Probationary period over, we're starting to see some real hits from the NCAA's academic mandates established several years ago.  Interesting, if nothing else.

^Rivals.com 

Well, it's been kind of a crazy week in the world, hasn't it?  TGIF.

Time for a roundup to wind down this week, and we've got a lot to cover.

---The latest from the pundits: ($)Bruce Feldman on the toughest roads to the title, Stewart Mandel opines in his mailbag about his readers' lack of reading comprehension, there's so much going on lately Tom Dienhart has to play catch-up, Ivan Maisel goes contrarian and questions the paradigm "defense wins championships", Pat Forde goes into terribly annoying parental lecture mode, Dennis Dodd's top 25 has been released and Oklahoma has been dropped to No. 15, Cory McCartney singles out ten freshmen ready to play and finally Paul Finebaum reflects on the legacy of "legendary" (his words, not mine) former Auburn coach Pat Dye.

---Remember that little dustup a few weeks ago about Auburn's academics?  Well, the university has cleared athletic department officials of any wrongdoing.

No surprise there, and no cynicism either.  It was obvious based on the original story that the transgressions had nothing to do with anything the athletic department had facilitated or encouraged.  For whatever reason the partisan nature of college football fans demands they paint with the broadest brush possible and see the misdeeds of an individual or a few people and extrapolate it as a function of an entire institution rotten to the core.

---Heh.  Mississippi State coach Sylvester Croom "suited up" for Practice two days ago, wearing a red cross shirt to signify injury.  He had missed a previous practice for personal reasons and as punishment arrived in pads, football pants and a helmet.  Must-see picture($) here.

---MGo's latest: a preview of Northwestern, "The Show Goes On"

---USC is clearly thumbing its nose at outsiders who mock its Hollywood image and turbulent offseason, issuing a press release about a team meeting interrupted by coach Pete Carroll and actor Will Ferrell, dressed as characters from his new movie Talladega Nights.  Here's the release and more from fullback Brandon Hancock' blog and reporter Scott Wolf's blog.  The team later spent the evening watching Ferrell's movie at a campus theatre.

---Hancock also has an interesting entry on his site about what he calls "The Third Eye".

---And the most important USC item of the day: star receiver Dwayne Jarrett, who came under scrutiny for living in an expensive apartment with teammate Matt Leinart and not paying equal rent, has been cleared by the NCAA.  However, he must pay $5,352 to a charity as punishment.

The NCAA's rule on this issue remains absurb, as athletes should be able to enter living arrangements as they so please, so long as it's a sensible plan and not accomodated for by overeager boosters or auto dealers etc.  However, given that the rule is on the books, this is a fair and sensible ruling.  What's interesting is the demand for Jarrett to submit a sum of money to a charity.  That comes awfully close to a fine if you ask me, and last I checked the professional leagues fined their players, not the NCAA.  This further weakens the amateurism line the NCAA's so recklessly tried to defend over the years.

---Navy blogger Pitch Right has head coach Paul Johnson channeling Allen Iverson.  That's amazing.  He also has a rundown of state-by-state football records during the 2005 season and adds a political twist.  That should nicely compliment a similar effort by CFR last year.  And from the archives: all you need to know and more about the great Phil Steele.

---Speaking of Phil Steele, EDSBS does a podcast interview with Mr. VHT.

---It looks like the Daily News has finally gotten around to adding a UCLA blog for Bruin beat writer Brian Dohn.  It only took them around six months from the day they created one for USC... do you think it would have taken this long if the UCLA fan base and readership cared about their football team?

---More on UCLA: their schedule poster is out and to quote The Wiz, it's uninspiring.  You have to love how asleep at the wheel UCLA's marketing department is to include a picture with the uniform back of linebacker John Hale front and center.  Hale was last seen pleading no contest to assault charges stemming from an incident at his parents' house this offseason.

---Finally, it's back!  Be sure and keep tabs on ViewFromTheRockyTop's neat "Animated Race to the National Championship"

I just found some eerily similar commentary to today's Amateurism entry from South Bend Tribune columnist Jason Kelly:

"Let's Remember, NCAA is a Trademark Brand"

As a defense, I had penned the majority of today's entry about the NCAA a few weeks ago (note the obviously dated sections about Brady Quinn and Notre Dame, for example) before finally pulling the trigger this afternoon.

Anyway, Kelly's column is terrific.

Kelly calls for some common-sense reforms and I agree with most of them.

Remove restrictions on endorsements and signing with agents. Grab the third rail of college sports and admit the amateur ideal doesn't exist and hasn't for years, for decades, forever.

Former USC quarterback Matt Leinart appeared in commercials last season as a celebrity spokesman for NCAA football. That didn't threaten his eligibility.

He made a spontaneous comment promoting "Sports Center" into an ESPN camera on the field after a game. That did.

Leinart made no money from either the NCAA or ESPN for using his image to promote their products. Yet the NCAA, in its infinite self-interest, replayed its own Leinart ad like a "Don't drink and drive" spot during prom season. For the "Sports Center" thing, it threatened to suspend him for the Rose Bowl (that didn't happen, of course, but that's another story).

That lack of shame in using revenue-restricted athletes as complimentary endorsers in its own ad campaigns illuminates the NCAA's lack of institutional conscience [Ed.-emphasis mine].

If Leinart had put his stubbly mug to use in a commercial enterprise that paid him for his time and marketability, he could have been drummed out of college football for debasing it with capitalistic interests.

Imagine that Brady Quinn could become a spokesman for Chipotle. He mentions it so often in response to "favorite food" questions, the chain ought to pay him anyway.

Or that Reggie Bush and his parents could accept a sweetheart lease from an agent as a loan against future earnings. That would be reasonable earnest money for the rights to a percentage of his potential net worth.

What effect would that have? It wouldn't make them stronger or faster or smarter. Just wealthier, and at least when it comes to its own bank account, the NCAA sees no problem with that.

In other words, Bush and USC should be off the hook.  Sound familiar?

