Will Wade is probably not okay
So uhhh, the wiretapped phone call of Will Wade (LSU bball coach) is certainly something. He's clearly talking about compensation to players and their families in the ballpark of NBA minimum salary "for a two or three year kid." Can't imagine what clear lottery one-and-done types get then.
Link to ESPN story on it.
Pretty damning stuff.
"GREAT OT WIN LAST NIGHT WILL! (don't worry about that story, we'll bankroll your defense). Oh...you gotta testify....who are you?"
-LSU Booster
I was debating posting this. Basketball recruiting is so ugly. LSU is 25-5 this season. If it seems too good to be true it probably is. I'm glad we don't have to worry about this stuff.
Yeah, I debated as well. Chose to because of how slow the last couple days have been. I feel for the players and their families. One and done is clearly not the solution anyone wants or needs, and a lot of these players are impoverished and looking for any opportunity to change that. The real problem is the NCAA and the ADs and Coaches who aren't sticking up for their student athletes. Instead they are talking about them like ... that. Not good.
Whether the players are impoverished or not is irrelevant. The players could simply wait another year or 2, etc to get their $$$. We are a country of laws and these players and families should be charged with the appropriate crimes, including income tax evasion. That would stop a lot of the NCAA nonsense and give clean schools such as (assuming) UM a level field to play on. I'm surprised that no one has implicated the head coaches (looking at you, Coach K, Williams, Self and others) to avoid jail time.
Coach Self is dirty, they all are. Speaking to one of their “ Friends of the program” and seeing him smirk and claim coach self didn’t know anything about it and was a victim while laughing made me sick. They are all dirty and it’s a joke to them. Plausible deniability.
I was debating posting this too but then asked the question why debate this? I can’t even make topics
I'm sure Tulane is about it get hammered with the Death Penalty for a player accepting $5 to get school supplies.
You can never trust these small schools.
Paraphrasing the late, great Jerry Tarkanian, "the NCAA got so mad at Kentucky, they put Cleveland State on probation for 3 years."
Watched a little of the recent LSU game and had this vague memory of a very young LSU team defeating us in a Hawaii early season tourney a few years ago. I think that was Wade's first year at LSU. I haven't kept track, but I assume this year's LSU team is led by that core of youngsters who beat us? If so, he's received good returns from his player investments.
That was last year.
Yup. I just looked it up and was amazed to discover we played them last year. Wow. That seems like such a distant memory.
I believe Eli Brooks was starting over Z(X)avier at that point. Those two have went in very different directions since then.
I'd argue the directions they took were the same. The only difference is one took a rocket ship and the other a ladder.
Eli has regressed. He looks like he is playing with zero confidence. He is passing up open shots and when he does shoot, he’s tentative. There’s no fluidity to his shot leading to misses that aren’t even close.
Agreed, hes been awful. He's something like 3/21 since early Jan., and there have been some uggggly shots in there. Hes flat out airballed some relatively good looks.
...and i bet a couple of those makes were layups
Tark died? Who's next...Keith Jackson?
Lmfao god damnit. I was reading the serious discussion above and just went to the next post and lost my shit when I read this comment. Also didn’t know Tark died, but the Keith Jackson comment got me gotted
not only that, but both the titanic and the hindenberg got waxed. bad.
So who thinks this turns into an actual thing and doesn't just float off like a fart in the wind?
...
...
*crickets, wind blows, tumbleweed rolls by...*
honestly though.... such a sad state of affairs. The dude is on a fuckin wire tap, and we all think nothing is going to happen.
Just mind blowing
"Faaaart in the wind...
All we are is fart in the wind."
Appropriate band...
If the wind is swirling, would the fart come back, boomerang-style?
Just SO shocking you'd see this from LSU.
Duke bought Zion's family a house, but it's Duke so it's fine. Recruiting is awesome.
Proof? Not that I think Duke is clean, but I'm pretty sure the NCAA couldn't explain that away like they did the UNC cheating scandal.
The NCAA can explain away anything it likes. And does. Every day.
....and the things which cannot be readily explained will merely be tacked on to Wake Forest's pending severe reduction in scholarships and add to evidence of their lack of institutional control.
