TDG News 10-5-07
Here is TDG News #2. Wow what a ton of stuff. Also attached are the minutes from the most recent executive
committee conference call. You are welcome to comment on any item. Please take a look as we are pushing forward
on many new/old initiatives which I will detail more and more in the future.
Enjoy the news—especially this article by Spencer Tillman of CBS news.
Keep up the fight!!!
Dave
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You can't go wrong with intellectual investing
Spencer Tillman, CBS Sports, 2 October 2007
I read your comments about last week's column: Dollars and Sense. Your thoughts are appreciated and helpful and
always taken seriously no matter where you're coming from. Some of you assumed I was promoting a "Play-for-Pay"
plan. Not once did I mention "paying" athletes.
I hope what I am suggesting in Part 2 comes through loud and clear.
I want to build on the point I made in last week's column, namely that college football players occupy a special place
and are exploited, a mild term in my view. I'm offering up what I believe is a way to get young men to earn a degree,
and give back to their families as well as their universities, bringing their return more in line with their investment.
Currently the relationship is one way, with the athletes getting the short end of the deal. College football players,
participating in revenue-generating programs, are at the center of a seamless web that creates billions of dollars in
revenue.
They are sort of the Wal-Mart of sports; the earnings of top college football coaches are one measure of where we
are. We're talking more than $300,000 a month in some cases. That's a living wage that makes the IRS give high
fives.
Here's the big picture of earnings and profits: Why do you think that CSI and other top programs are promoted
heavily during CBS' college football and NFL games? Were it not for the success of CBS' prime-time programming,
the network might not be able to afford the rights fees required to air live sports.
Why did a popular show, Grey's Anatomy, zoom upward when it was promoted after the Super Bowl? Why do you
think that in the Big 12 contract -- the same is true for all conferences with television contracts -- it guarantees
universities the opportunity to run ads promoting academics?
The answer to all of the above is that sports programming is unique in holding the viewers' attention, and that is
what we call in the trade a "lost leader." So, college football is leveraged to create unimaginable wealth that
stretches far beyond the field, and college football players make it happen.
We need to talk some about academics and athletics. What happens after their eligibly has expired?
Wallis Marsh, president and CEO of Houston-based EXTEX, says, "I've assisted student athletes by providing
employment opportunities after they've graduated for some years now. And in most cases, irrespective of race, a
disproportionate number lacked the maturity necessary to compete effectively in the real world. They tend to be a
step behind. I don't believe their ability to learn or capacity to do the work is any less than students who focus only
on academics.
"A fair percentage we hired were in the upper quintiles academically -- majoring in demanding curricula like
petroleum engineering. I believe part of (the) problem stems from their highly facilitated college experience. In an
effort to make their admittedly demanding commitments less complex, athletic administrators may have subtracted
from, rather than adding to, their ability to compete beyond the playing field."
Marsh continues. "I've hired former athletes -- from varied socioeconomic backgrounds -- ranging from football to
soccer. In all instances, the greatest strength of the former student athlete was their desire to succeed in a work
environment.
"However, when success didn't come quickly in business, results varied. Some of the former athletes buckled down
and transitioned in a healthy work environment. Others took the lack of success hard and moved on. It was as if the
junior and senior year of 'What are we going to do with this degree' questions were being asked. I personally think
that the athlete was so focused on class and their sport, that they didn't have the time or inclination (sense of
urgency) to worry about the college after-life."
Suffice to say that unless players met the university's standards, they wouldn't be there. Tomas Jimenez, who heads
the athletic counseling center at LSU and has spent 16 years in the profession, says that the course profile for
players is about the same as the general-student population. And, the days of "basket weaving" are long gone, with
intense scrutiny on requirements.
The Knight Commission is noted for tracking academic progress of athletes and making recommendations to the
NCAA. Most of what it does is focused on raising test scores. However, standards improve naturally, not arbitrarily.
They go up as the academic achievements of entering freshmen improve.
And, let's face it. You cannot measure a person's determination and heart. Years ago, the GI Bill made it possible
for veterans by the tens of thousands to go to college, once reserved for children of privilege and wealth. They are
the backbone of America's greatest generation. The student-athlete's educational experience is different than
students focused only on academics.
The demands are too high, as students who work and go to school can tell you. It isn't the same when young men
spend 40 hours or more per week in class and on the field, and get beaten to a pulp, playing often while sustaining
injuries that are debilitating -- leaving some scarred for life. This isn't a sob story. It is what it is.
They are sacrificing their bodies and often compromising their educational opportunities while alternately facilitating
the futures of many others. And, along the way, more than a few people become rich. And before you raise the
point, there's the myth of an NFL career.
Here are the numbers:
Of the roughly 14,000 or more players competing in college football's championship subdivision and football bowl
subdivision, only 224 will get drafted in any given year. And, of course, not all of them make the team. What
happens for the fortunate few who make it? The average NFL career for various reasons lasts three years. You
have a better chance at the lottery.
It's my firm belief that the present system is badly in need of improvement. Given the unique challenges athletes
face, what's needed is a more practical framework to earn a degree.
An educational action program based on the concept of legacy would be a giant step forward. Many universities,
especially in the Ivy League, guarantee admission to the children of parents who graduated from the university. The
goal is to build generational loyalties, and in the longer term they become catalysts of endowments. These families
historically give back generously to their alma maters.
This fund would be created and maintained by general campaigns and contributions. This is nothing new. Capital
campaign funds are established every time a revenue-generating athletic program wants to improve its athletic
facilities or a university wants to build a new building for one of its colleges.
Those who benefit most from college football should take the lead.
Today, college campaigns raise hundreds of millions of dollars for various worthwhile academic causes. A college
enterprise fund would allow players to complete their degrees after their eligibility has expired and the cheering
stops. Student-athletes who complete four years at an institution would automatically qualify for direct-grant
guarantees, for the exclusive purpose of completing their degrees.
In my opinion, these proposed grants have already been earned if the student-athlete competed for a revenue-
generating program. Will there be a rush to engage in creative bookkeeping so as to avoid being categorized as a
revenue-producing program? Perhaps. Business 101 says the market will decide.
The second part of the plan guarantees a legacy admission to their children. How many you ask? That's up to the
institutions to decide. It's a marriage of academics and athletics, something that's too often missing now. It also is a
powerful incentive for college football recruits to choose a university, and a powerful tool for coaches to get recruits
to sign on the dotted line.
Can you imagine the implications of such a plan? It will resonate when gifted student-athletes sit down with their
parents and say they've decided on one university over another because it had a robust legacy program.
We know that a college education is no guarantee of success in the real world. We know that getting a job in a trade
is only a start of a long process of honing skills. That's why American corporations invest billions of dollars in re-
training every year.
From my personal experience, my degree didn't earn me my current position. It gave me an opportunity to excel. It
was people skills and perseverance and competence in the craft. It has taken 15 years to get to this level and I'm
still trying to improve.
As a former college player, I still have a passion for OU and work on the university's behalf. I want other young men
to do the same wherever they get their degrees. It's a fair, honest and worthwhile investment in intellectual capital.
Academic Fraud in Collegiate Athletics
Academic fraud cases have long been a staple of the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s
infractions list. The descriptions are pleasure reading for critics of big-time college sports who bemoan
the influence that determined athletics officials, administrators and faculty can have on keeping
athletes eligible at all costs.
Elia Powers, InsideHigherEd.com, 2 October 2007
Of late, there’s been no shortage of material:
At Florida State University, a “learning specialist” and a tutor “perpetrated academic dishonesty” in a scandal
involving 23 athletes, an internal investigation found. In some cases, the employees — both of whom resigned,
according to the university — gave students answers to online exams and typed material for them.
A former Purdue University women’s basketball assistant coach, fired last year, was found to have partially
researched and composed a sociology paper for a player and then lied about it to university officials who were
looking into the allegations. The coach left an e-mail trail behind that proved to be the smoking gun.
The University of Kansas received three years’ probation last fall for a series of violations, including a former
graduate assistant football coach who gave two prospective athletes answers to test questions for correspondence
courses they were taking at the university.
Add to the list concerns over correspondence courses that allow athletes to gain eligibility and the issue of
“clustering” — illustrated in the Auburn University case involving a sociology professor who is accused of offering
specialized classes to athletes that required little work.
Whether or not cases of academic fraud have become more rampant or even more serious in recent years is open
to debate; statistics on their occurrence (increased or otherwise) are hard to come by. But many agree that the
climate has changed in college athletics in ways that may make such misbehavior more likely. And it has happened
since the NCAA unveiled its latest set of academic policies that raised the stakes on colleges to show that their
athletes perform well in the classroom while simultaneously lowering the requirements freshman athletes must meet
to become eligible initially.