And then he sounds a lot like Heisman Pundit with this proposal:

Offer an academic major in athletics, in the same serious spirit as music or art. In one of those cloying NCAA commercials -- "most of us go pro in something other than sports" -- a cocky saxophone player blows his own horn. He expects to end up in Chicago or New Orleans because "most good jazz musicians do." As if professional success as a performer requires nothing more than keeping his reed moist.

If he made a similar proclamation about his professional sports potential, a familiar lament would echo about misplaced priorities. Doesn't he realize he needs "something to fall back on" because sports provides only a fleeting living to the few who make it?

To cushion his eventual, inevitable fall off the stage, a sax player might have a music degree. An athlete has no comparable option.

Credit hours for varsity sports participation -- the performance element of athletics major -- would be only one way to back up platitudes about its educational value with the currency of a diploma.

Cross-list courses with sociology, psychology, medicine, journalism, education, business, all professional athletic fields as much as Wrigley and Soldier.

And then echoing my "responsibility" theme (Quote: "At least with more realistic degree options an extra ounce of choice is inserted into the process, and an athlete can pursue his or her true interest and calling and suffer the consequences if they fail along the way.  That's life"):

In accredited athletic departments, students, not coaches, should bear the responsibility for their education and graduation. Between phone calls, new Indiana basketball coach Kelvin Sampson said something honest.

Asked at his introductory press conference about how many of his players graduate, Sampson said, "All that want to ... We've never kept one from it."

Buck-passing sentiment aside, he had a point.

Disgust over graduation rates for athletes never acknowledges that individual responsibility might be involved, as though the system alone failed them.

Maybe it did. Among other things, that system creates incentives for the best athletes to go pro as soon as possible and reserves the right to strip scholarships from the worst.

Removing those barriers -- and assuring no shortcuts exist -- would place the burden for the quality of their education on the students themselves. After that, it's up to them. That alone would be a valuable lesson.

Great stuff and very similar to arguments presented here literally in the last few days.

SMQB has an entry from several months back that provides a great starting point in analyzing the NCAA's reasoning behind its policies to protect "amateurism".

In it, he argues one thing: the NCAA rules exist to protect its product---competitive collegiate athletics.

What is meant by "competitive"?  Well, the following:

[F]ans enjoying closer games and more teams with chances at winning more games is obviously good for any sport. The CFB version of the salary cap is scholarship limitations, and also the prohibition against paying players, which prevents the most monied boosters from buying the best teams at the expense of a better overall product

Got that?  The NCAA seeks to create rules and punishments that best drive equity and a level playing field into the finished product.  Its two obvious targets are recruiting and player compensation.

The NCAA's obvious solution has been to regulate recruiting practices.  Teams have limited access to recruits, and are granted limited financial resources to lure them to their programs.

In theory and according to the rules, every program has relatively equal access to a recruit and will spend similar monetary amounts on resources to lure the recruit.  This supposedly shifts the recruit's focus from the attention and freebies (lobster dinners?) thrown his way to the more important qualities of the institution thus eliminating the opportunity for rich programs to literally buy recruits and create a competitive imbalance.

In that same train of thought, the NCAA has also instituted scholarship limitations so that successful teams could no longer stockpile their rosters four deep with All Americans while the competition played with scraps.

This is all well and good, but it doesn't work towards enforcing the vague and idealized notion of "amateurism".

But why is amateurism a virtue? In Objectivist ethics, a "virtue" is an expression of rationality, something which expresses the value of a man's life. For example, "independence" is a virtue, because it recognizes that man must form his own judgments and live by the work of his own mind. In contrast, "amateurism," especially as applied by the NCAA, is not a virtue, because it holds that a man must--as an inflexible ethical principle--reject any form of compensation for his own work

Ahhh, the pretzel.

Look, somewhere along the way several American sports became highly profitable enterprises.  Professional leagues went from pennyless stick and ball barnstorming associations to profitable entertainment machines.  Babe Ruth could be sold to the Yankees and Donald Sterling could choke millions of dollars out of a moribund basketball team.

Further down river, amateur sports also gained economic prestige and emerged as veritable farm leagues that could develop amateur talent.  I am talking about you, D-I football and basketball.  The NCAA basketball tournament makes the NCAA and CBS fabulously rich and the BCS gets to award teams over $10 million for a simple appearance in their bowl games.

The minute the NCAA and its member institutions found ways to gain tremendous profit from college sports, the "amateur" moral high ground was lost.  Its mission could no longer be to protect some amateur ideal, but rather to simply regulate competition among its member institutions.

That is the current reality.

Let's get something straight before I go any further---I do not consider college athletics professional leagues.  The men and women who participate are student-athletes.  They play their games between fellow student-athletes and abide by the NCAA rules (however unfair and ridiculous some of them are).  My issue is with some of the rules that exist.  I take issue with their function, serving less the promotion of competition but rather the outdated ideal of amateurism.

Several situations of late have made me reflect on the frivolous nature of some of the NCAA's rules. 

Recently I introduced Brady Quinn's "agent shopping" conundrum.  Notre Dame quarterback Brady Quinn has been ahead of the ball in beginning the agent-search process before the start of his senior season.  For that, the NCAA might punish Notre Dame or himself.

Unfortunately, there is an NCAA Bylaw which says he may be ineligible if so much as an agreement was made for future representation between himself and a prospective agent.  Any ruling against Quinn would have been lunacy.  Nowhere is Quinn alleged to have benefited from his access to the agent other than peace of mind in not having to deal with the inevitable agent search process later in the season.

Remember, I've argued above that the NCAA's rules lack any moral or ethical strength.  The only logical and satisfactory mission left for the NCAA is to protect "competition" within its athletic product.  Quinn's actions do not threaten this competition in any way.  He had long ago been recruited to Notre Dame and thanks to the NCAA's strict transfer rules was not a flight threat if he so chose to leave for another program seeking access to agents or other benefits.

