Saban has already told the ncaa, you work in our interests or we form our own league. The ncaa is like a baseball commissioner now. A figurehead organization balancing the bad news to improve the product. Oversight is just an internal HR policy now…written to keep p5’s from screwing themselves. When real violations occur the ncaa just waits out the news cycle.
I feel really bad for SMU, the hammer’s about to come down!
SMU was just ahead of the curve.
The problem is that the FBI has things the NCAA doesn’t: subpoenas and the power to compel honest testimony or go to jail.
The NCAA? You can stonewall them and there’s absolutely nothing they can do about it.
They keep hitting Arizona. Time to whack some other moles.
They went in ‘82 (‘81 season) because SMU was on probation (we would have gone if we had scored 1 more point against Texas rather than tying them that season), but that was the only time UT went when they didn’t deserve it. They also won the right to go to the Cotton Bowl after the following seasons: 1977, 1983, and 1990. They would have gone in ‘95, the last year of the SWC, but the Cotton had other contractual affiliations after the ‘94 season. Cheating was rampant in the conference. I don’t think Texas was as pure as the driven snow but the schools that got their wrists slapped, including us, deserved it.
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Over the years Texas avoided several disasters including some of the players getting paid but never showing up for their job on Capital Hill, buying the top running back in the country from Mississippi (went to OU) a neat pair of boots later found to be worth around $1000 or more, the nice Continental that Earl drove as a freshman (I know because I interviewed him lol) and several other things that skip my mind.
But I agree, I think all the schools caught cheating deserved to be on probation. SMU most certainly earned its death penalty.
But one could argue that we got a raw deal on the probation that had nothing to do with Darryl Shepard. Instead we got nailed because our coach didn’t realize it was illegal to ride on a private airplane with a prospect.
Regardless, in my years of covering and going to sporting events I think college basketball is far more corrupt. Players started getting agents back in the late '70s and I will guarantee you that it has gotten worse since.
Lord knows how much Texas paid to get Durant all the way to Austin.
No, we were not lilly white either. Athletes here, well at least the studs, got special “hand shakes” from various alums and many athletes got nice envelopes delivered and disbursed on campus.
Cheating has been going on forever and I don’t look for it to change.
But it doesn’t hurt to have UT’s political clout to avoid most of the trouble…LOL
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College basketball is a cesspool today, and UT’s hands were as dirty as anyone else’s. I don’t know all the details of the ‘77 probation. I thought it was because Shepherd got a loan for a Trans-Am from a UH alum, but I don’t know. The 80s probation, however, was pretty bad. I think one can legitimately argue that Coach Yeoman believed he was helping dirt-poor kids and that acting as a humanitarian trumps stringently following NCAA rules. But be that as it may we were doling out the cash.
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Basketball has been controlled by NIKE, Adidias, Under Armour, etc.
for many years now and with recent FBI investigations, we are just now beginning to see evidence of some of it. Will more get out or will billion dollar industries influence politicians who influence judicial and law enforcement to limit the scope of investigations?
I still have not seen some of the bluest blood programs or NIKE get pulled into courts of law. Time will tell.
But, as far as UT I have posted before of how I worked many years ago with a former UT FB starter and a girlfriend of a former Aggie/NFL player. One day she was talking about what her boyfriend was receiving for playing at A & M. The former UT player who was only receiving cash hand shakes, etc. because he was that good and not a NFL prospect.
I still remember his example of UT recruiting back then that indirectly got a star player to play for them. This player was one of the most recruited players in all of college FB that year and UT backers actually purchased a home for his girlfriend and his child.
It turned out that the doctors doing his physical missed a birth defect that ended his career in his freshmen year. The defect was not correctable and the HC had another bad season and eventually was fired.
Oh, but the girlfriend still kept the house.
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“Penders warned…”, lol, ever hear of Dexter Cambridge and his summer job answering office phones for a UT booster? Of course, the $6,000 he earned (never mind the fact that he could barely speak English) was just simply repaid by Cambridge in one lump sum … as it was simply just a student loan made to him, of course.
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There was certainly the ‘helping the kids view’ in play. WAY back in the day I was a student waiting for my next class, a couple of our non elite players were in the class. I don’t pretend to recall the exact words but it was like this. One player scolded the other, don’t tell them you need the money for a date, tell them you need a few dollars for laundry or to help family. They were not talking about speaking to CBY. My buddies who were walk on practice squad players didn’t get anything. This is NOT a basketball example! This is football and during the SMU Death Penalty when one of their players was off scholorship here in my German class.
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thats going to drive someone on this board up the wall…
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Yep, especially if they get punished for it…after UNC was able to get off.
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It still really pisses me off that Rob Gray had to miss the first game of his senior season because a friend paid his $5 entry fee into a church league tournament. Meanwhile, UNC can create fake classes for its basketball players and no violation can be found. I have less respect for the NCAA than I have for politicians.
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Actually the Level 1 violations are against Orlando Early (Asst Coach) and Mark Gottfried (HC). State was hit with a Level 2 failure to monitor and another Level 2 for a football game ticket and parking pass for DSJ.
Early admitted in a statement to his attorney that was filed with the court that he got an envelope from Gott and gave it to one of DSJ’s handlers. He says he never looked in the envelope. He assumed it was cash. Gott has denied giving Early the envelope on the record and DSJ has denied receiving it. This is clearly wrong if it happened, but Zion Williamson didn’t play for free at Duke last year like most 5-star recruits across the country over the past decade. If you pay players at UK, Duke, or UNC-CHeat it’s just the way things work and the NCAA looks the other way. I will be watching the cases in Tuscon and Lawrence with keen interest since those coaches are on tape talking about doing this stuff.
As for the 20 years of academic fraud in Chapel Hill, this is our punishment for exposing that scandal. Plain and simple. I think we will have to vacate both wins from DSJ’s season in Raleigh and serve two years probation with no postseason ban. I’m ok with that.
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If you were to tell me that only 11 of Kentucky’s 12 players were paid last year I’d still laugh in your face. The NCAA and Calipari have a relationship like the Mob and the NYC Mayor’s office.
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State responded to the NOA yesterday by self imposing sanctions for the Level II ticket violations. Restrictions on visits and fine and the loss of one scholarship for one year.
On the Level I violations State said prove it first of all. DSJ has responded to questions by the university by saying he never got any money. If he had he wouldn’t have been driving his grandmother’s car while he was at State.
State also pointed out that the source of the money in question was from an agents middle man that State sent a disassociation letter to in 2012. That would make it an impermissible benefit and not a recruiting violation IF the money ever got to DSJ. We shall see how this plays out.
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