Largely as a response to sagging graduation rates for football and basketball players, the NCAA put into place
several years ago new academic rules that require colleges to report each term whether their athletes are on
progress toward a degree — with penalties awaiting those whose students aren’t progressing and aren’t performing.
At the same time, the NCAA reversed its previous approach of continually raising initial entrance requirements and
began allowing students with SAT scores as low as 400 (or a corresponding ACT score) to enroll so long as their
high school grades were high enough. That move appeased critics of the standardized test score requirement who
said it adversely affected minority students.
In the years since the changes, many have expressed concern that the combination of heightened academic
expectations and lowered entrance regulations would put the campus employees responsible for providing academic
support to athletes in a tough spot, asked to help a growing number of marginal students — potentially at all costs.
That fear is so real to James F. Barker, president of Clemson University, that he meets each semester with everyone
who gives tutorial help or guidance to athletes and “reads them the Riot Act.”
“I tell them, ‘I’m responsible for 20,000 people and a half-a-billion-dollar budget — those two things could keep me
awake at night, but they don’t. What does is academic fraud. No student-athlete is worth crossing that line for,’ ”
says Barker, who also heads the NCAA’s Division I Board of Directors, the panel of college presidents that governs
the NCAA’s highest-profile competitive level.
David Goldfield, a professor of history at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte who served on the academic
eligibility and compliance cabinet of the NCAA, which helped craft the new policy, said he supports the new progress
standards but still opposes lowering entrance requirements — which he said strains the entire system of academic
support.
“When there’s pressure applied you’re going to get a reaction, and the reaction we’re seeing is academic fraud
cases,” Goldfield said. “From a coach’s perspective, the major task is to win, but now with the new requirements, the
second and often equally pressing task is to maintain the eligibility of players.”
Goldfield fears that academic fraud cases are far more widespread than just the ones reported to the NCAA.
Compliance officers can have a difficult time tracking down such cases, he said, because they can involve
wrongdoing by people in all parts of an institution, and often rely on self-reporting by athletics officials.
The NCAA did not have a comment for this article. Kevin Lennon, the association’s vice president for membership
services, said in a statement about the Florida State case that “the NCAA and its member institutions take seriously
any allegation of academic misconduct” and that “these types of violations are among the most serious that can be
committed.”
Lennon added that the NCAA is committed to its academic reform measures. The association has defended its
eligibility changes by arguing that the focus should be primarily on what students can achieve in college and not just
on their high school academic performance.
But some say that stance ignores the reality that unprepared students often can’t cut it in college.
“Just because you’re technically eligible to compete doesn’t mean you are ready to compete in the classroom,” said
Tim Metcalf, director of compliance at East Carolina University.
Terry Holland, a longtime men’s basketball coach at the University of Virginia who is now athletics director at East
Carolina, said coaches and college officials are under increasing pressure to accept any student who qualifies
under the NCAA’s rules. In his meetings with other athletics directors, Holland said he hasn’t encountered one yet
who says athletes are better prepared now than they were five years ago.
“For many programs, the recruiting pitch is, ‘We have a great academic support system and everyone graduates,’ ”
Holland said. “Maybe what the athletes are hearing is, ‘You’re going to do the work for me. It may not be fraud, but I
won’t have to do as much.’ “
Colleges have largely responded by devoting more resources to academic support services. They are hiring more
tutors, building new academic centers and beefing up compliance offices.
If more academic fraud cases have surfaced in recent years, it’s most likely a product of better reporting and more
collaboration among those monitoring the athletics departments, said Phil Hughes, associate director of athletics for
student services at Kansas State University and president of the National Association of Academic Advisors for
Athletes.
Hughes said he understands the increasing demands on athletics and academic support employees, who are
spending more time tracking real-time data for the Academic Progress Rate (the NCAA’s primary new way of
measuring athletes’ and teams’ classroom progress) and helping struggling students, which can take time away from
helping other students, athlete or non.
Barker, the Clemson president, said he typically doesn’t meet with the academic support staff who provides tutoring
and other services to the general study body (as opposed to athletes) because he doesn’t see the pressures of
committing academic misconduct there to be as great.
At Clemson, both academic support offices report to the university’s provost. Some have called for more colleges to
remove the perceived wall between athletics and the rest of the academy by moving tutors assigned to athletes into
academic affairs, or at least providing students and athletes with the same degree of academic support.
Hughes sees reason for optimism in the academic support landscape: Advisers who once felt like they worked
directly for the football coach are increasingly reporting that they feel insulated from that pressure, he said.
Holland, the East Carolina athletics director, said that simply adding more tutors doesn’t get at the problem.
Colleges still face the risk of having lower-level employees (often graduate students) making important judgment
calls about what the proper boundaries are in helping a student stay eligible. The NCAA, he added, is also complicit
in adding stress to academic support system by scheduling events during busy test periods instead of moving more
contests to the weekend.
But Tomas Jimenez, executive director of the LSU Academic Center for Student Athletes, said he isn’t convinced that
entering students are any less prepared than before, or that the NCAA’s new academic rules are leading to more
cases of academic misconduct.
“It’s always easy to point the finger at the NCAA, but it takes institutions to step up for academic support,” he said.
Goldfield, the Charlotte professor, said he doesn’t entirely blame athletics departments for misconduct, either.
Faculty are often guilty of grade manufacturing or taking part in schemes in which athletes are funneled to their
class and largely given a pass.
And what about the role of students in such scandals? Kerry Kenny, vice-chair of the Division I Student-Athlete
Advisory Committee, which represents the interests of athletes in the NCAA’s top competitive level, said that while it’
s unfair to judge all athletes by the actions of a few, the group as a whole needs to make better decisions about how
it uses help from academic support employees.
In the end, most agree it comes down to trust.
“We have to rely on the integrity of the people involved,” Goldfield said.
Is this the end for the Aztecs?
Alanna Berman, SDSU Daily Aztec, 2 October 2007
Today, faculty and staff in the University Senate will decide whether to accept a resolution that would abolish the
San Diego State football team, effective as early as the end of this semester.
Leon Rosenstein, emeritus professor of philosophy, authored the resolution, which claims that the football team has
been running a deficit of almost $3 million each year. The resolution also states that there is no proof in the claim
that the football program makes money for SDSU, and that it instead puts a strain on other academic departments.
Athletic Director Jeff Schemmel said he has seen resolutions like this before, and encourages the process, but is not
worried about it passing.
"We welcome the discussion because there is a great deal of misinformation out there about what football brings in
for revenue and what it costs," Schemmel said.
Schemmel said the football program generates a great deal of revenue for the university, including scholarship and
sponsorship funds from the NCAA for being a Division I school - a status that could be in jeopardy if the program
folded.
The school's participation in the Mountain West Conference could also be affected, which would cost SDSU an
additional $2 million a year. Currently, between 230 and 240 student athletes receive full scholarships - 85 of those
students are football players. Schemmel said without football, all scholarships would be affected, losing almost $5
million for the school.
Schemmel also said there is no basis for the claim that football generates no money, or that the program has been
operating on a deficit since he began at SDSU nearly 3 years ago.
"We roughly estimate the money that is brought in, either directly or indirectly, by football to be about $10 million,"
Schemmel said. "This is a great source of revenue for the university."
In addition to the $5 million the athletics department gets from student fees, and the $5 million it receives from the
state general fund, football has needed more money from university sources each year. Last year, the athletics
department budget included $2.7 million in one-time funding. This year, one-time funding is projected to be slightly
less, at $2.645 million.
Rosenstein's resolution claims that these one-time funds could be enough to staff "approximately 550 courses with
part-time faculty or to establish 35 new tenured full professorships." The resolution claims that this fact ignores the
academic needs of many departments.
The resolution also claims that the salary for head coach Chuck Long and his 12 assistants (nearly $2 million)
exceeds the entire budget of some academic departments.
A University Senate member suggested that these claims are without proof.
The senate member also said that the resolution is unlikely to pass. In fact, there is the question of whether
Rosenstein's emeritus status gives him the authority to introduce a resolution.
Even if passed, the senate does not have the authority to abolish the football team. The ultimate authority to end
the program rests with University President Steven Weber - who has adamantly supported the football program.
Even Rosenstein does not expect the resolution to pass, but said in an interview with The San Diego Union-Tribune
that the resolution will start the discussion about funding for athletics, which is important to look at in the context of
an educational institution.
Schemmel said this comparison is not appropriate, since the athletics department only competes with other athletic
departments to be the best, much like academic departments compete with other universities.
"We don't compete with the philosophy department," he said. "It's not apples to apples."
Profs want change in University athletics
SACUA calls for more faculty control, focus on academics
Andy Kroll, UMich. Daily, 2 October 2007
Citing low academic standards for student-athletes and a disconnect between the funding and administration of the
Athletic Department and the rest of the University, the University's main faculty governing body is pushing
administrators to adopt a set of reforms that would increase University oversight of athletic programs.
