NER: Tempest

On the latest New Era Radio ... would you rather experience a hurricane or an earthquake? Talking Lakers basketball with Mike Trudell and UCLA football with senior RB Johnathan Franklin; is it too early to start playing Christmas music?

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New Era Radio: Good, Bad and Ugly

On the latest show ... the guys debate the true intention of the NCAA's sanctions on Penn State. Plus, NFL players behaving badly and could the 2012 Olympic men's basketball team really take down the Dream Team?

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NCAA Denies USC Appeal

It took four months, but the NCAA has finally spoken in regards to USC's appeal of the sanctions levied in light of the investigations in Reggie Bush and Todd McNair. USCFootball.com was the first to report that the appeal was completely denied.

The Trojans football team will be allowed to sign no more than 15 players to scholarships for the next three seasons (against a top limit of 25 for schools not under sanction).

And of even more immediate impact, USC would not be able to compete for the first-ever Pac-12 championship or appear in the first-ever postseason championship game in 2011 as well. 

Of further concern, the NCAA's unprecedented additional sanction allowing players affected by the postseason ban this year to immediately transfer to another institution without sitting out a season would still be in play for this year's seniors.

The school is unable to comment until the decision has been released to the public, which is expected to happen on Thursday.  There had been some hope that at least a portion of the appeal would be accepted in light of lesser punishments handed out to Auburn and Ohio State after recent infractions. However it appears that the NCAA will stand by their apparent decision to make an example of one of its marquee programs run amok.

Congratulations to the NCAA for finding the gumption to finally drop the hammer on one of its major programs for being caught in the act of major infractions. But with Jim Tressel being caught allegedly hiding violations and Cecil Newton shopping his kid out to at least one school, maybe consistency should be the next thing to work on.

Big 10 Conf Says "Play For Pay!"

Maybe something good will actually come out of the the whole Ohio State fiasco as the Big 10 Conference said on Friday that, there is a possibility that the conference could pay athletes beyond their scholarship checks.
Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany admits the conference has discussed cutting athletes a monthly check to help with their living expenses. This coming from a conference that is having a world of controversy dealing with the "Pristine" Coach Jim Tressel and the "Tattoo 5".
By paying players something you hope to curve the appetite for going to outside sources to get extra income. Delaney will like to some how bridge the gap between scholarship and needs to live in today's economy.

However, Detroit Free Press sports columnist Drew Sharp says players aren't taking money just to make ends meet.

"Athletes do no accept cash that they're not supposed to because they're trying to make ends meet. They're accepting the money because they feel they are entitled to this, because they have people telling them 24/7 you're being taken advantage of. You're basically a slave making all this cash for the man in the Big House there and you're getting nothing but crumbs," said Sharp.

http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/dpp/news/andrea_isom/should-big-ten-athletes-get-paid-question-mark-20110520-wpms

Whatever the outcome of this whole ordeal, I do believe college athletes do need to be paid more than their scholarship checks in some way or fashion. I had a brother who played at Nebraska and they pretty much paid for everything for him, food;travel gear; medical care;tuition and so on so forth. What they didn't pay for was his rent;food for the house;clothes to wear for everyday;rent and money just going out be a college kid.
It's a problem that will never be solved but it can be derailed in some sort of fashion.

Report: BCS Watchdog Was Previously A BCS Lapdog

Southern Miss AD Richard Giannini
reportedly took a cruise from Orange
Bowl organizers

It appears that Bowl Championship Series officials are trying to do what legions of fans and legislators couldn't...take down the Bowl Championship Series.

On the heels of an eye-opening report about graft and largesse surrounding the organizers of the Fiesta Bowl, comes a report from Yahoo's Dan Wetzel that the BCS has created a task force to investigate potential illegalities surrounding the other BCS bowls.

So who better to put on that task force than someone who took advantage of some of that glad-handing?

Giannini, the task-force member, was one of more than 40 administrators (plus spouses, of course) who accepted the Orange Bowl’s “complimentary getaway” to the Caribbean in June. He was pretty much just following the crowd. (He has not responded to attempts seeking comment). 

According to records obtained by PlayoffPAC, there wasn’t a single business meeting scheduled for the entire trip. The brochure did note that attendees would have time for things like a day on the private island of CocoCay, which “offers activities for everyone, from parasailing to sipping delicious ‘Coco Locos’ on a hammock.”

Of course now we're left to wonder not if the rest of the bowls are shady, but how shady they actually are. Something has to be going on to keep wretched games like the Hawaii Bowl and the Meineke Car Care Bowl afloat. It certainly ain't ticket sales.

Wait, let me rephrase. Schools have ticket guarantees they have to hit, so the bowl organizers are pretty much taken care of whether fans show up or not. Isn't it just a little curious that the attendance for all of these bowl games is exactly or close to the capacity of the stadium?

