levon1975 wrote:

I would bet there were a lot of favors called in by the NCAA, LSU, and Arizona alums, to persuade the FBI to go easy on the coaches, the NCAA, and the universities. When the assistant coaches were allowed to take the rap, and even their sentences were minimal; I knew the fix was in!  If they wanted the assistant coaches to sing like birds, they would have threatened them with much stiffer sentences; then you woudl have gotten some interesting dirt on the big-name Head Coaches.

The NCAA has a lot of political clout because it generates a lot of revenue; so it can rely of Senators and Congressmen for protection.  They benefit by allowing these coaches to pay the big-name stars to play a year in the NCAA before going pro.  It enhances the product, and ends up making their big money-maker the NCAA basketball tournament more attractive.  If elite players aren't paid thees large sums to spend one year on a college campus they would be more likely to challenge the system that requires them to do so.  That would certainly bring changes to the "one and done" system.  The NBA which supports and condones that system also benefits from the publicity surrounding these star players who spend one year in college.  The publicity they receive in this one year is priceless, and makes them household names before they are drafted.   It also fits well into, what I call the ESPN model for modern sports, which is the "star system" rather than the "team" system.  ESPN realized early-on that it was to their benefit to focus on, and create "stars' in each sport because they are much more marketable than the team itself. This altered the structure of sports, to the point that the team is secondary, and we are seeing the results in all major money generating sports. 

So why disrupt all of that by cracking down on payments to high school players?  They will try and defend this practice by invoking the theme that "the players should be getting a cut of the profits" and why should they play for tuittion, room and board, and expenses; but, this is a ridiculous defense for huge bribery payments to a select few players while all of the others play for the minimum.  You want to pay players, fine; bring it out of the dark alley,  open up the bank vault and pay them all! 

Paying players isn't illegal. It's against NCAA rules, but NCAA rules aren't laws. Now, there are side issues like taxes, but simply paying players itself is no crime.

duq81 wrote:

levon1975 wrote:

I would bet there were a lot of favors called in by the NCAA, LSU, and Arizona alums, to persuade the FBI to go easy on the coaches, the NCAA, and the universities. When the assistant coaches were allowed to take the rap, and even their sentences were minimal; I knew the fix was in!  If they wanted the assistant coaches to sing like birds, they would have threatened them with much stiffer sentences; then you woudl have gotten some interesting dirt on the big-name Head Coaches.

The NCAA has a lot of political clout because it generates a lot of revenue; so it can rely of Senators and Congressmen for protection.  They benefit by allowing these coaches to pay the big-name stars to play a year in the NCAA before going pro.  It enhances the product, and ends up making their big money-maker the NCAA basketball tournament more attractive.  If elite players aren't paid thees large sums to spend one year on a college campus they would be more likely to challenge the system that requires them to do so.  That would certainly bring changes to the "one and done" system.  The NBA which supports and condones that system also benefits from the publicity surrounding these star players who spend one year in college.  The publicity they receive in this one year is priceless, and makes them household names before they are drafted.   It also fits well into, what I call the ESPN model for modern sports, which is the "star system" rather than the "team" system.  ESPN realized early-on that it was to their benefit to focus on, and create "stars' in each sport because they are much more marketable than the team itself. This altered the structure of sports, to the point that the team is secondary, and we are seeing the results in all major money generating sports. 

So why disrupt all of that by cracking down on payments to high school players?  They will try and defend this practice by invoking the theme that "the players should be getting a cut of the profits" and why should they play for tuittion, room and board, and expenses; but, this is a ridiculous defense for huge bribery payments to a select few players while all of the others play for the minimum.  You want to pay players, fine; bring it out of the dark alley,  open up the bank vault and pay them all! 

Paying players isn't illegal. It's against NCAA rules, but NCAA rules aren't laws. Now, there are side issues like taxes, but simply paying players itself is no crime.

There has been in the past, that, aside from scholarships, these, mostly poor, athlete/students, often go to bed at night with far less to maintain themselves daily, and food, then their paying classmates.  No support from home, if they had a home, just the amount provides per NCAA rules, and that's about it.  Don't tell me about the Blue-Chip Players being treated like royalty, 95 percent of the players are role players with little help. It's not a good system. 

levon1975 wrote:

Bribery is illegal!

Would be hard to prove this as bribery. The FBI should have better things to do than this. This has been going on since the 1880s, and was much worse at certain times in the past.
 

I agree when he said if it was Cleveland State or Western Michigan in Louisville’s position then they would get a death sentence to their program. I’ve always felt like if Duquesne were to do what UNC did years ago with fraudulent student grades then our program would be put on probation in some way or form. But since it was UNC they didn’t even get a slap on the wrist. It’s easy to understand why because the amount revenue that they bring to college basketball with Jordan, ticket sales, television revenue. Why would they take that away from March madness.