Ohio State banned from postseason play in 2012

[Muck]

I heard Pryor has been disassociated from the OSU program for 5 years so he's not permitted on campus.

That happened over the summer. He's not allowed contact with the athletic department but AFAIK he's not barred from the school.

 

[Lonnie Utah]

Someone mentioned in another thread (it got closed) that they felt bad for the kids who are there and didn't have anything to do with it, citing that everybody involved has left the program. I'd just like to point out that it still wouldn't be right to not hit tOSU with sanctions regardless of who is there and who isn't. The point of sanctions is deter any kind of 'illegal' behavior as deemed by NCAA rules. A debate over whether these rules are fair or justly applied to universities is one thing, but as everything stands now they're what people have to do deal with. If you don't apply sanctions, you're essentially saying they can break the rules as long as everybody involved is fired or leaves.

The NCAA really is in a catch 22 when it hands out punishment. This case and USC are prime examples of it. The people who perpetrated the acts for the most part are long gone and hardly had to pay a dime, while the guys left behind have to pay for they're transgressions. You've got to punish the program some how but post season bans have a lot of collateral damage with them. Scholies, probation, and some form of monetary punishment are probably the best way to hit the program and not affect current students. But you can only go so far with those before you border on the death penalty for a program.

5 year show cause for Coach Tressle is pretty much a death sentence for his career, at least as far as the college game is concerned.

 

[MasterPulverizer]

I haven't seen a comparison to the USC penalties that came down 2 years ago on this thread. So, is the OSU punishment more or less fair than the USC punishment from 2 years ago.

ESPN had a guy on last night saying OSU got off easy considering the number of players involved, the level of coaching that knew about the violations, and that the ring leader totally escaped punishment. Yeah, these were tattoos and cars, not a $750K house for Toilet Paper's parents, but still, Tressel knew about it and didn't report it.

I could go either way and ultimately OSU and USC will turn out just fine. I'm interested to hear the responses.

 

[BOJ]

Came across a tweet yesterday from a sports writer (name escapes me at the moment) suggesting that the NCAA should get more creative in punishments by fining the institutions. He felt that if the NCAA started hitting schools in the wallet instead of making current players pay for failures that happened in the past (scholarship reductions, bowl bans,etc), it might make schools redefine how they operate their compliance departments. I guess the motivation would be that if you're sitting on a mountain full of athletic department $$, you'd best make sure your compliance department is on top of everything, or else the NCAA will start taking $$ from said mountain.

Thing I see wrong with that is it would have to be some sort of proportional payment. There is no doubt that compliance would probably change, but fining an Ohio State is far different from fining a Boise State (both of which had recent transgressions). OSU can definitely afford more of a fine than Boise State can. So if both schools had the exact same wrongdoing and both were fined the same amount someone is actually getting hit more than the other.

Second, if a sports team does something so incredibly stupid that a compliance department could not catch it could put a serious damper on other things for the school if the school has to take money out of its general fund to pay for some stupid athlete. Again this would affect schools differently, some athletic departments are self-sufficient while others are not. Theoretically, it would either work to instill a more hardcore compliance department, but it could also kill an entire athletic department (if we want to do that, might as well bring back the death penalty).

Certainly an interesting idea that should be researched though.

 

[jaws]

Came across a tweet yesterday from a sports writer (name escapes me at the moment) suggesting that the NCAA should get more creative in punishments by fining the institutions. He felt that if the NCAA started hitting schools in the wallet instead of making current players pay for failures that happened in the past (scholarship reductions, bowl bans,etc), it might make schools redefine how they operate their compliance departments. I guess the motivation would be that if you're sitting on a mountain full of athletic department $$, you'd best make sure your compliance department is on top of everything, or else the NCAA will start taking $$ from said mountain.

That works in theory but you have people running some of these programs with low morals. A school could set aside money for the shady stuff they do. So basically you are buying the right to cheat.

In essence the bowl ban does just that and more. They lose out on the money they could have eared from a B1G championship game appearance and a BCS appearance if they were so fortunate to make it to one or both of those games.

 

[ZRod]

5 year show cause for Coach Tressle is pretty much a death sentence for his career, at least as far as the college game is concerned.

But that's the problem, he could probably do just about anything he wanted in the NFL there's always somebody with out morals there. And then that 5 years doesn't really mean jack it's just a mark on his resume. I know some people want separation of the NCAA and NFL when it comes to punishment but how can you expect to set an example when someone can just run away from the punishment, and in the case of Pryor be better off than when they started.

 

[jaws]

I haven't seen a comparison to the USC penalties that came down 2 years ago on this thread. So, is the OSU punishment more or less fair than the USC punishment from 2 years ago.

ESPN had a guy on last night saying OSU got off easy considering the number of players involved, the level of coaching that knew about the violations, and that the ring leader totally escaped punishment. Yeah, these were tattoos and cars, not a $750K house for Toilet Paper's parents, but still, Tressel knew about it and didn't report it.