In other words the NCAA Bylaw in question is a terrible rule.  The only logic behind it is a bad one---one of pre-emption, striking at even the hint of impropriety that might occur because an agent might be in contact with an athlete.  It targets not competition but one's amateur status.

To this argument, SMQB would likely disagree with me.  In fact, he argues as such in regards to the Reggie Bush housing scandal that erupted in late April.

In Reggie Bush's case, agent access to athletes (or their families or friends) undermines the 'amateur' status of said athletes, which is not important for any esoteric or moralistic purposes - and certainly not just because the NCAA says it is - but for the ongoing success of the sport; the "value" being protected isn't amateurism, but competition, and that is good for football or any other sport where the games, and not the individuals, are the commodities.

This is where SMQB and I disagree.  Bush was in his second and third seasons at USC and was not a threat to transfer to another program.  The benefits extended to him were via contacts not of the athletic department or USC boosters but low-lifes his father had crossed paths with.  Whether Bush had gotten something as small as a free football or as large as a family house matters not because he was already enrolled and locked into his USC education and playing career.  Any such punishment would be towards a violation of a flawed "amateur" notion, not any doctrine about fair and even levels of competition.  The games, the commodity the NCAA is in theory protecting, would be the same quality whether or not Bush's family had gotten the house.

In no way was competition threatened via Quinn's or Bush's actions.  Thanks to other logical and acceptable NCAA rules already on the books, Quinn and Bush were recruited to their respective programs without any violation of NCAA rules or what we shall call the "competition doctrine" advanced by SMQB.

In fact, once they signed with their programs, it would be nearly impossible for them to offer their services anywhere else without steep consequences.  NCAA transfer rules require the loss of a season's eligibility and having to wait a year before being allowed on the field.  Combined with annual recruiting and the possibility for injury and many other unknowns, transferring from one program to another is a rare and arduous process.  The NCAA has put up successful safeguards in that respect, protecting the competitiveness of its product.

Here is yet another example of NCAA rulemaking gone wrong: Drew Tate.

Iowa senior quarterback Drew Tate recently hit a hole-in-one at a charity golf tournament.  That amazing shot netted him a $25,000 check as part of the tournament's awards package to lure competitors and donors.

However, if he had accepted the check it would have been a letter violation of an NCAA amateurism rule.  Thus, Tate returned the check and walked away.  Give me a break.  Tate received no competitive benefit for having hit a miraculous golf shot at a tournament he participated in, yet the NCAA sees fit to hem in on his ability to enjoy the rewards of participation in organized events.

Now, some of you will correctly argue that Tate was there only because he was Iowa's starting quarterback.  This is true, and I will not dispute that.  However, I don't buy the "pandora's box" argument that if Tate was eligible to accept the check, it would create a loophole for boosters to create similar events with easier prizes and rewards to athletes because of their status as star football players.

This is where I think the NCAA is entirely inflexible and afraid of its own shadow.  Any sensible organization would take a look at the facts of the matter and let Tate walk away with his check.  He was punished (not allowed to accept the check and retain amateur status) because of the possibility of abuse later on, on the chance that leniency towards him might open loopholes down the road.

I differ from the absolutists in that I think the NCAA should confront these situations head on.

***
So how do we reform the NCAA?  Good question and I have a few suggestions about where to begin.

1)Throw out the rule book.  Seriously.  Sit down and figure out what the organization's true mission is when it comes to enforcement.  Listen to arguments like presented at SMQB and here about competition and other themes.  Then, rewrite the rules, but write them with an eye not towards rigidity but flexibility.  Oh, and simplify things.  [Edit: Then re-write it.  Sorry, forgot this small but critical part in my zeal to complete this entry].

Many a failed organization (United Nations, European Union, etc.) tripped themselves up in contradictory principles and an ethic towards voluminous rule-writing.  Yet America's founding document had but ten original ammendments outlining the rights granted to the people and their governance.  It wouldn't hurt the NCAA to follow that lead and reduce its paperwork to but a few basic and well-understood principles.

2)Start making rulings and judgments.  Lots of them.  One of the great features of the American legal system is that the judgments build upon themselves.  The courts recognize the intense overlap of laws and the heavy shades of gray involved in any judgment.  Judges look towards previous rulings to make future rulings and when necessary adjust where they find previous judgments made mistakes or set bad precedents.

The NCAA needs to do the same.  Too often there is little established precedent to guide the NCAA in its decisions.  Create that precedent and future judgments become easier to render and easier to understand for potential rule-breakers.  Make it so that there are fewer pandora's boxes by being lenient towards the Drew Tate's of the world and oppresive towards the programs who decide on fancy, barely-earned door prizes for athletes at unimportant hypothetical golf events.  Stop "punishing everyone because of the possible actions of a few" as one commenter noted a few months back.

3)Don't be afraid to make mistakes.  An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure and learning from a few mistakes early on that lead to better future judgments is much better than the current model.

4)Be realistic.  The world will not end tomorrow if Drew Tate accepts a check for hitting a hole-in-one.  He's not the bad guy, nor is Brady Quinn or Dwayne Jarrett or Matt Leinart or Pete Carroll or Charlie Weis.

Overly friendly tutors however, are not a benefit to even levels of competition.  Nor are friendly boosters who create an atmosphere of luxury for star athletes, providing access to automobiles and other perks.  However, schools shouldn't be held responsible for outside parties they cannot police, either.  If a player signs with an agent without a school knowing, they shouldn't have to forfeit games he played in, for example.

5)Focus most intensely on these areas---recruiting, academics, boosters.  Benefits extended to recruits or current players can be an enticement to future recruits that other programs simply cannot offer.  That is unfair and strikes at the competition doctrine.  Student-athletes must hold up to the "student" label.  They need to make grade and not receive unfair assistance from tutors, professors or the athletic department to maintain eligibility.  Boosters must not interfere with the agreed-upon rules that have been established to protect competition.

The bigger picture here is that the NCAA's rules and disciplinary measures are a mess.  They serve no clear purpose and have been written haphazardly over the decades to attack windmills where sometimes there are none.