The Senate Advisory Committee on University Affairs recently submitted a report to the University Board of Regents
endorsing athletics reforms. The reforms are recommended by a 2007 report from the Coalition on Intercollegiate
Athletics, a group made up of the faculty senates of 55 schools with Division I-A athletic programs.
Vanderbilt University Prof. Virginia Shepherd, a coalition co-chair, said in an e-mail interview that the report was
written because athletic departments need to be more connected with their respective academic institutions.
"There are always decisions in any unit of a university that will need to be made by the leaders without our
knowledge," she said. "But with an operation as big as athletics that controls so much of our public image, our
financial health, our giving, it would certainly be healthy to have more transparency and honesty."
One of the main reforms in the SACUA report recommended the University athletic department budget be integrated
into the University general budget where possible.
University bylaws stipulate "separate accounting and financial statements will be made for department funds."
At a SACUA meeting yesterday, Athletic Director Bill Martin said the University Athletic Department budget is
reviewed annually by the University's chief financial officer, the University Board of Regents and President Mary Sue
Coleman.
"Our whole budgeting process is totally integrated with the University," Martin said.
The four recommendations in the report - titled "Framing the Future: Reforming Intercollegiate Athletics" - focus on
academic integrity in athletic departments, the student-athlete experience on campus, campus governing of athletics
and fiscal responsibility in athletic departments.
The faculty-endorsed report says "no academic programs should be designed specifically for student-athletes" or
created for the purpose of allowing student-athletes to maintain their eligibility.
The Athletic Department's academic integrity was in the spotlight this summer when former University football player
and Stanford football coach Jim Harbaugh accused University advisors of steering student-athletes into what he said
were less rigorous programs like the College of Literature, Science and the Arts's general studies degree.
SACUA members also questioned athletics administrators at yesterday's meeting about what they said was a
disproportionate amount of student-athletes in the Bachelor of General Studies program compared to regular
students.
"If the BGS program is so flexible and appealing, why are there so many football players in the BGS program
compared to the general student body?" asked Law Prof. Richard Friedman.
Shari Acho, an associate athletic director, said the General Studies program affords student-athletes flexibility in
their course selection.
"The General Studies degree lets students sample different classes and lets students find something that they're
interested in," she said.
The recommendations also call for the merger of academic student-athlete advising with existing academic advising
structures.
In an interview yesterday, Sue Shand, an associate athletic director, said athletic academic advising is critical
because it offers students extra help in scheduling classes around sports schedules - something that the
University's other advising offices don't do.
"We're focused on making sure that student-athletes don't miss classes and that they graduate and get their
degree," Shand said.
The third section of the proposal recommends that the chair of the University's Advisory Board on Intercollegiate
Athletics - a governing body comprised of faculty members, students, alumni and staff - be a "senior (tenured)
faculty member," not the athletic director.
University regent bylaws make the athletic director - a job currently held by Bill Martin, who is not a faculty member -
the chair of the board.
David Potter, SACUA's vice chair, said replacing Martin with a faculty member as chair of the advisory board would
be one of the most visible changes that could come from the recommendations.
The SACUA proposal also recommends that the overall growth rate in the Athletic Department's operating costs be
no greater than that of the University's operating costs.
The University's general budget grew 1.9 percent between the 2006-2007 fiscal year and the 2007-2008 fiscal year.
The Athletic Department's budget, meanwhile, increased 17.6 percent during that same period.
The University Athletic Department funds its operating budget entirely from its own revenues.
Shepherd said the COIA report - and pressure from groups like SACUA at universities around the country - will
hopefully hold athletic departments more fiscally accountable.
"It's difficult to justify the continued upward, seemingly out of control spending on athletic support services,"
Shepherd said. "Many places have locker rooms and training facilities for our athletes found nowhere else in the
world, with state of the art technology. Is this kind of spending necessary?"
Lower standards help some schools
Ray Melick, Birmingham News, 2 October 2007
Eleven years ago, South Florida didn't even have a football program.
Three weeks ago, South Florida's football team had never been ranked.
But now, at 4-0, with victories over West Virginia and Auburn, the Bulls are a consensus Top 10-ranked team,
showing up as high as No.6 in the AP Top 25.
And while the South Florida bandwagon has suddenly become the place to be in college football, rival coaches are
not quite as enthusiastic about the success of programs like South Florida, and similarly fast-rising schools like
Rutgers and West Virginia.
Good coaching is part of it. So is commitment to the program. And scholarship limits have spread talent around
more evenly.
But those reasons don't explain everything, in particular how some very talented football players are denied
admission to some schools but not others.
"The distribution of players is not the same for everybody," said Alabama head coach Nick Saban. "There's a
significant amount of players who don't qualify (at some schools) and they end up being pretty good players at some
other schools. I think there are six guys starting on South Florida's defense who probably could have gone to
Florida or Florida State but Florida and Florida State couldn't take them. And if you do a good job of recruiting that
way ..."
Saban stopped there, but the implication is obvious: If you recruit that way you get players that are good enough to
elevate a program in a hurry.
At issue is the difference in admission policies from school to school, which may be more stringent than the minimum
standards established by the NCAA.
Prior to 2003 the NCAA required incoming freshmen to have scored at least an 820 on the SAT or an 18 on the
ACT, plus have a grade point average of 2.5 in a predetermined number of "core" classes.
But protests brought about a change to the current "sliding scale," which allowed for higher test scores to
compensate for lower GPA, or vice versa. The slide can be dramatic: A 3.55 GPA makes a 400 SAT score -
basically what you get for signing your name - acceptable under NCAA rules.
The coaches who benefit from this say that such an extreme difference in GPA and test score is very rare. But the
people who work in NCAA compliance say it happens more than you might think.
What concerns coaches is that some schools appear to be willing to admit athletes based on the NCAA minimum,
while other schools hold their athletes to standards that are higher than the NCAA minimum, creating a very real
advantage-disadvantage in recruiting.
Conferences such as the SEC have pushed for legislation that would increase the NCAA's minimum standards, but
so far that move has been voted down by schools that argue admission standards should be left up to individual
institutions.
"It is what it is," Saban said. "I feel like if we do a good job of recruiting here, we ought to be able to get good football
players who are qualified who are the kind of people, character and attitude-wise, that we want to represent an
institution like this. And we know that there are going to be some occasions that we have to play against some teams
that don't have to do that.
"I'm glad, on the other hand, for the players, that they have an opportunity to get an education. ... So there's good
and bad, I guess, in all of it."
Flexible admissions standards are the truly great equalizer in creating parity in athletics.
As for what it means in the classroom - each school has to answer that for itself.
USF's Leavitt takes issue with Saban, News column
Ian R. Rapoport, Birmingham News, 3 October 2007
TUSCALOOSA - South Florida football coach Jim Leavitt criticized Alabama coach Nick Saban and The Birmingham
News on Tuesday, saying comments regarding the academic standards of the Big East were made by both parties
"without verifying the facts."
"Coach Saban and I, we've always had a good relationship," Leavitt told reporters in Tampa. "But to sit there and tell
the world something that he doesn't know is not right. We've done what we've done because we work extremely
hard. We recruit as best we can. It's an absolute wrong thing to do."
Saban did not meet with reporters Tuesday.
On Monday, Saban was asked by The News about the success of non-traditional football programs such as South
Florida, which is ranked No. 6 in the country. He responded that some conferences and institutions have lower
admissions standards than schools in the Southeastern Conference or the Atlantic Coast Conference.
"There's a significant amount of players who don't qualify (at some schools) and they end up being pretty good
players at some other schools," Saban said Monday. "I think there are six guys starting on South Florida's defense
who probably could have gone to Florida or Florida State but Florida and Florida State couldn't take them."
The comments were discussed in a Tuesday column by The News' Ray Melick.
"This person, Ray Melick, what right does he have to write an article without verifying the facts?" said Leavitt, whose
team utilized Conference USA academic standards until it joined the Big East in 2005. "This is why I get disturbed
sometimes. Now this article goes out, and everybody throughout the region thinks it's who we are."
Leavitt apparently thought that Saban was referring to schools' acceptance of non-qualifiers, and he mentioned that
his school has only two such players - one starter, one sub. But Saban's focus - and the column's focus - was on the
overall admissions standards, not simply on partial and non-qualifiers.
Prep coach: Grades an issue for ineligible Michigan player
John Heuser, Ann Arbor News, 1 October 2007
The high school coach for University of Michigan freshman safety Artis Chambers said Monday that college grades -
 and which grades can count toward eligibility - contributed to Chambers being declared ineligible last week.