So while most of the college fooball-watching public has been clamoring for a way to slice up the golden egg so everyone can get a piece, The Powers That Be have had their hands firmly around the neck of the goose.

Episode 20: The Player President

This week...we remember No-to-ri-o-us (you know the rest) and flash back on the '90s; wonder if the NCAA will have the stones to drop the hammer on Jim Tressel and Ohio State and Cacique gives the Gas Face to Tiki Barber.

In honor of Biggie, this week's show comes with a parental advisory sticker.

Sunday Reading: Will the NCAA Make An Example of Oregon?

Sandwiched in between the minute-by-minute updates of the NFL's labor negotiations, breakdown of the BYU Honor Code and the start of college basketball's conference tournaments have been reports that the NCAA is showing an interest in the recruiting practices for the University of Oregon's football program.

Just in case you hadn't heard - and considering most of America's media has been swimming in Charlie Sheen's Tiger Blood all week, it's understandable - the short version of the story is that Oregon paid $28,000 to two men with close ties to a pair players who committed to the school. The university says the money was paid for recruiting services, including video tapes of the players. You can read about it in-depth here.

Oregon has been forthcoming about its payment of the middle men involved in the story. Since the expenditures can be found on the state's website, it's pretty hard to deny it. On the surface it all looks pretty shady, but whether any NCAA rules were broken isn't clear.

But as George Schroeder of the Register-Guard points out, this could be the beginning of some uncertain times in Eugene.

When it comes to the NCAA, this isn’t so much about hammering Oregon. The Ducks have simply provided the opening the NCAA has been waiting for: the chance to send a message about the expanding influence of street agents in football recruiting.

At best, Oregon is guilty of nothing more than being bad comparison shoppers. Anyone involved in any aspect of college recruiting (or just anyone with good sense) will tell you that paying $25,000 for tapes is ludicrous. But financial irresponsibility isn't necessarily against NCAA rules.

What is against the rules is paying someone considered to be a street agent to funnel athletes to your institution. In the worst case scenario, that's what Oregon could be found guilty of. It's a possibility that gains legitimacy when the mother of one of the players in question expresses concern that the man her son considered a friend and mentor was paid by the school he eventually chose.

In between the two extremes is a large, murky Purgatory of NCAA investigation. As Schroeder points out (and as any USC fan can tell you), it's hard for any athletic department to hold up under deep NCAA scrutiny. Even if Oregon is cleared of any of these latest recruiting issues, what else might come up in a deep investigation.

But there is another issue at work. The scourge of street agents and AAU coaches has left a stain on college basketball recruiting and appears to be spreading to football. As such, the NCAA believes it has a chance to nip the problem in the bud. That could mean bad news to the people in Eugene (and College Station, Clemson and elsewhere). If there is a touch of impropriety, does the infraction committee drop the hammer on the schools involved?

This time, Lyles delivers NCAA's full attention

With the ongoing investigation into Cam Newton's recruitment to Auburn (and other places), the potential of having the BCS runner-up under scrutiny is the last thing college football needs.

Could the Longhorn Network's deal with Time Warner Cable Hurt UT's Non-Profit Status?

Mack Brown may hook a few more recruits

Right on the heels of Comcast's recent purchase of NBC Universal, the as-yet-unnamed Texas Longhorns television network may end up with some cable operator parentage of its own.

Sports Business Journal reported on Monday that Time Warner Cable is in talks to purchase as much as a 20 percent ownership stake in the new channel, set to launch in September. ESPN, which agreed to a 20-year, $300 million agreement with university will produce programming for the channel.

The announcement spurred huge reaction across the country with commentators wondering if this meant the beginning of the end of conference football as we know it or whether the school was running the risk of committing any number of potential recruting violations.

But a statement in the SBJ story may have an unintended impact on any similar deals going forward:

A deal with Time Warner Cable is essential for the unnamed channel’s distribution because TWC is the state’s dominant cable operator, with close to 2 million subscribers, according to Media Business Corp. In addition to being a UT corporate sponsor, TWC has wired the university for cable and broadband services, and it has a system that covers the state capital, Austin.

The immediate arguments are the complaints regarding lack of programming competition that many critics of the Comcast deal initially raised. Certainly with Time Warner Cable controlling such a large market share in the state of Texas and potentially having a vested interest in the success and visibility of Longhorn sports, there is reason for Texas A&M, Texas Tech and Baylor to be a touch worried about how much airtime they'll get.

UT AD Deloss Dodds is a game-changer

But a longer-term issue could be how the revenue gained by UT may be classified and whether it affects the school's nonprofit status. A May 2009 report by the Congressional Budget Office studied revenues earned by Division I universities - broken down in terms of commercial and non-commercial revenue and whether it came from inside or outside the athletic department - and aimed to determine whether the tax breaks many colleges received gave them an unfair advantage to pursue commercial interests.