Am I missing anything?  Feel free to add or subtract.

I don't agree, but we can at least table it:

The Football Major

Let's get serious, folks. Most of the players who fill football and basketball rosters at Division One schools are NOT legitimate students. Many would not be at their universities were it not for their athletic ability.

There are entrance requirements for regular students and then there are the entrance requirements for athletes. There is usually a huge gap between the two.

Now, in my book, there is nothing wrong with that. What's wrong is that we try to pretend that there's no difference.

We celebrate the concept of the student-athlete and expect players with NFL talent to also do well in useless (to them) majors like sociology or public policy and management.

I say it's time we cut all this nonsense out.

If you are football player, you should be able to major in football.

After all, if you are a gifted cello player, you come to a music school to major in cello. Why can't Brandon Cox major in quarterback?

Heisman Pundit makes a good case for his proposal, noting that football players with football or sports-related majors are not all that different from people with music majors etc.  They're following a curriculum that involves practice and an understanding of their field of study.

It would certainly abate some of the childish crowing about the great numbers of sociology, human development and basket weaving majors found within the rolls of major football teams.

Personally, I hope athletes would pursue more traditional majors and continue the facade of "student-athletes".  But there's something very libertarian and realist about HP's proposal that I cannot ignore.

As it is we're setting up many a young man and woman to fail with the status quo, pigeonholing them into pursuits they may not give a hoot about if not for needing a degree to stay eligible.

At least with more realistic degree options an extra ounce of choice is inserted into the process, and an athlete can pursue his or her true interest and calling and suffer the consequences if they fail along the way.  That's life.  For whatever reason there's a strong impulse within society to regulate a great amount of behavior and outcomes instead of letting people chase their interests right or wrong.  Perhaps a football (or athletics/sports) major is a check against that impulse.

I'm reminded of the story of former Notre Dame tight end Joey Hiben who ditched the football program to pursue a degree in the ultra-demanding architecture program.  To his credit the kid made an interesting choice and will face the consequences of that decision.  I think he was smart, as it's almost impossible to balance such a demanding pursuit with the demands of year-round football at major programs like Notre Dame.  He didn't choose football, but many others do, and it's a touch unfair to demand of them a pursuit they may not have great interest in.

This should be fun...

Origin: Stewart Mandel (bread + crumbs)

This list is not comprehensive but we have to start somewhere so here goes.

If college football had a commissioner, and I were in fact that person (head for the hills!), here are various policies I'd chase/enact:

---Comprehensive Schedule Reform: First legislation item signed would be that D-IA teams may only play other D-IA teams.  The day of the cupcake is over.  I would also strongly encourage every BCS conference team to play other BCS foes or quality non-BCS teams in out-of-conference play.  Games between powerhouse schools (USC/Notre Dame, Ohio State/Texas) would be incentivized with cash from NCAA coffers.

---Comprehensive Poll Reform: I'd work with the Associated Press to assemble a more engaged, talented group of voters for its poll.  I'd use NCAA money to send necessary information to all voters and pollsters such as full DVDs of all available games, or at least significant portions of the games, plus copious statistical information, quotes and stories of all games played each week.  Pollsters would be given several days to digest the material and not be allowed to send their ballots until Wednesday morning at the earliest.  Poll release would tentatively be scheduled for Thursday at noon Eastern time.

---Clarification on Postseason Play: No playoffs.  Ever.  The Rose Bowl would entertain only the Pac-10 and Big Ten champions.  If that were to disrupt a BCS championship game, tough.  Also there would be a reduction of bowl games.  There are simply too many bowl games right now and I'd work to phase out a few a year until the number settled at around 15-20 games.

---Football Saturday: I saw this somewhere else and I like the idea; like the NFL, college football games would start at similar times.  For example, all morning games would begin at say, 11 a.m. Eastern, and then the next round of games wouldn't kick off until 3 p.m., followed by more games at 7 p.m. and then a late flurry of 11 p.m. games.  One could channel-click at home with ease knowing each game watched would be at a similar junction as all other televised games.

---Preseason: I would allow every team one local exhibition scrimmage (minimal contact) against a nearby foe that wouldn't count on the schedule.  No fans or media would be allowed, but it would help teams smooth out a few rough patches before their first official game.  I would also bring back the various preseason classic games, which would count on the schedule.  It would be a great opportunity to schedule quality OOC games on opening weekend and help promote the sport.

---Eligibility: Players will have five years of eligibility, period.  There will be no redshirts, but players can apply for a 6th year of eligibility if faced with unusual injury, personal or family circumstances.  Transfers would no longer lose eligibility but must continue to sit one year before being allowed to play in games.

---NCAA Reform: The rule book would be burned.  A committee would be formed to greatly simplify the NCAA's mission to a few basic principles (think the U.S. Constitution---brilliant and concise, with delegation).  The majority of rules should be created to maintain 1)academic integrity and 2)fairness throughout the game.  Nearly everything else would be superfluous.  The NCAA would make many more rulings on the issues that come before it, making its mistakes but also setting precedents that will help clarify what is right and what is wrong.  Most people understand how our courts make their decisions and can reasonably anticipate how a judge or jury will react to a case.  In college football, it's almost the exact opposite.  The NCAA is simply too inconsistent and dark and distant.  Time to bring it into the light and create consistency in its rulings.

---Other Concerns: I would encourage a reduction in the number of D-IA teams.  We're at either 117 or 119 teams right now, which is ridiculous.  Ideally D-IA football should have anywhere from 80-100 teams.  Dropping a few D-IA teams would strengthen the quality of lower division football, making it more watchable and popular while also scraping away a handful of persistent losers from the D-IA ranks.  I would encourage the various conferences to find a way to reduce their numbers into something more like 10 teams.  Thus, round-robin play could be institutionalized and we wouldn't have to fret about certain teams playing conference title games and others not doing so.  Finally, I'd make it so that teams participating in 6-3 type games would both be credited with a loss.  That's not fun for the players, and it's not fun for the fans.

