Auburn pay for play

Submitted by MichFan1997 on

http://sportsbybrooks.com/

But McClover says there were money handshakes from boosters at other football camps too. At Auburn for a couple hundred dollars and at Michigan State. All the schools denied any wrongdoing. And things really started heating up a few months later when he went to Ohio State for an official visit where schools get a chance for one weekend to host prospective athletes. McClover says there were money handshakes from alumni there too. About a thousand dollars. And something else to entice him.

jlvanals

March 30th, 2011 at 11:36 AM ^

There is nothing illegal about paying a student to play college football.  While against NCAA by laws, that contract is 100% enforceable by a court unless they deem it "contrary  to public policy."  Whether a court would do that likely depends on the judge, but there would be a strong argument in favor of its enforcement as the players are the protected class (minors) who were promised something by an entity with superior barganing power (university).  The university should not be able to go back on a deal it made with full knowledge of its impropriety simply because it is expedient for the university.  There is a strong chace a court would enforce the terms of that contract.

st barth

March 30th, 2011 at 11:59 AM ^

Maybe not the NCAA's death penalty, but some of the rumours out of Auburn imply that the Board of Trustee's involvement in athletic & academic affairs might threaten the university's accreditation.  If that is lost, then it really doesn't even matter what the NCAA thinks.  Supposedly this will come out later after a Federal investigation of a banking-politics-gambling mess (that only incidentally includes funding for the Auburn pay-for-play shenanigans).

We'll just have to wait & see.

justingoblue

March 30th, 2011 at 1:14 PM ^

They're on accreditation probation right now, and only kept their accreditation in the first place with the Alabama Governor stepping in personally on their behalf.

Apparently the rigged slot machines could cost Auburn it's status as a school because they're owned by a member of the Board of Trustee's. I'm assuming that having an illegal gambling operation for the benefit of certain students isn't looked upon highly in the educational world, especially when a school is already on probation.

Lowder (the casino owner) is the one who got the school in trouble in the first place. So Auburn keeping him and then having a scandal like rigged slot machines come out would look bad for the accrediting body, to say the least.

BJNavarre

March 29th, 2011 at 8:57 PM ^

I'm not going to get too high and mighty because there could easily be some renegade boosters at Michigan doing cash handshakes. The difference with Auburn and maybe OSU is that there's some serious evidence that pay-for-play is systematic. Of course, the NCAA has decided to barely lift a finger in Auburn's case.

NateVolk

March 29th, 2011 at 9:35 PM ^

Can't stand the general idea that "everybody is doing it" or that a school that isn't under the gun shouldn't judge because chances are they are crooked too.  The NCAA just pieced through Michigan's athletic department for the second time in 10 years.  My guess is that anyone that had gotten a cash handshake like this would have surfaced or they would have found something.

GBOD79

March 29th, 2011 at 9:52 PM ^

How? If the booster keeps it from the AD how are they going to know? The players, would not be asked if they are receiving money from a booster since the investigation was for impermissable practice hours.

 

NCAA: "So how much have you practiced this week?"

Player: "20 hours, which is the legal limit"

NCAA: "Hmm ok good. By the way, have you received a cash handshake lately? Just curious"

BJNavarre

March 29th, 2011 at 10:07 PM ^

Additionally, when players do come out saying that they received cash handshakes, the school can easily defend itself by saying there's no proof, and the player just has a bone to pick with the university.

I'm not trying to make a "everyone's doing it" argument. My point is that there's very little the NCAA can do to stop cash handshakes, so we shouldn't be surprised if it's happening everywhere. Because it's so hard to catch anyone, it is essential that the NCAA comes down hard whenever a school gets caught attempting to pay a player or recruit. Unfortunately, their idiotic handling of Cam Newton is only going to make matters about 100 times worse.

 

TheLastHarbaugh

March 29th, 2011 at 8:51 PM ^

OMFG. If the NCAA doesn't strip Auburn of its BCS National Championship, and ban them from playing football for one year, then....you know what, they're really something else.

 

Zone Left

March 29th, 2011 at 10:38 PM ^

If you follow the link there is a poll that asks what would happen if both Tressel and Gee tried to fire each other. Ironically, the most bizarre answer given in the poll is also the most likely to happen (and the most popular answer):


Tressel and Gee are fired, and Lloyd Carr is hired to fill both positions (phenomenon known as SINGULARITY MAIZE)

I don't think Tressel survives this, and I wouldn't be surprised if Gee doesn't survive it either. He's a PR disaster.

 

 

Bodogblog

March 29th, 2011 at 10:58 PM ^

a turd swirling around that toilet bowl.  Whether Smith and Gee join him as trailing pooh logs is probably the subject of much jockeying and politicking.  I think there are too many unkowns about their involvement and (lack of) oversight to say right now.  If Smith knew, it will be hard to keep him around, NCAA darling or no.  I'd wager both make it out if they weren't involved.  OSU will consider the Tressel resignation payment in full.

