December 21, 2011

I am giving up college sports as my new years' resolution. I can no longer deal with how dirty every aspect is.

posted by scully at 09:24 AM on December 21, 2011

Guess Ohio State must bring more revenue to the NCAA than USC.

The prospect of two Ohio State-Michigan games a year? Ka-ching.

posted by etagloh at 11:27 AM on December 21, 2011

I think the answer is more in the area of the same anti-West Coast bias that pervades American sports hierarchy and media.

I think it's less a bias than it was the NCAA's desire to look like they were actually doing something. When USC's violations came down the pike, the NCAA had the chance to say, "We will not stand for this, and we are willing to sacrifice this huge, heralded, money-making program to show the world that we are serious."

But they forgot that no one would A) be able to change their program's ethics on a dime (a lot of the Buckeyes' violations were before the USC sanctions were handed down), and B) think they would get caught anyway. So when a bigger (by number of people, by school hierarchy involvement) scandal popped up in Ohio, they quickly realized that a proportionate response would be perilously close to the death penalty -- and then Miami happened, and they realized that there was no way they couldn't give that school the death penalty unless they just gave up entirely. So you'll hear a lot about how "every case is decided individually" and "this is a whole new regime," and Oregon will get a slap on the wrist and everyone will just agree to forget about that spike in enforcement in 2010.

posted by Etrigan at 12:52 PM on December 21, 2011

I think it's less a bias than it was the NCAA's desire to look like they were actually doing something.

Yeah, I think this is the obvious explanation. The NCAA's M.O. has been to make an example out of one relatively high-profile school that's looking a bit too big for its boots every so often to show that they Mean Business, but deliver wrist-slaps in the intervening years, because if they actually Meant Business, then the billion-dollar business that is college football would be out of business.

posted by etagloh at 01:51 PM on December 21, 2011

one might be able to realize that the infractions and paths of investigations of the USC and OSU situations have pretty much nothing in common

We're not talking about one school that gave its athletes grades for no work and another school that bought hookers for recruits. We're talking about one school where a player's family took money and the NCAA said the program should have known vs. a school where several players took money and the program did know. That's more than "pretty much nothing."

The only dimension in which the USC infractions appear to be larger than the OSU infractions was (maybe) total amount of money. And yet, in every dimension of the sanctions save one -- a show-cause penalty of a guy that no college will hire anyway -- USC got hit harder.

Yes, the problem is with the whole system.

One can hold this position while still recognizing that any comparison of the violations and the penalties leans heavily toward USC having gotten the sharp end of the stick.

posted by Etrigan at 03:04 PM on December 21, 2011

I'm not familiar with what self-imposed sanctions USC placed on itself, but could that be the reason for the perceived difference in penalty?

USC never self-sanctioned over l'affaire Bush. Many in the college football media world have put forth the theory that the reason the NCAA came down so hard was USC's insistence that they shouldn't be expected to monitor their players' families -- had they shown a little remorse, regardless of whether they felt it, the punishment would have been more in line with what OSU got.

And the situations were more Honeycrisp-and-McIntosh than apples-and-oranges -- players got money, there was a single point of failure in the monitoring system, and there's plenty of "the system is rotten to the core" to go around.

posted by Etrigan at 03:56 PM on December 21, 2011

there's plenty of "the system is rotten to the core" to go around.

Agreed there. As a Buckeyes fan, on one hand I can't help but feel a bit betrayed by Tressel and his facade of law and order; on the other, I think it was just their turn to get caught. I guess I've come to the conclusion that it's impossible to embrace big time college football without employing a certain amount of moral relativism.

posted by tahoemoj at 05:27 PM on December 21, 2011

Egg nog alert: I named Penn State players rather than Ohio State players in my post above. Apologies.

posted by beaverboard at 08:01 PM on December 21, 2011

To the Ohio St. fans that for some reason cannot see how USC fans would be upset by the relatively small penalty the Buckeyes received compared to USC let me make a somewhat extreme analogy for you. A parent discovers that their kid has been cooking up and selling meth out of the parent's home; the parent stops the practice on the spot. What should the parent do next? Call the authorities or help the kid get rid of the lab? One of these universities called the police and got the equivalent of a manslaughter conviction. The other tried to cover it up, and got a Paris Hilton style DUI. For those of you who will say, "It wasn't the university it was Tressell." A university hires a coach to be the representative of that institution, in other words: In all things Buckeye Football, Tressell was the Ohio State University.

posted by booda_lama at 12:44 PM on December 22, 2011

Weren't USC's violations concerning Reggie Bush much more severe than OSU's "tattoos for jerseys" violations?