The New York Times' Pete Thamel examines some unusual academics courseloads for several Auburn athletes.

It's lengthy, so I'll try and condense it to the following:

Several Auburn football players (notably many members of 2004's 13-0 team) took classes with one Professor Thomas Petee.  It appears Petee offered classes to many athletes that required little or no classtime, instead providing a certain number of assignments, readings and essays via email or other communications.

Petee defends his approach as legitimate and laborious, but many academic peers question how he could handle such a heavy courseload and why grades were so high for many of his students.

Here's the introduction, I encourage you to read on and make your own judgments.

A graphic popped up on James Gundlach’s television during an Auburn football game in the fall of 2004, and he could not believe his eyes.

One of the university’s prominent football players was being honored as a scholar athlete for his work as a sociology major. Professor Gundlach, the director of the Auburn sociology department, had never had the player in class. He asked the two other full-time sociology professors about the player, and they could not recall having had him either.

So Professor Gundlach looked at the player’s academic files, which led him to the discovery that many Auburn athletes were receiving high grades from the same professor for sociology and criminology courses that required no attendance and little work.

 The knee-jerk response is to go "a-ha! gotcha!".

However, this does not appear to be an instance where academic improprieties were extensively orchestrated from within the athletic department.  This Petee guy appears to be a rogue professor, and offers at least a somewhat reasonable defense of his behavior (namely, the athletes in fact did a certain amount of work---it wasn't exactly study hall and throwing pencils at the ceiling).

This kind of activity does strike at the heart of college athletics, in that some level of education (even for the best of athletes) should be administered.  However I don't find the actions of the Auburn athletes or the professor (based only on what is presented in this article) to be particularly egregious.  The players appear to have done some reading and essay-writing along with meetings with Mr. Petee.  They do appear to have been given more credits than they deserved, and that needs to be further analyzed by Auburn's academic departments.

Auburn's fault lies more in not recognizing this questionable conduct earlier.

***
Other early reaction:

• Blue-Gray Sky
• Georgia Sports Blog
• EDSBS
• Roll 'Bama Roll
• MGoBlog
  

Media

• AJC
• Birmingham News
  

I'll continue with a limited roundup.  I hunch this will get a big reaction from the blogs and traditional media, but I'm kind of underwhelmed---based on my reading of the Thamel piece Auburn wasn't intentionally gaming the system here.  This was an oversight by the athletic department and a rogue professor more than a cynical attempt to boost the academic performances of several athletes.

All-everything running back recruit turned dropout Jason Gwaltney wants back in (H/T: Mountainlair).

That's fine, except that Slaton guy kinda took your job and won't be returning it anytime soon.

I have no problems with kids wanting to return to school, however.  They are student-athletes, after all. 

For the informed college football fan, there is no greater time to practice one's eye-rolling skills than the offseason.

With rare free time and the troublemaking opportunities it presents, college football players inevitably get into trouble.  When you combine that inevitability with a bored and sensational media and illogical braying of some blogger/fans, the eyes get to roll in delerious pleasure several times a week.

In a classic case of karmic retribution to the naive and those who spoke too soon, athletes at UCLA and Texas were busted for off-field transgressions in the last week or so.

Riddle me this:

A bunch of off-field nonsense happened to UCLA's football program under Bob Toledo.  Now, similar nonsense has happened under Karl Dorrell.  What's the connection?  Well, since there are two different coaches, we can narrow this down to being an institutional issue.  That's it, it's a UCLA problem.  Those rascal Bruins, always up to trouble!

At least, that's the logic some employ.

In reality, UCLA's no different from anybody else, but their fan base and coaches are simply less willing to absorb the public relations hit that comes with winning football.  The difference between them and say, Miami, USC and Ohio State is that UCLA has a glass jaw and folds when the punches start coming---firing winning coaches and complaining to no end about the next set of coaches while demanding they make angels out of their players.

That's fine, that's their choice as a program but it's one reason they're not a top 10 historical football program despite the university's tremendous resources.  Every recent shot at winning football has been met with off-field issues.  The sooner a program recruits guys that get tired of playing in these types of games (and these types of games), the sooner a program has happy fans.  But there's a cost.  That's the way the game works. 

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

As I explained last week, these problems exist all over D-I college football, at every institution.

Is it any surprise that the majority of off-field news in the last eight years has dealt with players from Oklahoma, Miami, Florida State, USC, Ohio State, Tennessee and yes, Texas?

Notice a thread?  They've all won championships.  It's a not so dirty little secret that every elite team needs at least a handful (if not many more---see Ohio State) of kids who are rough around the edges but are great football players.

Vince Young's a good kid now, but he had a rough background and hasn't lived the most perfect life.  Think Texas wins last year's title without him or Ramonce Taylor?  Mack Brown knew what he was doing when he recruited both (and several other marginal characters) and assumed those risks.

Eric Wright and Winston Justice were guys who would need a lot of babysitting to keep on the straight-and-narrow.  That never happened, and they were a big headache for USC, but they contributed mightily to USC's football efforts in the last few years.  Pete Carroll knew what he was getting into when he recruited them (and many other questionable players).  He assumed the risks.

The bottom line is it's simply impossible to run a spotless program and win a national championship or ably contend for one.  Every team that's reached the game's greatest heights (or new heights for non-championship teams) has gotten there on the backs of a bunch of players who the program's fans would otherwise not let associate with their fine institutions.

Heck, earning a school's first 10-win season since 1998 meant playing knuckleheads like Maurice Drew, John Hale and Jess Ward, and Justin Medlock.

Is it any surprise, for example, that Georgia Tech's last 10-win season piggybacked various transgressions that put the team on probation?  The Yellowjackets have just seven seasons of 10 or more wins in their history (and just three since 1956).  Playing to the level of an elite team takes either a few miracles or mixing in players who are going to have classroom and/or off-field issues.