I’m still trying to wrap my head around how Miami, the U, got off with all the cocaine and hookers for the recruits. I was naive enough back then to think the NCAA actually cared and didn’t know how corrupt and impotent they were.
Are you saying you don't think that Duke did provide such housing? Because I think the smoke is pretty thick on that one.
I don't follow hoops recruiting outside of whoever we're targeting. Again, nothing surprises me. Just hadn't seen any info on housing.
Well from Chris Duhon, to Corey Maggette, to Lance Thomas, the NCAA has quite the history of looking the other way on shady business from Duke.
There are recorded conversations from Kansas recruiting Zion. They make it clear that to get Zion, you need to get his family a house.
Maybe there is way more to the tape, but did I miss the part where he implicated himself?
This is mostly quotes from the FBI tape as reported by ESPN. This is pretty strong evidence that he committed a crime and since they're his own words, he is clearly implicating himself:
"Dude," Wade continued during the call, "I went to [the handler] with a [expletive] strong-ass offer about a month ago. [Expletive] strong.
"The problem was, I know why he didn't take it now. It was [expletive] tilted toward the family a little bit. It was tilted toward taking care of the mom, taking care of the kid. Like it was tilted towards that. Now I know for a fact he didn't explain everything to the mom. I know now, he didn't get enough of the piece of the pie in the deal."
"It was a [expletive] hell of a [expletive] offer," Wade continued. "Hell of an offer. ... Especially for a kid who is going to be a two- or three-year kid."
In a different telephone call with Dawkins, Wade joked that the player would be compensated more than the "rookie minimum."
Wade told Dawkins that he had made deals for "as good of players as him" that were "a lot simpler than this."
A crime, or a violation of NCAA bylaws? Very different things.
Not a lawyer, but I would think almost certainly both. The person paying the money would owe taxes on it (the giver must pay taxes on large gifts)*. I'm guessing a coach involved in arranging the payments under the table would have criminal liability for conspiracy in the tax evasion.
* Technically, the giver would not necessarily actually owe taxes, because there is a $5.6 million lifetime exemption (which is doubled for couples) to gift taxes. However, any 2018 gift over $15,000 per person would need to be reported to the IRS so they can track the lifetime limit.
Conspiracy to commit bribery is a federal crime. In full disclosure, I am an attorney, but don't practice in the criminal area. That said, the elements of the crime are all present. It's just a matter of whether the U.S. attorney's office believes there's enough evidence to convict, or if they want to pursue charges. They could also use him as a pawn to turn on bigger fish or to serve as a witness in other cases that they believe are more important.
Can someone just please blow this conference up? first it was football then it was baseball possibility softball , all of a sudden that conference became the power conference overtaking the UCLA's, Arizona's and Arizona State's and then basketball. well I guess Kentucky always did
And Tennessee football magical is now getting all the 5 stars...
Personally, I don't give a rip about bball. But, it's pretty frustrating that only one team north of the Mason-Dixon line has won a college football NC in the last 22 years (OSU), and that was no accident either. I'm so sick of the NC being Clemson & Bama, with a bit of FSU, LSU, FLA, & Aub sprinkled in once in a while (and USC & Texas a few years earlier). It's not one bit surprising that those are the same schools most talked about being dirty with UGA & UT quickly making moves in that direction. I don't know what the answer is. Allowing the B1G to follow SEC trends? Only 8 conference games and no P5 non-conference games? Lobby to get rid of amateurism?
And if yesterday's Bracketology holds true, wasn't LSU in MSU's side of the bracket?and one of the tougher teams in that bracket
Yikes!
Here's a twitter link to a video of him being interviewed during a fan luncheon when the story dropped. His facial reactions say a lot.
He looks like he wants to run away. Makes me feel a little sorry for him.
The problem I have is, yes the coaches are swarmy dudes but the athletic departments and the AD's know what's going on it's just the SEC and a way of life
You're nicer than I am. I enjoy his discomfort immensely.
He does look like someone would who just heard the most devastating news possible. Damn.
Love the commenter just below who asks if they can't just get off his eggplant and let LSU have its moment of basketball glory.
In a world where almost everyone is corrupt you just accuse everyone else of hypocrisy when you get called out. Nice. Scary.
I always figured recruits committed to LSU because of the academics...