Fort Wayne (Ind.) Snider coach Russ Isaacs said that Chambers, who enrolled at Michigan in January, took summer
school classes with the hopes of boosting his first-semester grade point average. Under NCAA rules, Chambers was
eligible to play this fall.
But Isaacs said he got a call from a Michigan assistant coach last week telling him that under Big Ten rules, summer
school grades couldn't count toward eligibility for freshmen such as Chambers, who enrolled in the middle of a
school year.
"I don't understand why these kids would be any different in their summer school GPA not being used," Isaacs said.
"In one regard, they should be rewarded. They graduated from high school in seven semesters and met all the
NCAA requirements."
Michigan athletic director Bill Martin announced Saturday that Chambers would be ineligible for the rest of the
season, and took responsibility for the misinterpretation of conference rules.
Chambers played in the first four games, mainly on special teams.
Big Ten spokesman Scott Chipman said Sunday that a league subcommittee was reviewing the issue and could take
up to two weeks to decide on any action against Michigan. Forfeiting the team's conference victory over Penn State
is an option.
MWC: Aztecs face threat from within
Emeritus professor seeks to can the football program, citing lack of revenue generated during losing
seasons
Rhiannon Potkey, Salt Lake Tribune, 4 October 2007
Philosophical differences between athletics and academics is nothing new in the era of million-dollar budgets and
publicity-rich sports teams.
San Diego State is the latest to come under fire after a longtime faculty member recently sponsored a resolution to
abolish the football program.
Leon Rosenstein, emeritus professor of philosophy at the school, cited the program's failure to generate revenue
and said he believes it puts a strain on academics.
The San Diego State faculty senate voted Tuesday to request further review of the resolution. But it is unlikely to
succeed because the final decision rests with school president Stephen Weber, who said he fully supports the
football program.
The Aztecs have recorded eight straight non-winning seasons, and are 1-3 heading into their Mountain West
Conference opener against Colorado State this weekend.
San Diego State head coach Chuck Long said the public backlash from Rosenstein hasn't been a distraction to his
team.
"Everybody is entitled to their opinion and every campus has them," Long said of athletic dissenters. "It just so
happens we are an easy target because we are not winning."
Long has preached patience since taking over the program last year. The Aztecs are 4-12 under Long, a record he
attributes partly to youth, partly to injuries and partly to a challenging schedule.
"I think we are too quick to judge at times," Long said. "I feel like the past woes here and the frustrations all of a
sudden are taken out on us. That is not right. We are a new staff and a new program."
Despite the call for abolishment, Long is confident the Aztecs football program will survive.
"I wouldn't have come here without the support of our president, and I wasn't going to go to a place that was thinking
about getting rid of football," he said. "That wouldn't have been a smart career move."
Parity, not perfection
The past three conference champions have run through the schedule undefeated. But the coaches agree it's not
likely to happen again this season.
"I think the teams are too close and I think every game is going to be competitive," New Mexico coach Rocky Long
said. "But I thought that the last two years and the last two champions have been undefeated."
BYU head coach Bronco Mendenhall, whose team leads the conference at 2-0, believes the champion will emerge
with one loss.
"We have always talked about parity, but if you look at just the way the teams this season are shaping up it could
very well happen," he said. "Again, it's hard to predict, but of any of the years so far I have been in the league this
would probably be the one most susceptible to that happening."
The Great Divide
As an increasing number of schools reach for the college sports summit, debate intensifies regarding
the current makeup of Division I.
Paul Steinbach, Athletic Business Magazine, October 2007
The University of Central Florida will become the first school in Division I history to open new venues for both football
and basketball within the same academic year.A summer-long marketing campaign at the University of Central
Florida carried the theme "The Knights Are Coming Home," a nod to the school's ability this fall to host football
games on campus for the first time in its history. Now in its 12th season as an NCAA Division I-A institution, all
indications are that UCF has truly arrived on college football's biggest stage. It christened the $55 million, 45,000-
seat Bright House Networks Stadium with a Sept. 15 game against the University of Texas, the nation's fourth-
ranked team in most preseason polls. "We're talking about Texas," says UCF associate athletic director for
communications Joe Hornstein, whose school put a scare into the visiting Longhorns before losing, 35-32. "That
says a lot about this university and the program, that we are even able to have a team like Texas agree to play
here."
And the firsts aren't confined to the gridiron. On Nov. 11, the men's basketball team will host Nevada in the inaugural
game at 10,000-seat UCF Arena, a new multipurpose campus venue, thus distinguishing the university as the first
ever in Division I to open new facilities for both football and basketball within the same academic year. If that weren't
enough, both venues and their student-athlete occupants are sporting new Knights logos in 2007-08. Says Bill Carr
of Carr Sports Associates, a Gainesville, Fla.-based consultancy that assisted the UCF athletic department with its
strategic planning, "I have never seen a school where more is happening all at once. It's just extraordinary."
To help put the confluence of events in perspective, Hornstein dusted off the 1993 press release announcing UCF
football's intention to join Division I-A (after the school spent separate six-year stints in I-AA and I-AAA) and posted it
on the athletics web site in mid-July. "Because we're doing so much that's new — new stadium, new arena, new look
— you're going to hear the word 'new' quite a bit," he says. "But we don't want to forget where we came from."
Over the past 30 years, no fewer than 46 institutions — including 24 since 2000 — have left the comfort of the
familiar for the allure of Division I (or I-A football) in at least one sport. (As of Aug. 1, the NCAA began referring to
Divisions I-A and I-AA as the Football Bowl Subdivision and the Football Championship Subdivision, respectively —
to mixed reviews.) The migration picked up such momentum in recent years that the NCAA on Aug. 9 announced a
four-year moratorium on new Division I memberships, as well as reclassifications between the division's three
subdivisions, effective immediately. "They acted quickly, because they knew if they made any public
acknowledgement of the question that they would invite an avalanche," says Carr, who had been assisting as many
as three institutions a year with reclassification decisions prior to the moratorium. "I think several schools on the
fence would have moved ahead."
Twenty schools currently in the middle of the reclassification process (which takes between two and seven years,
depending on the breadth of the jump) are unaffected by the freeze. "Division I is seeing an increase in schools in
the queue toward active membership," says David Berst, the NCAA's vice president for Division I, adding that as
many as a half-dozen schools will be eligible for entry in one future year alone. "It just appeared time for us to stop,
take a breath and consider what a Division I institution ought to look like."
An NCAA-funded study released this summer took a financial snapshot of schools that moved either from Division II
to Division I-AA or from I-AA to I-A within the 10-year period from 1993 to 2003. It found that while revenues
increased as a result of such moves, expenses increased even more, thus debunking a common notion favored by
administrators during the run-up to reclassification: financial sustainability. In fact, athletic department net profits for
the 11 institutions that reclassified from I-AA to I-A decreased by an average $1.7 million. Meanwhile, net profits for
schools jumping from Division II to Division I-AA dropped nearly twice as much as for peer institutions that stayed
put. "Most of these schools are not being honest about their reasons for reclassifying," says study co-author Daniel
Fulks, an accounting professor and faculty athletics representative at Division III Transylvania University in
Lexington, Ky. "The president and the trustees will try to make it at least appear as though it's going to be profitable.
We just haven't found that to be true. There are still fewer than two dozen schools in the country that are showing a
profit on athletics. One of those is in I-AA. More often than not the motivation is a matter of ego."
The study authors do acknowledge some potential perks of reclassification — most notably, enhanced institutional
prestige. "Many schools feel like they need to compete at the highest possible level athletically in order to give their
institution the greatest visibility," says Carr, a former athletic director at the universities of Houston and Florida.
"Our university didn't make the jump to Division I to become an athletic power; it made the move to enhance its
standing in the marketplace," says Greg Kampe, men's basketball coach at Oakland (Mich.) University, located in
one of the wealthiest counties in the nation. "The university wanted to become a player."
Oakland jumped from Division II to Division I-AAA in 1999. While it's impossible to credit athletics solely for an
increase in enrollment from 14,289 in 1998 to 17,737 in 2006, on-court success no doubt has played an integral
role. In 2000, Kampe's program capped its first Division I campaign by winning a conference championship. In 2005,
it earned a spot in the NCAA tournament, an achievement that still greets visitors on the university's home page.
That year, Oakland played two eventual Final Four teams — Illinois and Michigan State — during the regular
season and lost in the tournament to eventual national champion North Carolina. "A lot of the people who were
against the move saw the publicity that we got and what it did for this school," Kampe says. "You can't put a dollar
figure on that."
"You are who you play. How do you measure that?" echoes Carr. "There are some intangibles. Constituents feel
better about the institution, and in today's marketplace, there's great value in that."