Say what you want about Mack Brown or Pete Carroll, Bob Stoops or Jim Tressel, but they're all shrewd, shrewd coaches, and know what it takes to reach the heights they've reached.  It's not pretty but then, they're not interested in being second-rate coaches and assume the consequences of getting where they've gotten.

I don't intend to excuse poor behavior in writing this, but it's up to the rest of us to recognize certain realities and get over our hangups about what's happening each and every year with this great sport that we follow.

It's up to each individual program to do its best to discourage poor conduct and punish it faithfully, but they're not going to stop recruiting the best football players---thus taking a flier on whatever potential transgressions they'll commit while at school.  Not when coach salaries are in the millions of dollars.  Not when the available talent isn't through natural selection out of a school's student body but through recruiting.  Not when ego is at play and the mood of a booster can determine the fate of a coach.

And even then, it's not always enough.  Not when high character guys (April 27 entry) get tagged for things nobody would have expected.

Even mighty Notre Dame isn't immune.  The last time they had a contender was 1993.  Remember the little brouhaha about players from that team that came to light?  Or how about the coach during Northwestern's miracle run in 1996?  One Gary Barnett.  Think there's a little more to his stay at Northwestern than what's been revealed to the press?  His downfall was at Colorado but he found the winning formula in Evanston.

These things come with the territory.  The bloodshed spilled all over the message boards, air waves and blog sites is thus frivolous (for the most part).  We're all guilty.  I just want to see great football, personally.

***
Update

Yes, I pulled this entry after writing it, as I continued to revise it over and over and over and finally just sat on it, figuring to keep working on it and maybe publish Tuesday...  problem was it was already published and copied elsewhere (gotta love the internet), and at this point I'm not going to continue to chase links to further augment the arguments.  Its' already out there, so here it is again, heh.

Peter at BON has a good point that it's about how you handle these situations that also matters (a point I make as well).  It's a nod towards the supposed "loosey goosey" way Pete Carroll has handled USC's off-field messes.  But in reading a lot of stories this offseason, it looks like he's got a policy of putting disciplinary matters into the hands of USC's Student Affairs office.  Occasionally he'll step in after the fact and have some kind of internal discipline, but mostly lets others determine his fate.  Interesting, and a bit risky if you ask me, but that's his way.

What I find notable is that a strict start doesn't always work.  Look at BN's rundown of early transgressions at UCLA under coach Karl Dorrell.  He suspended several players and sent a message that disciplinary issues would be met with severe punishment.  But yet, things kept happening!

Same at USC, where Carroll watched the school suspend players like Marcell Almond and Winston Justice, who had to jump through all kinds of hoops to get back into school once their punishment had run its course.  Allmond behaved upon his return, Justice didn't.  He also effectively gave back Hershel Dennis a permanent benching after his non-charge, but curfew breaking night that saw him alleged for rape in 2004.

You can do only so much, but when you've got troublemakers, things are not going to stop.  Phil Fulmer's been adding all kinds of new punishments over his career at Tennessee, but the bad conduct of a handful of his players never ceases.  We're in a bizarre reality where a lot of guys simply don't get it and maybe never will.

So no, this wasn't so much an excuse for Carroll (or other coaches), but kind of a reality check.  I simply get tired of reading all these nonsensical diatribes that some program is renegade and bad simply because of its name and a few knuckleheads that go there.  Last year the team du jour was Tennessee (Fulmer Cup! 10 offseason arrests!), this year it's USC, next year, who knows, but at some point people are just going to look stupid hyperventilating about what's happening.

***
Update #2

See, this is some of the idiotic nonsense I'm alluding to.

The big name player in the midwest taking money and gifts from various boosters.

The elite national football recruit lured to the northwest after chasing booster and program dollars.

The national recruit out of the southwest and his father who sought and received booster money from various programs and were even involved in criminal activity on a recruiting visit.

These are but three easy to recall examples of scandalous, rule-breaking behavior happening within college football in recent years.  There are many more stories out there like these: well-known within coaching and recruiting circles but rarely if ever reported to the press or the NCAA.

Why is that?

Here's a hint: every program is guilty of something, and most are unabashed repeat offenders.

From time to time, flare-ups occur between programs, mostly about recruiting but often simple jealousy is to blame.  However, the war of words is often private.  Vague threats may be made before the sides go back to their corners to simmer down and move on.  At least, that's usually the case.

This detente of sorts between the majority of D-I college football programs is what is commonly called a Gentleman's Agreement.

An unwritten agreement guaranteed only by the pledged word or secret understanding of the participants

I'm sure most coaches wouldn't admit to something like this being in place, but it's a logical explanation for the lack of tattling through the papers and NCAA given the depth of widely-known violations that exist.

What's happened is that a mutual protection society of sorts has formed, and most squabbles are handled internally between football programs and their coaches.

The logic behind this is twofold:

1)Nobody wants to deal with the NCAA-As I mentioned earlier, the NCAA lacks a predictable, systematic response mechanism to the rules violations it finds.  With so much left to chance, the NCAA has given itself a broad and powerful range of sanction powers.

Very often the sanctions are nonexistent or "slaps on the wrist", but there is always the threat of scholarship losses, postseason bans, and even stronger punishments such as the mythical "death penalty" imposed upon the SMU football program so many years ago.  Yes, a program may know its neighbor or rival is cheating, but it's not like they're perfectly clean either.  Being turned in by a foe thus becomes a form of Russian Roulette.  This leads to No. 2...

2)Bad karma/breaking the agreement-I think the appropriate quote here is "there but for the grace of God, go I".  It's one thing to be mad at another school for whatever violation is discovered, but it's another to rat them out.

Every program has its skeletons in the closet---thus, every attempt made at outing others is certain to be considered of poor taste and discretion.  Who is to say that the program doing the ratting isn't the next to get turned into the NCAA?  Investigations reduce the flow of booster money, they affect recruiting, invite bad press and truth is often lost in the hysteria.  Few, if any programs can stomach the uncertainty and possible sanctions.  Therefore it's in everyone's interest to play along and uphold the agreement.