Terrelle Pryor is known to have received tens of thousands of dollars in cash for memorabilia and for hanging out with guys who had money to throw around. Reggie Bush's family got about $300K, which figure includes use of a house, and Reggie himself got a limo ride to the 2005 Heisman ceremony (not the one where he won).

Twenty-seven other Buckeyes (then-current and former) were implicated in the original SI story. If you go by sheer scale, then probably the total value of the cash and services received by all those people may or may not exceed $300K. But really, by the time you get past amounts of money that come in stacks you can count, is the total amount the issue?

posted by Etrigan at 03:59 PM on December 22, 2011

You're a better man than I, tahoe, but I can't let some of this silliness slide. Just as one example, Twenty-seven other Buckeyes (then-current and former) were implicated in the original SI story ... In your world, I should be able to get the NCAA to impose some wonderfully horrific sanctions on Michigan by simply tossing out here (since that would approximate the level of journalism put forth by SI and ESPN throughout this debacle) that "all signs point toward Brady Hoke and no less than 41 players being involved in a black market organ harvesting ring". There, that looks good to me, and no matter what the NCAA proves, since this is the starting point, that should really screw Michigan.

The original allegations, errr rumors, such as what you're trying to pass off as fact, were unfounded and don't appear in the NCAA findings - heck a couple players so vehemently denied them and had proof to the contrary, that they considered defamation lawsuits. But if that helps your case to belabor the "woe is me" for USC, have at it (a USC program, who contrary to a previous post, was not at all cooperative, which according to some reports helped add to their penalty). Tressel royally fucked up, OSU had a hand in it, USC got the screws put to them, and we can all agree that the NCAA has some "sham-iness" to it. But, this hand-wringing over OSU's supposed hand-slap is near comical.

This thread has degenerated into a couple OSU fans vs a couple anti-USC fans, and that's not what SpoFi is about (unless the Red Sox and Yankees are being discussed ... I kid, I kid), so I'll try to bow out and will be visiting my therapist about that "let it go" thing.

posted by littleLebowski at 08:57 PM on December 22, 2011

I don't care if a sports story is "extensively reported" by you, me or SI ... I don't care if a story on childhood obesity is "extensively reported" by an 8-year-old or the American Academy of Pediatrics ... Oh, if only "reported" = "true". If the stories are "extensively wrong", can't be substantiated by anyone including a governing body and are even proven incorrect - no matter the source, they're all essentially flaming bags of crap. But, if you want to cite it as gospel despite the facts as they are known, I can't stop you.

And I'm at a loss how a statement such as "Tressel royally fucked up" can be interpreted as somehow minimizing his fault or trying to absolve anyone of anything? HE tried to cite mitigating factors, not me or anyone else in this thread. Everything you then soapboxed points to Tressel completely fucking up with intent - no argument from me, so what exactly are we debating there?

I've admitted to being an OSU fan, while talking about a level of fault on the university's part and refusing to be a Tressel apologist. On the other hand, just maybe, could your allegiances be the source of your biased FPP headline and your vitriol on this one?

GODDAMMIT, Kansas. I went to USC and Michigan, and you have to hire Weis into the Big 12 so I can't see either of my teams tune up on him every year?

posted by Etrigan at 11:23 AM on December 09

I don't think the scenarios are remotely similar, but I feel for innocent USC players and fans stuck with the lingering penalties and we're in agreement the NCAA has real issues overall. But like a friend said, even though I've been guilty of it, it's a 5-year-old's tactic of "yeah, I broke the vase, but sister didn't clean her room either and you didn't ground her as much." USC complaining about OSU is like OSU complaining about Auburn, Miami or Oregon. We can debate about the inequality of the "crimes" all we want ... every situation is different in some way, but if you don't eff up in the first place, then there's no debate about your punishment.

I said I'd TRY to bow out ....

posted by littleLebowski at 01:27 AM on December 23, 2011

The headline takes an editorial viewpoint that's pro-USC. Given the link you used, something like "USC Fans Question Ohio State Punishment" probably would have been less questioned.

I have trouble getting worked up about controversies like this because I have no faith in the NCAA to be consistent and fair. The way they enforce their rules on big-name programs is a crapshoot. It's like hoping for equitable treatment from FIFA.

posted by rcade at 09:10 AM on December 23, 2011