Adds Fulks, "We don't have any strong evidence that alumni and boosters are going to give you more money just
because you're playing Florida and not Florida A&M. But there is intrinsic value. What we found in our research is
that the diversity of the student body improves, the average entrance exam score improves and the high school
GPAs of incoming students improve. And maybe that's reason enough."
Kampe, the Oakland coach since 1984, best explains the school's enhanced reputation within the scope of his own
recruiting efforts. "People had no idea that Oakland University was in Michigan," he says, adding that one prospect's
father asked Kampe if the coach could get him a tee-time at Pebble Beach. "Now, because of the success, they
know who we are. What the university wanted out of this was name recognition, and we've gotten that. From that
standpoint, it's been everything the university wanted it to be."
Following a heavily scrutinized 0-28 season, Savannah State turned to former Georgetown great Horace Broadnax
to coach Lazarius Coleman and the Tigers.Whether the recent "institutional creep," as Carr calls it, is welcome within
the Division I establishment is another matter. "The more schools that are in Division I," he says, "the more schools
that get a piece of the men's basketball tournament money."
Adds the NCAA's Berst, "It's true, Division I money is shared among Division I institutions, so it's obvious that
including more schools dilutes the dollars available. But I have not heard institutions individually or as a group
campaign against adding members."
When asked if the NCAA can flat-out refuse a reclassification request, Berst says, "The power is not very clear
under the current bylaws. There is a subcommittee that evaluates programs and makes comments on steps taken,
and it can actually hold an institution back for a period of time. But it's not very clear that there is a mechanism to
say no."
Some feel the NCAA should be able to just say no. After losing all 28 of its men's basketball games during the 2004-
05 season, its fourth in Division I, Savannah State University was singled out in a widely circulated Associated Press
story as "the most striking example of a school that had no business jumping to Division I." It was only the second
time in 50 years that a Division I basketball team had suffered through a winless season.
"The school moved to Division I in name," Horace Broadnax, who became Savannah State's head coach on the
heels of the 0-28 campaign, told the Orlando Sentinel last year. "But the resources necessary didn't come with it."
When Broadnax, a former star guard at Georgetown, arrived at Savannah State in April 2005, the program had no
assistant coaches and only 5.5 scholarships devoted to men's basketball — 7.5 shy of the maximum allowed by the
NCAA. Two years later, Broadnax has two assistants and his scholarship allotment has doubled. And if his team has
not yet turned the corner on the court — going 12-19 last season — the men's basketball program is nonetheless
turning a profit. According to U.S. Department of Education figures, Savannah State posted men's basketball
revenues of $750,481 during the reporting year ending June 6, 2006, while expenses totaled just $414,670. The
team drew a meager average of 1,100 fans to its 6,000-seat Tiger Arena, topping out at 3,727 when the Un iversity
of Massachusetts came to town. But like many fledgling Division I programs, the Tigers' meal ticket takes the form of
guaranteed payouts for traveling to play such established heavyweights as Illinois and West Virginia, which last
season beat the Tigers by a combined score of 157-75.
"You can't say to Savannah State, 'We can't let you in because you're going to get pummeled,' " says Fulks. "What
bothers me is not that they got in but that they're allowed to stay in. And it's not just Savannah State. There are so
many pretenders in Division I that are not granting the minimum number of scholarships and not meeting the
minimum attendance requirements. It's just a matter of nobody really wanting to do anything about it."
One potential action might involve creating "a more palatable way to move backward — either from Division I to
Division II or from the Football Bowl Subdivision to the Football Championship Subdivision," Berst says. "It's very
difficult for schools to do that right now. The more likely result is they drop the sport rather than fund it."
Another option is for Division I to adopt a Division II idea that makes reclassification contingent upon conference
membership. Savannah State, which as an independent supplements its schedule with NAIA opponents out of
necessity, played 17 of its 31 games on the road last season, including a 10-game stretch in which they were home
only once. They lost all 10 by an average of 20 points. "A lot of schools are making the jump without being in a
league, and that kills you," Kampe says. "You can't recruit anybody if you can't go to the NCAA tournament, and
fans aren't going to come watch you play games if they're meaningless."
According to Kampe, his only demands of the Oakland University administration at the time of transition centered
upon being in a conference and having a budget in line with the conference average. (The OU men's basketball
budget — including scholarships and staff salaries — came in just shy of $300,000 during the team's Division II
years, but now approaches $1 million.) The team is heading into the second year of an FSN Detroit regional
television contract, and the school is raising funds to build a basketball practice facility, which at $15 million will cost
more than the program's nine-year-old arena. The Golden Grizzlies will play 15 games at home this season, the
most since joining Division I. "How about that?" Kampe asks. "We're to the point now where we can get home
games." And here's where Kampe begins to sound like he's channeling the late Division I coaching legend and TV
color analyst Al McGuire. "It's a blossoming flower. It's just growing and growing, and good thi ngs have been
happening."
Savannah State can only hope to one day experience that kind of good fortune. According to athletic director Tony
O'Neal, a former Bethune-Cookman College compliance officer who says he was drawn to Savannah State by "the
opportunity to run a Division I program," the school has applied for membership to one conference, and sent feelers
out to others. In the meantime, another season as a Division I independent awaits. "The excitement is huge, and the
expectations are high," O'Neal says. He recalls recently crossing paths on campus with senior frontcourt player
Lazarius Coleman, a survivor of the 0-28 season. "He's stronger and more knowledgeable. He knows that he can
compete, and he's looking forward to the opportunity. That's been the motto of the program overall."
One of three institutions to achieve active Division I status in all sports this year, the University of California at Davis
celebrated in September with the unveiling of a $30 million multipurpose stadium.The opportunity to reap the
rewards of Division I competition can take investments in time and money. Hornstein scans a paragraph from the
UCF press release he pulled from the archives. It talks about escalating expenses and an annual budgetary
increase of $2 million, but also about how "the increased expenditures will be more than offset by revenue realized
through increased donations, road game guarantees, ticket sales, television, merchandise sales and other sources."
"A lot of what was originally said back on April 12, 1993, will come to fruition beginning this year, because now the
university is staging football games," says Hornstein. "Expenses have gone up, but our opportunity to accomplish
the revenue side of it has also gone up."
UCF had hoped to sell 20,000 football season tickets for the inaugural season at Bright House Networks Stadium,
but sales were so brisk by late summer that a sellout total of 25,000 became the new goal heading into the Texas
game, which was broadcast live on ESPN2. Compare that to a record 15,000 season tickets sold in 2006 (the
season following the Knights' first-ever bowl appearance and their last season as a Citrus Bowl lessee) and fewer
than 10,000 sold in 2005.
Likewise, Boise State University, which moved to Division I-A from I-AA in 1996, reports record football season ticket
sales in the wake of its 13-0 season and stunning Fiesta Bowl upset of Oklahoma in January, and the school is close
to selling out the luxury suites, club seats and loge boxes that comprise a $35.9 million renovation of Bronco
Stadium. According to USA Today, the school has benefited from multimillion-dollar donations, a $3.5 million cut
from the Fiesta Bowl, and bookstore memorabilia profits of $1.2 million. "But perhaps more important, we got a
bounce in how Boise State is perceived by the state Legislature," BSU president Bob Kustra told reporter Jill Lieber
Steeg in August. "For years, we've been the fourth-best-funded college in the state. There've been a lot of doubting
Thomases who've asked, 'Should it really be the first university people think of when they think of Idaho?' We are
now, thanks to the Fiesta Bowl."
As a mid-major conference representative, Boise State's ability to crash the Bowl Championship Series party last
season was unprecedented, but it may not be enough to swing the pendulum away from the "haves versus have-
nots" dynamic that Fulks has seen emerge in Division I. In fact, it could get worse as more schools enter the division.
"We've found that schools that were already making money will make more money with the move, and those that are
losing money will lose more money, because everything just gets bigger," he says.
"The message in this whole thing is that if an institution is going to move forward to Division I and be successful, the
university itself must be prepared to provide resources to allow that to occur," Carr says. "You cannot depend
entirely on external revenues for that to happen. It simply will not happen. It can't."
One can't help but wonder whether Fulks' NCAA-funded research produced the kind of results that the association
wanted to see — a sort of disincentive to division-hopping. Berst acknowledges that the education process is
ongoing. "We're trying to develop better data in Division I so presidents can make better-informed decisions on
financial matters — not just what subdivision to belong to, but if you're going to pay your football coach 'x,' what do
other institutions look like that are doing that?" he says. "Who do you want to compete with?"
In the meantime, new incentives to climb the competitive ladder seem to keep cropping up. Witness the Appalachian
State University football team's monumental season-opening win over fifth-ranked Michigan — the first time since
1989, when the Associated Press expanded its college football rankings to 25 teams, that a Division I-AA school
defeated a ranked I-A opponent. So historic was the victory that the AP for the first time ever opened its poll to
include consideration of I-AA programs.