Before we go further, I want to clarify that I'm not being naive here.  I have several recruiting contacts who tell me interesting and devious tales about some of the rule breaking going on.  In general we're in a newer, more clean era of football as the NCAA has strengthened itself over the years.  Things certainly aren't as wild and wooly as they used to be, and everyone's the better for it.

However, violations persist and that's likely never to change.

Everything's kosher so long as everyone's on board 

***
Boston Massacre Syndrome

As I said earlier, most combatants tend to simmer down and let bygones be bygones.  But not all of them, and that's where we run into a problem.

Imagine being in a room filled with a hundred people, all with guns pointed at one another's heads.  That's kind of what's happening here.  Things are tense, but chaos and bloodshed (in this case, all kinds of accusations and NCAA investigations and punishments) has been avoided because for the most part everyone's playing by the rules---the aforementioned gentlemen's agreement.

When someone pulls their trigger, however, problems surface.  The agreement loses its strength and people start getting hurt amidst all the shooting.

***
Three such programs have in fact pulled the trigger in recent memory.  For that, they earn CFR's stamp of disapproval as certified tattle-tales.

1)Clemson

See link

On to college football, where the Clemson coaching staff is perturbed about an alleged last-minute recruiting heist Florida tried to pull with CJ Spiller, who signed with the Tigers anyway.

As the story goes, Florida sent one of its top players on a lengthy drive to see Spiller and keep him busy on the eve of signing day. If the story is true, Florida could be in for some trouble with the NCAA

Clemson's staff sat on that potential violation for a while---and simmered---and still couldn't get over what looks like a ticky-tack violation.  Rear end sufficiently red, someone called the local paper to complain.

Clemson blogger TigerPundit has a good read on this story, and takes the Clemson coaches to task for their petty carping to the local rag.

One more thing, and I think this is kind of important: Clemson's recruiting record under Bowden has been on the up-and-up, and he is to be commended for that. In fact, the Tigers haven't been busted for a major recruiting violation since 1992.

Well, it sure as hell better stay that way. He's just invited every school in the South that Clemson competes with for recruits to do to the Tigers what he did to Florida

Bingo. 

2)Tennessee

This one's not as recent, but certainly the most entertaining of the bunch.  Upset at losing recruits to Alabama from his little honeypot in Memphis, Vols coach Phil Fullmer secretly rallied boosters and NCAA officials to put the squeeze on Alabama.  They dug up evidence about the out and out bribery involved in the recruitment of defensive line recruit Albert Means, and caught Alabama booster Logan Young in the act.

As a result, Alabama was sanctioned, lost Means, and Young went to jail.

3)Texas

Days before USC and Texas played in the Rose Bowl, Texas newspapers questioned USC about possible recruiting violations at a restaurant used for recruiting dinners, the Papadakis Taverna.

The not-so-strange strange thing is that everyone in the Pac-10 knew about USC's recruiting dinners, and the specifics of what went down there, but nobody complained in those first five years under Trojan coach Pete Carroll.  Yet lo and behold days before the Rose Bowl, a complaint is made.  The Texas papers wouldn't have known about something so specific without a tipoff from inside the UT program.

More recently, Yahoo! Sports writer Charles Robinson admitted to ESPN that the tips from his anonymous sources about the Reggie Bush housing story he broke were told to him at Texas' Pro Day and also Vince Young's individual workout.  Again, more UT insiders playing games.

What's with UT's and the whole goody two-shoes act?

***
I can't stress enough, with the rampant level of violations out there, both intentional and accidental, everyone is guilty of something and everyone else certainly knows about it.  Only by upholding the gentleman's agreement can the bloodshed of media firestorms and NCAA sanctions be avoided---think USC's happy about the beating it took two weeks ago?  They're managing, but I'm not sure the next team who gets that treatment is going down without a heck of a lot of collateral damage to everyone nearby.  Nobody wants that.

Bottom line: it's all all or nothing deal, where either the agreement stands or one too many teams gets self-righteous and collapse the whole system.

 

***
Getting back to the UT's and Clemson for a moment: assuming that everyone knows of the agreement, I wonder, "was it worth it"?

It's too soon to tell for Clemson, although they're already getting bad press.  Texas won the national championship, but I'm sure there are some folks at Texas A&M and Oklahoma frothing at the opportunity to drop all kinds of dirt on them if the agreement eventually collapses.  Think anyone is curious how Vince Young was able to get through school?  For Tennessee, they had a nice recruiting class recently, but the football team is in shambles after a 5-6 season.  I'm a sometimes believer in karma, and Tennessee exhibited poor form and bad karma in dragging Alabama through the mud like that.  I wonder if similar fates await Clemson and Texas.

***Update: Like I sad, bad Karma.  Texas running back Ramonce Taylor, already excused from the team to concentrate on academics, was arrested Sunday morning with more than five pounds of marijuana in the back of his car.***

I'm reminded of a quote from the movie One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, when Jack Nicholson's character is meeting with a psychiatrist.  He's been put in a mental hospital but doesn't quite fit the profile as someone who is mentally ill.  The drama flows from his constant bumping  of heads with the woman in charge, Nurse Ratched.  Right away Nicholson's character picks up that she's dishonest, but is in a power position and gets away with really petty power trips.  During the evaluation meeting, Nicholson tells the psychologist this great line:

She likes a rigged game, you know what I mean?

That's how I feel about the programs listed above.  They're playing a rigged game when they don't uphold the agreement like everyone else.  It's not exactly the most fair thing to do when a lot of other programs have held their fire.  They become villains, not unlike Louise Fletcher's Nurse Ratched.

Hint: she's not the movie's good guy

Once in a while I take a look at the search terms used to arrive at CFR via the various internet search engines.

My new favorite:

what happens if I fail to graduate from highschool after signing the LOI

Heh.

Paging Florida State, USC, Alabama, Ohio State, Tennessee, Texas, Florida and Miami, paging...

