Open market football recruiting

Posted December 2nd, 2010 by Jack
Filed under: Feature, Football, Recruiting

The Cam Newton ruling is stunning to me. The NCAA says his father broke rules by shopping his son, but there’s absolutely nothing wrong for Cam to play stupid while boosters and Cecil Newton negotiated a private transaction. I sort of get their point – if the school itself and the player itself didn’t do anything improper, what the heck are they going to do about it?

Jadeveon Clowney is the top recruit in the country according to Rivals.com. He’s a bonecrushing 6’6″ defensive end from the Palmetto State that reminds scouts of Mario Williams, a former #1 pick in the NFL Draft and an All-Pro. Cownley hasn’t committed yet but has offers from 13 BCS conference schools from Alabama to South Carolina to all the way out West from Southern Cal. At this point, why commit to anyone? Just get your dad to contact each school’s booster club and get the best price. Rivals.com’s #3 prospect is a Virginia linebacker named Curtis Grant, who runs a 4.5 40 and is 6’3″, 222 as a high school senior. There’s 22 schools after Grant and he hasn’t made a decision. Why make any decision that doesn’t involve getting paid? Just let your parents get a media spanking from the NCAA and smile as they cash the check.

I guess it’s nice to know that Texas has one of the wealthiest alumni bases in America, but now we face an ethical decision. We share a conference with Oklahoma and Texas A&M – who have a long history of shady behavior and are going into the postseason while the Longhorns stay home this year. If Pandora’s box has indeed been opened – the Ags and the Sooners both will be at the front of the line with their checkbooks open. Texas can pay coordinators and position coaches more than the majority of head coaches in the FBS…but does any of that matter if OU and A&M start paying for five star athletes? Just because RC and Switzer aren’t running things doesn’t mean those alums went away.

There’s probably some 14 year old freshman phenom right now leading his team into the playoffs this weekend that will become the first million dollar recruit if his dad plays this system right. Coaches and scouts will flock to his games in 2014 watching him shred opponents while praying that their school’s rich alums and the phenom’s family can work out a deal behind their backs. As long as the athletic department stays ignorant and the recruit’s parents tell him where he’s going to school, this is deemed acceptable by the NCAA. He can roll onto his new campus in a 80K ride and have a 200K off campus condo if his parents bought it all for him, right?

All this talk about the NCAA closing this loophole is probably dumb. That says that they don’t want a filthy program like Auburn to get punished for THIS season. Auburn has faced sanctions a whopping 7 times since 1950. This is a quote from former Auburn president William Muse after the NCAA dropped the hammer on Auburn in 1993 for alums paying players: “If this program is to survive, there can be no more days like this one, intentional or unintentional.”

Guess you lucked out on this one, War Eagle. Can Reggie Bush have his Heisman back now?