But while ASU collected $400,000 to travel to Ann Arbor that day, Michigan cleared $5 million in ticket sales alone,
more than double what the Mountaineers can expect to pocket should the two-time defending I-AA champions sell
out every seat in their 16,650-seat stadium this season. Moreover, the most recent government figures show ASU's
football revenues from the 2005-06 season at $1.3 million, while Michigan's approached $38 million. Wrote CNBC.
com sports business reporter Darren Rovell, "Putting this all in financial perspective makes it hard to believe that
little Appalachian State could be a goliath."
"I think it's safe to say we all want schools to think twice before they make any move," says Fulks, speaking for NCAA
officials and reclassification consultants alike. "We don't want there to be an assumption that it's going to be a cash
cow, because it just isn't."
Editorial | Athletic Dept. should tell the whole story
Staff Editorial, TAMU Battalion, 1 October 2007
Texas A&M Head Coach Dennis Franchione's secret football newsletter that was distributed to a privileged group of
fans is questionable. Solid answers are necessary to clear up the murk the newsletter has created.
The "VIP Connection" was published for three years and was written by Mike McKenzie, special assistant to the
athletic director. The Associated Press said Franichione disclosed his candid evaluations of players and revealed
specific player injuries in the newsletter.
Franchione told the Associated Press the money - $1,200 collected annually from each donor - went to offset costs
incurred from operating his personal website, coachfran.com. Although Franchione and McKenzie said neither of
them benefited financially from the document, the public needs to know specifically where the money was going, as
more than $14,000 was collected annually from these donors - AP reported that the newsletter had about a dozen
subscribers. Maintaining a site that contains personal blogs, depth charts and rosters and retaining the rights to a
domain name does not usually cost $14,000 to run every year - especially because the site contains
advertisements. For a coach that earns an annual salary of about $2 million a year, the collection of this extra
money requires an explanation.
It is the secrecy surrounding the newsletter that makes it so concerning, especially because Franchione told the AP
that donors were asked to sign confidentiality agreements. Franchione's assessments of players and their abilities
and injuries should not have to be bought or accessed through signing a legal disclaimer.
Athletic Director Bill Byrne advised Franchione to stop distributing "VIP Connection" after learning about the
newsletter's existence from a San Antonio Express News reporter. Franchione did stop the newsletter, and told the
AP that all donors will receive refunds. The newsletter may have ceased to be, but the damage has already been
done.
Because the newsletter has been enveloped in so much mystery, there are numerous questions floating around
waiting to be answered. It is too soon to make a judgment on the legality or questionable ethics that went into
creating "VIP Connection" because the public simply does not know enough. Byrne must step forward and clarify the
newsletter and its intent or allow Franchione and McKenzie to speak for themselves - neither is avaliable for
comment. If he does not, the image of the team and the University will be tarnished.
Brent Shirley, editor in chief
Rick Rojas, opinion editor
Kevin Alexander, news editor
Cheating scandal latest issue for Florida State athletic director Dave Hart
Steve Ellis, Florida Today, 28 September 2007
This is a week that should celebrate Dave Hart's administrative successes, including his role as schedule-maker. It
was the idea of the Florida State University athletic director for the Seminoles to play his alma mater, Alabama, this
week in Jacksonville.
But Hart also is having to answer questions about a university investigation that uncovered wrongdoing by a former
athletic department employee plus a tutor hired by the athletic department who helped 23 student-athletes in some
degree with an online exam.
FSU President T.K. Wetherell said the discovery of the academic misconduct that led to FSU's self-reporting of
violations to the NCAA on Tuesday was not the reason he formally advised Hart in May he would not extend his
contract that expires in January of 2009. That letter was dated May 29.
"Publicly, I will say this (NCAA) matter has nothing to do with Dave Hart (and his contract not being extended),"
Wetherell said.
Wetherell said he first addressed the subject of Hart's contract with Hart before the violations took place.
Attorneys representing Hart have met with FSU's legal counsel since the letter became public in early July regarding
a termination date and financial terms.
Wetherell and Hart have been at odds relating to various issues since Wetherell became FSU's president in January
2003. Two members of Hart's senior staff -- Pam Overton and Charlie Carr -- submitted letters of resignation May 9.
Wetherell said their resignations are not tied to the findings of the in-house investigation of Chief Audit Officer David
Coury.
Another member of the athletic department staff -- Brenda Monk, an assistant director and learning specialist within
the Athletic Academic Support Services -- resigned July 5.
As for impropriety involving the 23 student-athletes, a final and more complete self-report is expected to be filed with
the NCAA in the next four weeks. The Compliance Group, a Kansas consulting firm headed by former NCAA
enforcement staff member Chuck Smrt, has been hired by FSU to help with filing that report.
"It was critically important," Hart said. "We needed somebody from outside that can bring an additional level of
expertise."
When the NCAA moved its headquarters to Indianapolis in 1999, Smrt remained in Kansas and opened this firm.
Smrt's staff includes former NCAA staff members as well as former members of legal counsel or compliance offices
from universities.
FSU's initial investigation resulted in a 12-page report that Smrt's group will use in compiling a final report to the
NCAA.
"We've been hired to prepare a report and assist in any way we can they want us to," Smrt said.
SonnySpeak
a CLIPS EYEWITNESS REPORT
Retired sports marketer Sonny Vaccaro wowed them at the Yale University Law School on Friday.
From Wikipedia:
John "Sonny" Vaccaro (b. 1940) is a former marketing executive for sneaker companies, including Nike, Inc. Reebok
and Adidas.
He is best-known for founding the ABCD All America Camp, an elite showcase of high school basketball standouts
held every summer in New Jersey. The camp ran from 1984 to 2007, which included future stars such as Kobe
Bryant and LeBron James.
Vaccaro organized his first basketball event in 1965, in his hometown of Pittsburgh.
James Gandolfini is slated to play Vaccaro in an upcoming HBO movie called "ABCD Camp."
By Nick Infante, Clips Editor, 9-22-07
MANY FAMOUS PEOPLE have spoken at Yale University in its esteemed three century history: the extensive list of
speakers is a veritable who’s who of the intelligent and influential, the powerful and the humble, the movers and
shakers of Western civilization . . . . . .
Yesterday, Friday Sept. 21, Sonny Vacarro’s name was added to that prestigious list of speakers. The venue was
the Yale University Law School, in one of those large, steeply banked amphitheater classrooms. In the audience of
a hundred or so were the Yale men’s basketball team, law students, miscellaneous persons, plus I thought I saw an
NBA spy?
Vaccaro’s purpose was to set the record straight on his turbulent career, and to appeal to the students to make a
difference in their lives. It helps that Vaccaro is no shy guy, that he loves meeting students and that he loves to
perform.
His speaking style is frenetic, passionate and animated. Gesticulating vigorously, stomping and scurrying, he
alternated seamlessly from humbleness to braggadocio. Sonny is 68, but he has the energy level of a man much
younger.
I had heard and read plenty about Sonny Vacarro. I expected him to be straightforward, uninhibited and
entertaining. I was not disappointed.
SONNY’S NARRATIVE UNFOLDED in a roughly chronological matter. Befitting that chronology was an intro by Yale
AD Tom Beckett, who grew up in Western Pennsylvania with Sonny. Beckett described Sonny as coming from a
“common background, but with an uncommon touch.” He also made reference to the upcoming HBO movie (“ABCD
Camp) about Sonny, in which James Gandolfini will play Sonny. Here at Yale, said Beckett, “Sonny will be playing
himself.”
Sonny thereupon took us from his Pittsburgh area roots to high school – he said he graduated 43rd out of 52 in his
class - to a junior college in Fresno to Youngstown State to several years as a special ed teacher.
Meanwhile, Vaccaro’s narrative affected a series of zig-zags, reverses and meanderings, such that persons with
linear thought processes (which was most everybody in the room other than Sonny) experienced some
comprehension difficulties. But it didn’t matter, because Sonny highlighted common themes repeatedly; things like
keeping one’s word, loyalty, business, profit, family, and the difference between rules and laws.
Many of the events that Sonny was describing occurred before many in the predominantly under-25 audience were
born – or they were just kids – but he skillfully made that history relevant to today’s challenges. He kept coming
back to the validation of actions based on what’s right, what’s good for the kids, what the norm is in any situation (i.e.
-What’re the other guys doing?), etc.
This was not a guy describing an absolute black and white delineation of right and wrong. This was hearing a
seasoned business pro describing real-world relativism.
After all, what might be considered a kick-back nowadays was probably considered a finder’s fee a few years ago.
Similarly, what was once considered a gift might now be considered a bribe.
It’s all relative.