***MORE***

Other funny search terms:

basketball coach comb-overs

Should I be worried that the person arrived here from a computer at uscourts.gov?

usc cheats

Gee, I wonder if these guys had anything to do with it?

how did college football start

Well, Billy, I guess it's time we had a little talk about the birds and the bees...

Finally, this gem-

anthony smith (pro football star)

Who? 

It's an analogy for the way college football teams try to get recruits enrolled into their respective universities.  Some universities have difficult entrance requirements, others find ways to fit even the most disastrous of academic records.

For at least the second year in a row, the Orlando Sentinel has published its "take on how the NCAA's 119 Division 1-A schools rate in terms of being able to get football players in school".

Here's the link.

Last year the rankings were relative to other schools within the conference and based on a scale of "Buckle Down", "Semi-Tough", "Semi-Easy" and "All In".  Those have been replaced with a 1-10 scale, with 10 having the toughest admission standards.  It remains unclear whether these results are standardized across the schools or by conference.  My guess is the former, but I suspect that in doing so the results are a little more haphazard and should be given a little more caution than last year's data.

The information is reproduced down below, but for kicks, take a look at the final AP top 25 rankings with the Sentinel's ranking next to each team.  Please keep in mind the results are completely unscientific and anonymous, providing plenty of opportunity for error and bias.

1. Texas-7
2. USC-3
3. Penn State-7
4. Ohio State-3
5. West Virginia-2
6. LSU-3
7. Virginia Tech-2
8. Alabama-3
9. Notre Dame-7
10. Georgia-7
11. TCU-5
12. Florida-5
13. Oregon-5
14. Auburn-3
15. Wisconsin-5
16. UCLA-8
17. Miami-4
18. Boston College-6
19. Louisville-2
20. Texas Tech-3
21. Clemson-2
22. Oklahoma-5
23. Florida State-4
24. Nebraska-5
25. California-6

Average: 4.48

Distribution: 2,2,2,2,3,3,3,3,3,3,4,4,5,5,5,5,5,5,6,6,7,7,7,7,8

Results, by Conference:

• Atlantic Coast: Virginia Tech-2, North Carolina State-2, Clemson-2, Miami (FL)-4, Florida State-4, Maryland-4, Virginia-6, North Carolina-6, Boston College-6, Georgia Tech-7, Duke-8, Wake Forest-9
• Big East: West Virginia-2, USF-2, Louisville-2, Cincinnati-2, Rutgers-4, Pittsburgh-6, Connecticut-6, Syracuse-7
• Big Ten: Ohio State-3, Michigan State-3, Minnesota-4, Wisconsin-5, Purdue-5, Iowa-5, Indiana-5, Illinois-6, Penn State-7, Michigan-7, Northwestern-9
• Big 12: Oklahoma State-2, Kansas State-2, Texas Tech-3, Iowa State-3, Texas A&M-4, Baylor-4, Nebraska-5, Kansas-5, Oklahoma-5, Colorado-5, Missouri-7, Texas-7
• Conference USA: UTEP-2, UAB-2, Marshall-2, East Carolina-2, Southern Miss-3, Memphis-4, Houston-4, UCF-5, Tulsa-5, Tulane-8, SMU-8, Rice-10
• Mid-American: Toledo-2, Bowling Green-2, Akron-2, Western Michigan-3, Central Michigan-3, Eastern Michigan-3, Northern Illinois-3, Ball State-4, Kent State-5, Ohio-6, Miami (Ohio)-7, Buffalo-7
• Mountain West: New Mexico-3, Colorado State-3, BYU-3, UNLV-3, Wyoming-4, TCU-5, San Diego State-6, Air Force-8
• Pacific-10: USC-3, Washington State-3, Oregon State-3, Arizona State-3, Washington-5, Oregon-5, Arizona-5, Cal-6, UCLA-8, Stanford-9
• Southeastern: Tennessee-2, South Carolina-2, Mississippi State-2, Ole Miss-3, LSU-3, Auburn-3, Arkansas-3, Alabama-3, Kentucky-5, Florida-5, Georgia-7, Vanderbilt-9
• Sun Belt: Troy-1, Middle Tennessee-1, North Texas-2, Florida International-2, Florida Atlantic-2, Arkansas State-2, Louisiana-Monroe-3, Louisiana-Lafayette-3
• Western Athletic: Utah State-1, New Mexico State-1, Louisiana Tech-2, San Jose State-2, Idaho-2, Boise State-2, Fresno State-3, Nevada-4, Hawai'i-4
• Independents: Temple-2, Notre Dame-7, Navy-9, Army-9

Average Rating, By Conference:

1. Independents-6.75
2. Big Ten-5.36
3. ACC (tie)-5.00
4. Pac-10 (tie)-5.00
5. CUSA-4.58
6. MWC-4.38
7. Big-12-4.33
8. MAC (tie)-3.92
9. SEC (tie)-3.92
10. Big East-3.88
11. WAC-2.33
12. Sun Belt-2.00
    

***

Previous:

• Admission Standards

What's bowl season without late-breaking announcements of ineligible players, suspensions, and arrests.  We're talking to you, USC, Texas, Northwestern, Wisconsin and Clemson.

The rundown:

• ESPN very nearly made Matt Leinart ineligible for the rest of the season after asking him to do a short promo for one of their programs.  USC self-reported the error and he will regain eligibility before the Rose Bowl.  D'oh!
• Several Texas players were named in a variety of police investigations, although it appears they won't be charged or suspended.
• Wisconsin's Booker Stanley is once again in trouble, this time for an alleged domestic assault.
• Several Northwestern part time starters will miss the Sun Bowl for a variety of academic and disciplinary reasons.
• Clemson added three more casualties, two academic and one disciplinary.
  

I'm sure more announcements are coming, particularly related to academics.  Bowl season falls right in that gap between first and second semesters (or second and third quarters), when athlete grades are made final and determinations are made about ongoing eligibility.  Inevitably a few players, for whatever reason (think: not going to class but still playing football) have fall academic issues that go unpunished until bowl time.