The study concluded that at the Division I-A level, a number of athletic departments were closer to commercial enterprises than non-profit institutions of higher learning. However the CBO also stated that even though the continuation of such tax exemptions amount to a federal subsidy and could "encourage an 'arms race' between schools", most universities would be able to find loopholes that would enable them to avoid any real taxation through athletic department earnings.

Yet the CBO makes an evaluation that that might give pause to some ardent Bevo backers:

When athletic departments function primarily as a part of the educa­tional experience for students, they participate in that nonprofit market. However, highly competitive college sports teams with large-capacity stadiums and prime-time television events with advertising are more reasonably considered participants in the market for entertainment. They compete for entertainment spending with many other recreational options, but their most direct competi­tors are professional sports leagues.

UT has said its channel will feature non-sporting events like coverage of lectures and visiting speakers as well as commencement ceremonies. The same will likely apply to BYU's forthcoming network. While those academic appetizers provide some cover from critics, the main course that has networks and some cable operators salivating is football with men's basketball for dessert.

ESPN has already heard its share of criticism about becoming such a prominent partner with one school - a refrain the network has dealt with more often in recent years with their controversial coverage of supposedly "favored" athletes like LeBron James and Ben Roethlisberger. But with a cable distributor in the mix, the situation gets even stickier.

The Big 12 conference still has another year left on its deal with Fox Sports Net, meaning there will likely still be some even distribution amongst coverage of the competing schools. However, the ABC/ESPN contract runs through 2015-16. With ESPN and Time Warner being so closely tied to Texas, will fans of the rest of the conference see just enough of their teams to keep them from jumping to satellite?

If so, does that put Texas in direct competition with other university athletic departments? It's also a question that may be asked to a lesser degree of Notre Dame. Currently the Irish's deal with Comcast-NBC is for home football games only, but if the Longhorns' network proves to be profitable, you can bet Fighting Irish TV is sure to follow.

Here's the rub: Major League Baseball was granted an antitrust exemption allowing it to be a monopoly. The NFL enjoys a partial antitrust exemption. Still franchises in both of those leagues must still pay taxes. If a university is allowed to keep it tax exempt, non-profit status yet run its athletic department as a business it creates a competitive imbalance not just for the other schools in its respective conference or region, but for other entities competing for the same entertainment dollar.

If Texas, Notre Dame, BYU or potentially Oklahoma (which is reportedly pursuing its own TV deal) can claim much of the same advertising, ticket and merchandising revenue as the New York Yankees or Dallas Cowboys, should they also be able to solicit donations from boosters with the added incentive of making those donations tax-deductible?

I'm in no way advocating for Congress to get involved with legislating television contracts for college sports. Goodness knows they have far more important things they need to spend their time on. But with fans clamoring for the NCAA to take a closer look at its model of big revenue schools making billions off amateur athletes and consumers concerned about media consolidation narrowing wide market access, this could be a story to keep an eye on.

BCS Title Game Offers Up More NCAA Hypocrisy

As Auburn and Oregon prepare to play for a BCS Championship and talk of Cam Newton's suspect recruitment and eligibility crank up as one of the game's subplots, the good people of the NCAA continue to spit in the eyes of every college football player and fan.

Here is it, the BCS edition of the Cam Newton jersey for sale at a souvenir stand in Glendale, Arizona before the game for $125 a pop. 

Somewhere A.J. Green is beating his head against a wall.

(H/T to Clay Travis)

Did Jim Tressel Extort the Buckeye 5?

For Ohio State, January 4th can't get here soon enough. It began with the story that five players were suspended for receiving extra benefits, followed by an NCAA eligibility ruling that raised many an eyebrow. Then yesterday, a report surfaced that Sugar Bowl officials lobbied Ohio State and the NCAA to make players eligible for the bowl game.

Today, came this tweet from Adam Jardy of Buckeye Sports Bulletin:

According to a report from the Columbus Dispatch, Tressel told the quintet that they "have to make any decision based on the future and (leaving early for the) NFL prior to us leaving for our bowl game." He added that it would be unfair for any of the group to play in the game, then head for the NFL.

But it's fair to hold their decision hostage? If you're going to punish the players, then punish them...and recognize that sometimes doing the right thing means hurting your team in the process.

Mind you, there's nothing stopping the players from filing their NFL draft paperwork immediately after the bowl game. Considering how this latest incident has shown how blatantly they're being used as revenue streams for their university and bowl organizers, I wouldn't blame them if they did just that. Then again, we all know how vindictive Ohio sports fans can be when they feel wronged.