Nike and High School Players

[Newhouser]

Oh, and what am I doing?

I sent an email to Mark Emmert when this scandal broke, blasting the NCAA for being complicit while this was going on. I sent an email to him chastising the hypocrisy of his "wheelhouse" comment re: UNC, which conveniently moved the goalposts and let them off the hook.

On this forum, I've repeatedly expressed dissatisfaction with the NCAA as an ineffectual governing body -- and when the time comes, I'm going to support the P5 breaking off and forming their own league, with rules that are applicable to contemporary college athletics as big business.

And I've been criticized for taking that stance, with admonitions about "be careful what you wish for" and "what replaces it might be worse." I'm not sure how that is possible, frankly -- the system we currently have in place is about as bad as it could possibly be, given the hypocritical stance supported by the NCAA re: amateur athletics.

You still buying tickets? Watching games on TV?

 

[RF2044]

Why is the sneaker money different than the booster money? How do we know the scale is that much grander? It may be occurring on a grander scale (or it may not), but why are we more upset about it now? The cheating is more effective? More widespread? At what point is the line drawn to say - I can tolerate cheating but only up to this level?

It isn't -- both sets of rules should be enforced to stop this crap from happening. There shouldn't be different rules for Duke or Kansas than there are for Pepperdine.

The rules aren't enforced because the NCAA is a dud, and because schools aren't afraid of being caught. So, LSU cheats on a grand scale because it helps them level the playing field. If the NCAA enforced the rules, it wouldn't happen, or certainly wouldn't at the level it occurs today, because the rules would have teeth. Unfortunately, they don't have teeth because the NCAA is a sham.

 

[RF2044]

You still buying tickets? Watching games on TV?

Not interested in being interviewed -- I've said my piece.

 

[Cusefan0307]

 

[Newhouser]

It isn't -- both sets of rules should be enforced to stop this crap from happening. There shouldn't be different rules for Duke or Kansas than there are for Pepperdine.

The rules aren't enforced because the NCAA is a dud, and because schools aren't afraid of being caught. So, LSU cheats on a grand scale because it helps them level the playing field. If the NCAA enforced the rules, it wouldn't happen, or certainly wouldn't at the level it occurs today, because the rules would have teeth. Unfortunately, they don't have teeth because the NCAA is a sham.

I agree but I blame the schools. If they didn't want the NCAA to oversee the operation (and in a way tacitly approve of them being a dud), they would band together and change the system.

 

[Cusefan0307]

I agree but I blame the schools. If they didn't want the NCAA to oversee the operation (and in a way tacitly approve of them being a dud), they would band together and change the system.

If some schools are getting better treatment, why would they want to band together?

I think this is far more complicated than people think.

 

[Newhouser]

If some schools are getting better treatment, why would they want to band together?

I think this is far more complicated than people think.

That is my point - the schools like the system.

 

[Cusefan0307]

That is my point - the schools like the system.

Some* most likely.

 

[RF2044]

I agree but I blame the schools. If they didn't want the NCAA to oversee the operation (and in a way tacitly approve of them being a dud), they would band together and change the system.

I'm not sure that we're that far off, to be honest.

Agree somewhat -- and there are definitely going to be schools that want to keep the status quo [I'm looking at you Duke, Kentucky, Kansas, Louisville, and Arizona]. And there are going to be schools who want to cheat to help them climb the mountain [Auburn, LSU readily come to mind] -- without fear of reprisal, because the risk of the NCAA doing anything is low.

It all comes down to what we do now that this institutionalized corruption has been exposed. If people shrug their shoulders, then nothing changes.

But if people look at the muck under the rock and demand that the NCAA do something, or actively work to change the system, then the NCAA won't be able to put the genie back in the bottle and follow the path of least resistance like they always do.

Every journey begins with a single step. The results of this FBI investigation have been damning. We need to hold the NCAA accountable in general and the schools / coaches accountable in particular for breaking the rules. A serial cheater like Bruce Pearl should never coach an NCAA team again. Period. Throw the book at someone, and you'll see a rapid reaction in response.