Vaccaro’s sports marketing career got started when he hooked up with what was then Blue Ribbon Sports (and soon
became Nike). In those days, Converse was Bigfoot in the athletic shoe category, but Vaccaro (with liberal funding
from Portland) was instrumental in Nike’s meteoric rise to supremacy.
[Ed.-I would have loved it if Sonny broke off on a several hour tangent about his early Nike days. Maybe I can hear
more someday over cognacs and cigars.]
Vaccaro described a sort of Wild West, a rules-void era in the 80s where there were sizable gaps in oversight of
high school and college recruiting. Into that void plunged all the shoe companies - not just Nike, and not just Sonny
– and the rest is marketing and promotions history: Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, etc.
Everybody was doing it (whatever the “it” was).
It’s all relative.
All along the way Sonny peppered his speech with plenty of yucks. [Ed.-See Clips Best Quotes section for a
collection of Sonny’s quotes.] One of his best lines came when he described the early days of paying coaches to
endorse Nike stuff. Of former UNLV coach Jerry ‘Tark the Shark’ Tarkanian, Vaccaro said, “Tarkanian would take
money from a dead man.”
After about an hour and a quarter of nostalgic narrative, Sonny up-shifted into the advocacy part of his monologue.
He lit into the NBA (over the 19–plus–1 rule) and the NCAA (for seemingly everything else under the sun).
This is where Sonny pulled out all the stops. As if we hadn’t already been exposed to an engaging, passionate
speaker, now there was a even more supercharged dynamo in front of us.
Sonny was especially agitated over the NBA’s 19–plus-1 rule, remarking that “white America was not ready for these
black kids.”
He then mocked the end result of the rule, that there were eight players who jumped to the NBA after an “and-1.”
Said Sonny, “They weren’t student-athletes. They were rent-a-players.”
As caustic as his NBA remarks were, he blasted the NCAA even worse, for hypocrisy, for duplicity, for faux
amateurism, for being “the most selfish group in the world,” etc.
I was sitting next to Yale Assistant AD Ryan Bamford, and we were both chuckling at several points along Sonny’s
address. However, it would have been really interesting if NCAA President Myles Brand and NBA President David
Stern were sitting next to me. I doubt I would have heard them chuckling.
It’s all relative.
This Clips Eyewitness Report was written by Clips Editor Nick Infante on 9-22-07.
Cheating is now name of the game
Bob Lipper, Richmond Times-Dispatch, 21 September 2007
So who's on the up and up anymore? Who follows the rules? Who doesn't fudge his Form 1040? Who doesn't drive
6 mph over the limit? Who turns in a legit expense account? Who doesn't hit the college-town bars with a phony ID?
Who doesn't spy on the other team or mainline STP into his bloodstream or slip pixie dust in the crankcase at the
starting line, all in the name of competition, trophies, checkered flags and - oh, yes - sacks of loot?
Who's our Abe Lincoln?
Who can we trust?
What was it Vince Lombardi once said - that winning isn't everything, it's the only thing? Man, was he ahead of his
time. Maybe it's a good thing he didn't live long enough to see millionaire coaches and DVDs. He didn't know the half
of it.
Winning, see, is where it's at in this here society of ours, and if that means winning at all costs, so be it. This
explains why Republicans and Democrats would rather keep score than govern. Why TV suits prefer to hype Britney
and O.J. than enlighten. Why White Houses are tilted by pollsters.
And why coaches and sluggers and auto techies and pass defenders and every bicycle rider this side of your local
messenger boy will do anything to gain an edge.
Committee chairs, Nielsens and absolute power are on the line, you know - as are championships and seven-digit
endorsement deals. So what if our moral compass strays from its magnetic field. Big deal. In this game, compasses
are for losers.
And so, we have our frayed and grimy little sports world. Barry Bonds morphs into pick-a-NASCAR-mechanic who
morphs into Bill Belichick who morphs into Rick Ankiel who morphs into Floyd Landis, who yesterday - once again -
was told he can't keep his yellow jersey or 2006 Tour de Pharmaceuticals title because his system was found to be
more radioactive than the North Anna power plant.
'Course, he still has another appeal if he chooses to use it. There's always one more spoke in the wheel.
It's a blurry mess out there and getting messier all the time. Consider, if you will, Belichick, the fraud du jour.
Belichick is the famous football coach of the Patriots who dresses in frumpy hooded sweatshirts but would be just as
much at home in trenchcoat and black fedora. He specializes in 3-4 defenses and surveillance.
Two Sundays ago, Belichick was busted by the NFL for having an accomplice aim a camera at Jets defensive
coaches and film them and their signals during a game - a rules violation specifically reiterated by the league in an
offseason advisory. Belichick nonetheless ignored it - blatantly. And then weaseled about his "interpretation" of the
rule. Nixon would have been so proud.
Like Nixon, Belichick didn't need to break the law to win - or did he? The Patriots have claimed three Super Bowls
during his tenure. Were they won fair and square? Or did the Pats get extracurricular assistance?
Still, Belichick has his Super Bowls, just as Barry Bonds has his (tainted) record, just as Sammy Sosa has his
(dubious) 600 dingers, just as Jimmie Johnson guns for a second straight NASCAR championship with serial-cheat
crew chief Chad Knaus at his side.
Not even feel-good stories last long around here. That was Ankiel, the one-time phenom pitcher whose career went
south when his control mysteriously evaporated but who resurfaced in the Cardinals' outfield this summer as a
slugging sensation. Come to find he apparently trafficked in performance enhancers pre-comeback. As if we should
be shocked.
Honest Abe. We revered him then. We'd probably call him a sap now.
THE BOOK OF NORMAN
Academics before athletics; go team!
Norman Chad, Cleveland Plain Dealer, 17 September 2007
To: The University of Maryland
From: Couch Slouch, Class of '81
Re: Fund raising
Recently I received a letter - one of many over the years - asking me to contribute money to my alma mater. Rather
than reply privately - as I have many times over the years - I thought I'd give you my answer here:
No.
My answer will remain the same, for this and any subsequent lifetimes, as long as the school continues to foster,
promote and cultivate big-time intercollegiate football and basketball. I hate to single out Maryland, because it is no
more culpable than any one of dozens of other institutions of higher earning that keep pushing that loaded rock up
the Division I hill, but other schools aren't soliciting me for money.
Since I graduated from College Park a quarter-century ago, I understand academic standards have risen. Similarly,
McDonald's has begun offering healthier menu items. In either case, we're not talking top-shelf education or nutrition.
I have nothing against Ralph Friedgen or Gary Williams. Coaching is their profession; they are paid to produce
winning teams. But this type of activity is inappropriate at the university level. Until you change the culture of athletic
worship, you cannot meet the challenges of the outside world.
I know, I know: Who doesn't lap up the pageantry of college football on a fall Saturday afternoon? Who doesn't get
swept away in March Madness and the Final Four? Please. The height of hypocrisy - as disingenuous a pursuit as
any - college football and college basketball have nothing to do with college. They aren't student-athletes; they are
athletes paid practically nothing to create massive revenue for the school. They are minimum-wage drivers in the
getaway car to the bank - and they don't even have any auto insurance.
Our priorities are screwed up. We spend far too much time on fumbles and fast breaks. Why should a football coach
be the face of the university? Why not an electrical and computer engineer who is doing breakthrough work in the
areas of magnetism, nanotechnology and biochemical detection?
Should a bigger weight room ever be a priority? Do we even need a weight room? They're student-athletes - have
them lift some books once in a while! Start with thin volumes, like "The Cat in the Hat" and "The Old Man and the
Sea," and have them work their way up to "Look Homeward, Angel" and "Moby Dick." Heck, the O-line should be
able to bench-press "Don Quixote" by midseason.
Alas, we need to chart a new course.
Vanderbilt blew up its athletic department. You know what that's called? A nice start.
Eastern Tennessee State dropped its football program. So have Boston University, Morris Brown and Cal State
Northridge. If you visit those campuses, you'll find scholarly and blissful students going to science classes and sock
hops!
I don't expect you to disband the football and basketball programs tomorrow, though that's the goal. At the moment
I'd like to talk about the American Journalism Review, the media journal run by the University of Maryland
Foundation.
I recently read that AJR might have to cease publishing - it's $200,000 in the red. Two-hundred grand? That's three
days of meals for the football team. Can't someone step up here? If the football team gets, say, an extra quarter-
million dollars a year in funding, maybe it goes from 7-4 to 8-3. What's that, the difference between the Meineke Car
Care Bowl and the Roady's Humanitarian Bowl? But if AJR gets that same quarter-million dollars, it can actually
impact the quality of information that flows through the veins of our fledgling democracy.
I'm going to throw in the first $1,000 to get AJR back on its feet. I'm asking some fellow Terps to follow my lead.
P.S. Beat Wake!
