It's a joke about losing out on high school recruits. 

They are talking about players, obviously 

In fairness, we lost Mattison to rivals twice

Edit: comment deleted for being meaner than necessary 

Fix the headline Seth!

In college football, we're already well into what came after Glasnost: Gangster Capitalism. Vicious battles for control of natural resources and wealth-generating entities erupted everywhere; money and aggression were necessary to triumph in a completely lawless environment. The weak and powerless were trampled underfoot.

Ok, in this instance I'm hoping Putin comes along quickly! They need leadership over at the ncaa...

Paul Farmer--and most students of the period--would disagree. The Soviet health system collapsed. Many, many people died, esp. in (former) Soviet prisons. The period of cowboy capitalism that followed was a crazed free-for-all that savages like Larry Summers and his Harvard boys insisted was necessary, but created a predatory period in which the oilygarchs were created. One can trace a relatively straight line to Putin, who people like Henry Kissinger admired. If anyone writes a half-truthful account of the period, it will not look pretty, let alone organized. Much of the current ugly traces to it.

Edit: I think that all regulated and or taxed economies produce black markets. As competitors seek advantages in those economies, and as poor people pursue the narrow margins that they need to survive.

Yes, agree. And many fans that are "turned off" by the "transactional" nature of recruiting now are in fact more turned off more by having to argue about it rather than the concept itself (as could be executed by UM).  If enough $ is on the table for all the major programs at a level that "money does not matter [to many players]", I think these fans would be fine with that set up.

The NCAA has spent years and millions trying to preserve the system of: YOU have to play more games so WE can make more money. Warde is just falling in line. It's OK for him to be well-compensated for a leisurely job, but heaven forbid the players want to help their parents pay the bills or have some money for their future.

Appreciate these guys for calling it like it is, reprehensible

They should be separated but Title IX doesn’t allow it. That’s my problem with this issue - people will continue to harp about the NCAA and universities involvement in this ‘problem’ without stopping and asking themselves this question: What’s the odds of finding 218 house members, 50 senators and a president that are going to change Title IX to allow male athletes in a couple of sports to make bank while all other male and female athletes get left out in the cold?

The case I am making is more that public universities cannot rationally have separate policies for what are fundamentally the same activity offerings for students.  The only fundamental difference between the "revenue" varsity sports and all the other varsity sports is what people outside the schools are willing to pay to watch them (hence nothing different in terms of the educational mission statement of the university).

I'm not certain *any* school sport can be labeled as "corrupt" or "exploitative" when it is provided by the university (optional - schools are not required to provide these sports) to students that are supposed to be focused on taking classes first and foremost, while not having ti *pay out of pocket or raise funds* to participate in these sports (ask the UM women's hockey team about that one), and even provides them the opportunity to have their entire education costs covered (and that is before even getting into NIL and the opportunities that participating in these sports opens up once they leave the school).

Exactly, the market value is the point.

Should Michigan refuse to receive the market value for the product they put on the field because athletes in non-revenue sports don’t bring in as much money? I hope we can all see the absurdity of this suggestion, which is equivalent to the one proffered about the athletes themselves

The difference being that neither the PGA nor the local golf league is being offered by the university as part of a diversified educational experience for their students (which is why schools offer *any* sports in the first place).

The PGA is a for profit institution with the explicit purpose of generating profit (and paying its participants to do so).  Universities are not.

"Transactional" in this instance is the direct quid pro quo of payment from the universities (and/or proxies) for service rendered to the schools... which is fine for an employment or independent contractor arrangement.

Yet school sports were not intended to ever be such, and it would become difficult to logically (and ethically) argue thar university varsity sport "A" should be handled in such a transactional nature while university varsity sports "B" should not.

Well, It seems possible that Juwan just isn't a very good basketball coach, and that getting a better coach would improve our prospects, independent of the other issues.

our admissions department and ineffectual AD preventing him from getting the kids he needs to be successful.

Or... maybe Juwan is not looking at the "right" kids.  We know Michigan has higher standards than other schools - this is not a "bad" thing and only becomes an issue *when people don't properly plan for it*.

(And "right" isn't just their classroom performance - it includes attitude, expectation, effort, availability, etc.  Finding people that are near locks to be *able* to come, but also want to *stay* for the long haul and eventually become team leaders - not simply blow town at the first opportunity.)

We know that Michigan can get "good" kids that both play well and fit in Michigan's academics... Beilein did this for over a decade.  Harbaugh did for nearly a decade.

The problem is when the people doing the recruiting (and those facilitating the process) fail to perform due diligence.  Things happen and sometimes it doesn't work out for a kid here and there (e.g. maybe they let the grades slip near the end of HS, or got into some other trouble, etc.)  But when it becomes a *recurring issue* with a program's recruiting... that is the fault of those running that program.

Of course. But if you just shake your head and mutter 'terrible, terrible,' the lynch mob can proceed. If you stop and ask why maybe you prevent these issues (some of them?) from haunting us for another decade. Because Juwan is loved by the players, can think the game, etc. So if we say, "Well, he can't recruit. . ." and then hamstring the next coach in recruiting in these same ways. . . Let's at least have this conversation be about the real issues rather than just. . .feeling good about feeling bad, which is kind of a sports blog specialty.

I regret that Brian and Seth write and think so acutely about football and are so perfunctory about hoop, are now just contributing to the rancor. But this is a football blog, when all is said and done.