Though Remo Gaggi (Casino) comes to mind: "Look... why take a chance?"

Ace: "And that's that."

MichiganMan2011

March 29th, 2011 at 9:27 PM ^

"The second segment focuses on "the money handshake" - the illicit payoffs talented players received to attend and stay at college sports factories. Stanley McClover, a former Auburn defensive end, talks about how he received not just cash but sexual services during a recruiting visit to Ohio State."

 

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/iteam/2011/03/hbos-real-sports-must-see-tv-for-final-four-viewers

BlueDragon

March 29th, 2011 at 10:43 PM ^

The sexual services at Auburn were a lot better.  *rimshot

 

The most interesting news from the segment comes from Rigo Nunez, a former UMass basketball forward who says many of the nation's top players planned a protest in 1995.

This is interesting. Remember the famous story about Mr. Webber walking past State Street shops selling $50 jerseys with his number on it, and the resentment the Fab 5 felt for not being compensated for their services?

"Well, how was that gonna happen?" Goldberg asked.
"We were not gonna play," Nunez said.
"What?"
"We were just gonna go to the middle of the court and sit down. Every game, in the whole country."
"Because you weren't getting paid?" Goldberg said.
"Because it was not fair to us," Nunez replied.

bronxblue

March 29th, 2011 at 9:28 PM ^

I fully expect (like most Auburn fans would admit) that the NC will be taken away from them sometime in the coming years, right after the NCAA is done cashing in that last advertising check they received from the bowl game.

Honestly, I don't even care what the NCAA does at this point - teams are going to cheat until they are caught, will accept the penalties and hide behind the sympathetic  "you are punishing kids who had nothing to do with this" angle, then rather-rinse-repeat in a decade.  People act surprised by the SEC is winning so much in football this past decade, how they manage to attract these top kids with shady pasts, how they manage to bring in 30+ student recruiting classes yet never exceed the scholarshhip limit, etc. and try to rationalize it away with demographic shifts and the natural "evolution" of football.  But the reality is that people may be "haterz", but only in the sense that they are playing with different rules, and until the NCAA does something legitimate (like ban an Alabama, Auburn, or LSU for a couple of years), you won't see this practice change.  

smwilliams

March 29th, 2011 at 9:55 PM ^

The problem with the NCAA is the fact that these are allegations.

These could be disgruntled players saying the craziest shit they can think of to get back at their former school or schools that dropped them during the recruitment process.

Not that I believe that, but still, there's no physical proof, no Tressel-esque e-mails that serve as concrete evidence something fishy is going on. There isn't even an incident like Mateen Cleaves being in Mo Taylor's car when it crashed to spur on an official investigation.

Unfortunately. Because it probably is going on at select institutions and it cheapens the game.

dahblue

March 29th, 2011 at 10:12 PM ^

I can't see the "sexual favors" as being a big deal.  Sure, that phrase makes for good television, but there's nothing wrong with a recruit getting some "attention" when he's on a visit.  I lived on a floor with lots of football players in South Quad (many moons ago) and recruits were routinely "entertained" by women of questionable virtue while on visits.

These weren't hookers or strippers...they were just relatively skanky girls, who lived in the dorm and were fond of football players.  If they were paid for, then there's an issue...but, as the  Geto Boys once said - you gotta let a ho be a ho.

Medic

March 29th, 2011 at 10:15 PM ^

But, I was illustrating the point that the whistle blower didn't have a bone to pick with OSU, so the whole jilted lover/ax grinder argument has no merit imo. Leave the sexual favors comment alone, and he STILL said he was getting $500 handshakes at OSU..

Tater

March 30th, 2011 at 11:13 AM ^

The NCAA always acts in their own self-interest.  Before, it was in their interest to let schools like USC and TSIO get away with stonewalling because it saved the NCAA the embarassment of having to suspend one of their "prestiege" programs. 

With the internet/information age reaching "adulthood," it is almost impossible to hide abuses on the scale of those at TSIO or any of many chronic rulebreakers anymore.  Consequently, it may now be in the best interests of the NCAA to continue to perpetuate shamateurism by making an example out of a big program. 

TSIO could be in some serious, serious trouble here.  The NCAA has a dilemma: continue to aid, abet, and enable TSIO's stonewalling or make an example out of them.  I think it may finally be time for door number two.

Leaders_and_Best

March 30th, 2011 at 1:03 PM ^

another article lists the other benefits at Colombus as "sexual favors," now when I think of sexual favors on a recruiting trip I think of Jesus Shuttlesworth banging two white girls, so I think OSU can cook up something a little better. 

In other NCAA compliance news it seems like Dez Bryant is getting into a reggie bush-like situation:

somewhere T. Boone Pickens is crying....or paying Bryant's bills