U-M professors urge reconsideration of Michigan Stadium expansion
David Gershman, Ann Arbor News, 14 September 2007
Professors opposed to adding luxury boxes to Michigan Stadium have gathered the signatures of 600 faculty and
staff on a petition urging the University of Michigan to reconsider the project.
But U-M administrators say the $226 million project has already been thoroughly debated, it was approved by
regents in June and it is moving ahead.
"One can always reconsider, and that is our hope," said Irwin Goldstein, an emeritus professor of biological
chemistry and former associate dean of the U-M Medical School.
In an e-mail sent earlier this week to all faculty at U-M, Goldstein included a copy of the petition and wrote that U-M
President Mary Sue Coleman and a divided board of regents "rammed through" the massive renovation plan without
open discussion. "Why the Machiavellian measures and obsession with secrecy," the e-mail asked.
On Thursday, Goldstein said 200 people signed the petition in the past few days, bringing the total number of
signatures to 600 faculty and staff. The drive is continuing, he said. He said he understands U-M officials want
what's best for the university, but he believes the project is flawed.
Athletic Director Bill Martin said the professors' opposition comes too late in the process.
"This has been one of the most talked about and debated issues, certainly in my time at Michigan and maybe of all
time, that has gone through a very open and transparent process," Martin said.
Martin said presentations on the plan were made at public meetings in Dearborn, Flint, Grand Rapids and Ann
Arbor, and U-M regents gave their approval at three steps in the process.
"We're moving forward with the project," Martin said.
Goldstein said the project is too costly and he raised questions about how the financing for the athletic department
project would affect academic initiatives. Because U-M backed the project's bond with university funds rather than
athletic department funds, Goldstein said, the principle or interest would be paid from the same budget as
academics if the athletic department can't pay the debt. He also said the bond drives up the cost of borrowing for
academic initiatives.
But Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Timothy Slottow said the project does not interfere with U-
M's ability to borrow money for major new academic projects. He said U-M used the financial strength of the entire
university to lower the long-term cost of the bond, which is financially responsible. The athletic department's financial
plan is conservative, he said.
Athletic department officials expect the 83 luxury boxes and approximately 3,200 indoor and outdoor club seats to
generate more than $14 million annually. That will help pay for improvements throughout the stadium, such as more
concession and restroom facilities, wider aisles and additional concourse space. The most visible change to the 80-
year-old stadium would be the construction of two large structures that will span the east and west sidelines and top
out at 10 feet above the existing scoreboards. Construction is scheduled to begin after the 2007 season.
The project received its final go-ahead with a 6-2 vote of the U-M Board of Regents in June.
While Goldstein's e-mail to the faculty was signed by six other current and former U-M professors, one of them,
James Duderstadt, distanced himself from it, saying his name was added by mistake. Duderstadt, a former U-M
president, said he has raised concerns about adding luxury boxes to Michigan Stadium and commercialization in
intercollegiate athletics, but he said Coleman and the regents acted appropriately in considering the project.
"While the faculty has every right - and indeed, obligation - to debate its important role with respect to intercollegiate
athletics at the university, I believe it inappropriate to focus these discussions on either the process or the
individuals involved in the decision on the Michigan Stadium project," he said in an e-mail to the faculty explaining
his position.
Results with its athletes and academics
Georgia working hard, seeing results with its athletes and academics
David Ching, Columbus Ledger Enquirer, 13 September 2007
ATHENS, Ga. --Joe Cozart admits it -- he's a big Georgia football fan.
Fandom inspires abnormal behavior in many normal people. For Cozart, a Georgia graduate student seeking a PhD
in science education, it's to wake up early in the morning to tutor freshman football players in physics.
"It pays OK, but I wouldn't get up at 7 in the morning for what it pays just to tutor anybody," Cozart said Tuesday
morning after completing a group tutoring session with freshmen Bruce Figgins, Chris Little, Clint Boling, Israel
Troupe and Walter Hill.
"But it's fun to get to know them on a personal level. It makes them seem like normal guys, not as big of a deal. They
looked downright scary the first time I met some of them, but they're just normal guys who happen to be humongous
and good football players."
Cozart is one cog in a massive wheel geared toward keeping Georgia athletes academically eligible and on track to
graduate. That hasn't always been a bright spot at Georgia, where graduation rates for scholarship athletes have
sometimes been unimpressive.
Last year's NCAA graduation success rate (GSR) reports showed that only 41 percent of Georgia football players
and 9 percent of men's basketball players who entered college between 1996 and 1999 would have graduated by
2005. Those totals ranked last in the Southeastern Conference.
Under athletic director Damon Evans, Georgia is dedicating the attention to academics to improve those totals.
How it works
The halls of the Rankin M. Smith Student-Athlete Academic Center buzz each morning with players attending
mandatory study hall and tutoring sessions. Most players are forced to sign in with class checkers prior to class and
freshmen meet with mentors twice weekly to help develop proper time-management and study habits in order to help
them adjust to the rigors of college education.
There is ongoing communication between instructors, academic counselors and coaches to assure that athletes are
getting their work done off the field as well as on.
"We get a report every day on what's going on," Georgia football coach Mark Richt said. "Once a week, every
Thursday, we meet as a staff and we cover every player we have with their academic advisor, every class, and if
there's something to report, we talk about it.
"If a guy has got either an attitude problem or an attendance problem, whatever it is, it starts out with the position
coach handling that type of thing," Richt added. "If a guy becomes a chronic problem, he ends up coming to see me."
More than two unexcused absences to any class net a suspension for 10 percent of the athlete's season. More than
four unexcused absences to study hall, tutoring or mentor sessions also triggers a suspension.
Georgia took unusual measures to prevent a suspension for missing academic appointments. Under a new policy,
each unexcused absence after the second nets a $10 fine. It was a policy that produced immediate results. In a
three-week period immediately after the policy started in January, Georgia athletes missed 46 classes or academic
appointments -- a 90 percent drop from 421 in a three-week period last September.
Gamecock athletic department ramps up study facilities
Pete Iacobelli, Associated Press, 13 September 2007
COLUMBIA, S.C. | An academic center for University of South Carolina athletes opened Thursday at the library,
becoming the first, small sliver of the school's nearly $200 million vision to upgrade its athletic facilities.
A section of the library's second floor underwent a $250,000 renovation for the center, according to Gamecock
athletic director Eric Hyman. The center will serve student athletes until a $13 million academic center is opened in
2009.
Hyman said the athletic department expects to break ground on that building next summer and is hopeful of finishing
before the 2009-10 academic year.
Football coach Steve Spurrier and basketball's Dave Odom were on hand to cut the garnet-and-black ribbon on the
renovated section.
"This is another sign, I believe, that we want our facilities to be at the top level" of the Southeastern Conference,
Spurrier said.
It was last November when Hyman outlined a dramatic overhaul of South Carolina's mostly aging athletic complex.
The ambitious plan came with a hefty price tag: more than $194 million.
The first major structure, when it's finally complete, will be the $24 million baseball field currently being built in the
city along the Congaree River. Hyman said the new ball park, which will replace Sarge Frye Field on campus, should
be completed next year but he would not say if it would be done in time for next baseball season.
Hyman said it became clear that South Carolina's coaches thought the highest priority was improving academic
support - something that could not wait until the more elaborate structure was done.
"Just to do this is sending a message, we do want our people to perform in the classroom," Hyman said.
The new center includes a computer lab with 12 terminals, numerous study and tutoring stations with dry-erase
boards and laptop plug-ins.
"I think the athletes will respond to say, 'This is what the university's done for us. We've got to take advantage of it,'"
Odom said.
They had better. Gone are the days when athletic departments could overlook academics for their top sports
programs. Low grades in the classroom can now mean problems on the field.
The NCAA has begun compiling Academic Progress Reports (APR) that measure eligibility and retention of student
athletes for every program at every Division I school.
Teams scoring less than 925 - the equivalent of a 60-percent graduation rate under the NCAA's formula - receive
warning letters and can face harsher penalties over time, up to disqualification from NCAA tournaments.
"There's no better place to study than the library," said Odom, who starts his seventh season as basketball coach.
"Now, we're in a no excuses" mode.
Odom said the new center, along with the necessary tutors, gives his players and all South Carolina athletes a
strong foundation for achievement. It's also a place coaches can show with pride to prospects and their parents,
Odom said. "Everything's in place now," he said. "All we've got to do is do our job."
Once the larger academic facility is complete, the plans call for the center to be open to all students. However,
Hyman hopes athletes can keep using it when they need the Thomas Cooper Library's resources.
He's just glad there's tangible proof, no matter how small, that progress in department facilities is taking place.
"I don't look at this as a stopgap either," Odom said. "I think this is just a beginning to something even better. But
until that time for better comes, this is going to be more than adequate."