attempts from usc to use john wayne to get donations and good exposure for usc.
7. big jake told me in person his responses to usc's overtures before he passed away and what he thought of usc.
8. use your imaginations. john wayne's responses were not polite or pretty and usc ended up with donations about equal in value to the newspapers in big jake's box.
dream on mikey and petey
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The more you try to write bad things about the Trojans, the more pathetic you look.
You come off as a sad pathetic, whiny, cry baby.
Go do some real sports editorial writing!
Keep devoting your time writing about USC as much as the hate you have.
LOSER!
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In capitalism a person is supposed to be able to sell their products and services at the price that the market will bear. In the case of college athletes, there is a huge demand for good players but a limited supply so that means good college athletes have value that needs to be compensated. Besides a scholarship, the NCAA rules do not allow compensating college athletes but the forces of supply and demand do not get hung up by NCAA rules and financial reward finds its way to the athletes one way or another. This applies to all schools and not just USC. I think people who are claiming their favorite school is clean or arguing that one program is dirtier than another program are naive.
RedMetal's contract idea is interesting. But I wonder if it has to be that complicated because not all college athletes are good enough to warrant compensation beyond a scholarship. Schools should grant scholarships as a base compensation and the scholarship should allow the athlete to complete his/her degree after their playing career is over, depending upon how long the athlete played for the school and the circumstances under which their playing career ended. In addition, athletes should be allowed to make money off of their identity or personality (e.g., they should get a cut from the sales of their jersey). They should be allowed to have agents to explore their professional options without risking their "eligibility." I think that this way the really good athletes, like Derrick Rose, OJ Mayo, Tim Tebow, Reggie Bush, etc., could earn the compensation that their talents warrant without creating administrative work for the true student athletes.
To bring about a change like this will be difficult because in Division I athletics the NCAA rules are there to be broken. They are just there perpetuate the hypocrisy of amateurism in Division I athletics (particularly football). Part of the appeal of college sports to fans is that the players are supposed to be amateurs. Everyone, from the presidents and athletic directors down to the players, knows that they need to keep up appearances so as long as no one says anything everything is just fine. The football players are initiated into the club in their recruiting visits when they are introduced to the camaraderie in the locker room, at the alumni dinners, and the wild parties. Nothing builds camaraderie like breaking rules together and getting away with it. NCAA rules violations only come out every once and a while when a third-party or non-college entity is involved. The Reggie Bush issue came out when he changed agents and left the wannabe sports agent who had been giving him benefits that he now wanted to get repaid. The OJ Mayo issue came out when the sport agency runner was investigated. Even the self reported Alabama text book issue was reported only after the book store contractor, a company independent from the university, raised questions about the athletes' accounts. Also the Rhett Bomar case and Oklahoma only was self reported when the dealership was sold and the new owners asked questions about what he was getting paid. And any enforcement is a joke (i.e., vacating wins means nothing, vacating a football championship may not even be possible because the NCAA doesn't determine a football champion... Alabama has been on probation since 1995) because the same people who break the rules are handing out the punishment. As long as the rules are just there to be broken the people covered by them will see no need to change them.
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