No rules, enforcement, governance, etc. will eliminate all cheating entirely--expecting that outcome would be naive--but there need to be escalating penalties that are ENFORCED and make coaches think twice about breaking the rules, due to the severity of what might happen. And when violations come up, then the schools / coaches need to be punished commensurate with the infractions -- irrespective of the name on the front of the jerseys.

 

[Hoo's That]

The staff in India-noplace does what the member schools tell it to do. If you think that they are looking the other way, then you need to put pressure on your AD to do something about it. As they suddenly realized in the Nerd movies, there are more have-nots than there are haves.

No member school of the NCAA, whether it's Harvard, Stanford, Bama, or Western MiddleofNowhere Teacher's College, is going to allow the NCAA to decide what is or isn't a legitimate course. So we need to move on from that. The thing that got UNC off was that the fratty boys found out from their athlete buddies what a good thing these courses were and they started taking them, too. And UNC lucked out by letting the fratty boys take them, even though there was supposed to be an e-mail, memo, or the like that said the AFAM Department set the courses up to keep AA athletes eligible.

 

[RF2044]

The staff in India-noplace does what the member schools tell it to do. If you think that they are looking the other way, then you need to put pressure on your AD to do something about it. As they suddenly realized in the Nerd movies, there are more have-nots than there are haves.

No member school of the NCAA, whether it's Harvard, Stanford, Bama, or Western MiddleofNowhere Teacher's College, is going to allow the NCAA to decide what is or isn't a legitimate course. So we need to move on from that. The thing that got UNC off was that the fratty boys found out from their athlete buddies what a good thing these courses were and they started taking them, too. And UNC lucked out by letting the fratty boys take them, even though there was supposed to b e an e-mail, memo, or the like that said the AFAM Department set the courses up to keep AA athletes eligible.

This perspective echos what the NCAA's "aw shucks, nothing we can do" logic while missing the broader point that SHOULD have been squarely in the NCAA's wheelhouse.

I don't think that anybody disagrees that the NCAA should not be reviewing every college course, and weighing in on whether course content is legitimate vs. illegitimate.

Where the NCAA dropped the ball - IMO - is that they focused only on whether the courses were accessible to the entire student body, and therefore was out of their jurisdiction, INSTEAD of taking into account that these courses were used to artificially inflate the GPAs of student-athletes, manipulating their eligibility for nearly two decades.

It really was an ingenious defense on UNCs part.

In the mid-90s, when handing down sanctions to the University of Minnesota, the NCAA levied a scathing indictment, claiming that it was the most egregious institutionally sanctioned academic fraud in college athletics history. Which is comical, because it didn't hold a candle to what UNC walked away from unpenalized.

 

[RandygoCuse]

Oh, and what am I doing?

I sent an email to Mark Emmert when this scandal broke, blasting the NCAA for being complicit while this was going on. I sent an email to him chastising the hypocrisy of his "wheelhouse" comment re: UNC, which conveniently moved the goalposts and let them off the hook.

On this forum, I've repeatedly expressed dissatisfaction with the NCAA as an ineffectual governing body -- and when the time comes, I'm going to support the P5 breaking off and forming their own league, with rules that are applicable to contemporary college athletics as big business.

And I've been criticized for taking that stance, with admonitions about "be careful what you wish for" and "what replaces it might be worse." I'm not sure how that is possible, frankly -- the system we currently have in place is about as bad as it could possibly be, given the hypocritical stance supported by the NCAA re: amateur athletics.

Many have responded that boosters would simply pay players to attend their school. My response is that I'm fine with that if boosters really want to spend their own money that way. Would it hurt parity? To some extent, but if the top players ultimate goal is to reach the NBA, they aren't all going to go to the same schools. And I'd rather do what's fair to the players than having absolute parity anyway.