OT - NCAA Expanding Bush/Mayo Investigation
It looks like the NCAA hasn't forgotten about USC afterall. I know it was asked a while ago if anyone knew the status of the USC investigation so, for what it's worth, according to ESPN the NCAA is going to combine the Mayo and Bush investigations into one. I highly doubt USC would be that arrogant to do these things but, then again, I am reminded of Nick Nolte in Blue Chips -- sometimes you just HAVE to get Butch McCray and Ricky Roe!
My guess is that some heads will roll but not the entire program. See Link for more info:
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/news/story?id=4055102
The NCAA never forgot about USC, they've just never had the power do anything about it as long as the people involved refuse to answer questions. It is more efficient to have one group of investigators get nowhere than two.
To me this looks like more of a way to get rid of this than a consolidation of resources with the goal of finally getting to the bottom of USC's involvement with whatever actually went down with Bush and Mayo.
The goal of the consolidation is to determine whether USC had institutional control. This allows them to waive their hands, push some paper and ultimately say "while we couldn't determine what actually went on in each of these situations, including the extent to which any coaches or assistants knew or should have known of any benefits received, we can say that during the time period in question, USC maintained institutional control and that whatever happened were isolated instances and not representative of any wrongdoing or lack of oversight by the university." Or something like that. End investigation.
This will end up being a lot like the OSU "investigation".
If evidence of NCAA rules violations are found, someone will be punished. It doesn't matter if they are found to be isolated events. The much bigger problem from the NCAA's standpoint is actually getting people to speak out, since it does not have subpoena power. A lot of times they wrap up an investigation by concluding that there probably was wrongdoing, but that they could not turn up concrete evidence, and then they slap the program on the wrist. Opposing fans then cry foul, but from a legal standpoint there's not much else the NCAA can do. (Keep in mind, this was also true for us the the first time they investigated us for the Ed Martin scandal (1997). It was only a few years later, after Martin got nailed by the FBI and had to squeal, that the NCAA reopened the case.)
you will hear crickets coming out of this investigation. Guarantee...no one will talk when this come to a end. There will be no self-responsibility by NO ONE...Petey and Timmy will blame outside entities for bringing shame upon SC. Mayo and Bush will be the victim by these individuals who simply preyed on them...yeah right!
I may have posted this before, but my boss is a big time athletic booster for USC, and is fairly close with the athletic program. We always talk sports, and he has mentioned a number of times that USC does all kinds of illegal stuff, mentioning both Bush and Mayo among others, but that "nobody's going to do anything about it." The scary part is he might be right.
I highly doubt USC would be that arrogant to do these things.
Very rarely is it actually the school itself that is guilty of improper benefits. It's almost always some overzealous booster/street agent that sidles up to the players and gives them gifts. When schools get nailed, it's generally for the "lack of institutional control" rule.
has to do is to prove that any official in the athletic department was AWARE of any wrong doing on the part of the athlete or the agent/third party and Bam!! they've got them. Any good investigator worth his salt will find an ex-employee with an axe to grind looking for payback for being fired, wrongfully terminated, or slighted in some way.
see how easy that was NCAA? but you don't hear me tho'
April 10th, 2009 at 12:00 AM ^
speaking of axes to grind, ive always wondered why there arent more stories out there about scandalous activity from the student-athletes themselves. say im 5-star recruit XYZ getting hounded by both osu and michigan. i come to michigan, therefore hate osu, wouldnt i be inclined to speak out about any caash money, cars, or hoez osu offered me?? there are thousands of students every year being recruited by schools, i cant believe more of them dont speak out...??
That's when the NCAA will suddenly find the wherewithal to lower the boom on USC. As long as the Trojans are on or near the top of the college football world, they bring in far too much money into the NCAA's coffers for that august organization to do anything to jeopardize the gravy train.
April 10th, 2009 at 12:22 AM ^
I think money is the reason OSU didn't get hammered for Maurice Clarett, either. The so-called technicality of him not saying it directly to an NCAA investigator doesn't wash.
If UM can vacate five seasons of basketball, USC and OSU can vacate a couple seasons each of football.
If USC is found to be in violation with Bush, does that mean UM didn't lose the Rose Bowl?
When teams vacate a win, the losing team doesn't have their record changed. The official record will list no winner and Michigan as a loser. I guess technically the Rose Bowl could declare those games a forfeit, but it is not happening.
By the way Chris Webber left Michigan after 1993, and I think every other player found to be taking money from Martin left by 1998, yet the NCAA didn't officially do anything about it until 2003. Maybe it's not a conspiracy, maybe they just take a while to do things?
As I noted above, the NCAA investigated us twice for Ed Martin: once in 1997, and again in 2002-03. In the first investigation, everyone clammed up and the NCAA couldn't prove any serious violations occurred, although it noted in the report that it was likely they occurred (which was enough to convince Goss that Fisher should be fired). We most likely would have never heard from them again over the scandal if the FBI weren't also after Martin. Under pressure from the feds, Martin and the four players had to testify. That gave the NCAA the evidence it had previously lacked, and it reopened the case.
Again, the thing people don't realize is that the NCAA does not have subpoena power. It can't force athletes to testify against their programs. The fact that it often looks impotent has nothing to do with them "not wanting" to punish certain programs and a lot more with them simply not being able to turn up evidence.
I think money is the reason OSU didn't get hammered for Maurice Clarett, either. The so-called technicality of him not saying it directly to an NCAA investigator doesn't wash.
I'm pretty sure Clarett was forbidden from ever playing again after his freshman season. What else was the NCAA supposed to do to him?
Do you think we should have gotten nailed for the Jamal Crawford situation? When it's one player, that one player usually gets punished. When it's multiple guys, the program gets called into question. The NCAA has established a pretty clear precedent here.
Clarett filed a fake police report, and then lied about it. That it is the extent of the punishable offenses he committed at OSU. Seeing as OSU didn't file the police report, I'm not sure where they should have been punished.