I could go either way and ultimately OSU and USC will turn out just fine. I'm interested to hear the responses.

Are you saying that Todd McNair (USC Assistant coach) didn't know about what was going on with Reggie Bush? The fact that USC involved agents and high profile athletes in TWO different sports is what got USC in more trouble. If someone on the OSU basketball team were involved with the same stuff as the football players, the hammer would have been really dropped on OSU.

 

[Muck]

ESPN

The next time ESPN has something even remotely accurate in regards to Ohio State will be the first time.

The majority of the punishments that have been leveled against various individuals (Posey etc) were higher than what the past precedents set by the NCAA.

 

[BOJ]

Came across a tweet yesterday from a sports writer (name escapes me at the moment) suggesting that the NCAA should get more creative in punishments by fining the institutions. He felt that if the NCAA started hitting schools in the wallet instead of making current players pay for failures that happened in the past (scholarship reductions, bowl bans,etc), it might make schools redefine how they operate their compliance departments. I guess the motivation would be that if you're sitting on a mountain full of athletic department $$, you'd best make sure your compliance department is on top of everything, or else the NCAA will start taking $$ from said mountain.

That works in theory but you have people running some of these programs with low morals. A school could set aside money for the shady stuff they do. So basically you are buying the right to cheat.

In essence the bowl ban does just that and more. They lose out on the money they could have eared from a B1G championship game appearance and a BCS appearance if they were so fortunate to make it to one or both of those games.

I actually don't think that would be much of an issue because there would be too much individual liability for the trustees to allow something like that to happen. While maybe a rogue AD would do something like that, the board of trustees allowing that to happen, I just don't see.

 

[NUance]

Came across a tweet yesterday from a sports writer (name escapes me at the moment) suggesting that the NCAA should get more creative in punishments by fining the institutions. He felt that if the NCAA started hitting schools in the wallet instead of making current players pay for failures that happened in the past (scholarship reductions, bowl bans,etc), it might make schools redefine how they operate their compliance departments. I guess the motivation would be that if you're sitting on a mountain full of athletic department $$, you'd best make sure your compliance department is on top of everything, or else the NCAA will start taking $$ from said mountain.

That works in theory but you have people running some of these programs with low morals. A school could set aside money for the shady stuff they do. So basically you are buying the right to cheat.

In essence the bowl ban does just that and more. They lose out on the money they could have eared from a B1G championship game appearance and a BCS appearance if they were so fortunate to make it to one or both of those games.

I actually don't think that would be much of an issue because there would be too much individual liability for the trustees to allow something like that to happen. While maybe a rogue AD would do something like that, the board of trustees allowing that to happen, I just don't see.

It seems kind of farfetched that a trustee could be culpable for a football scandal. So maybe a money fine would actually work. But offending schools shouldn't be able to pay a fine and get away scott-free. So maybe a bowl limitation rather than post season ban. Say, instead of banning bowls entirely, just limit a guilty team to bowls that take place before Christmas Eve. In other words, bowls that suck. The Beef O-Brady Bowl would have been a lot more interesting of the Buckeyes had been playing. Maybe a bit lopsided. But more interesting.

 

[BOJ]

Came across a tweet yesterday from a sports writer (name escapes me at the moment) suggesting that the NCAA should get more creative in punishments by fining the institutions. He felt that if the NCAA started hitting schools in the wallet instead of making current players pay for failures that happened in the past (scholarship reductions, bowl bans,etc), it might make schools redefine how they operate their compliance departments. I guess the motivation would be that if you're sitting on a mountain full of athletic department $$, you'd best make sure your compliance department is on top of everything, or else the NCAA will start taking $$ from said mountain.

That works in theory but you have people running some of these programs with low morals. A school could set aside money for the shady stuff they do. So basically you are buying the right to cheat.

In essence the bowl ban does just that and more. They lose out on the money they could have eared from a B1G championship game appearance and a BCS appearance if they were so fortunate to make it to one or both of those games.

I actually don't think that would be much of an issue because there would be too much individual liability for the trustees to allow something like that to happen. While maybe a rogue AD would do something like that, the board of trustees allowing that to happen, I just don't see.

It seems kind of farfetched that a trustee could be culpable for a football scandal. So maybe a money fine would actually work. But offending schools shouldn't be able to pay a fine and get away scott-free. So maybe a bowl limitation rather than post season ban. Say, instead of banning bowls entirely, just limit a guilty team to bowls that take place before Christmas Eve. In other words, bowls that suck. The Beef O-Brady Bowl would have been a lot more interesting of the Buckeyes had been playing. Maybe a bit lopsided. But more interesting.

Oh, I meant the board of trustees wouldn't allow a financial account to just hold money so the school could willingly break rules. They are trustees so they do have a fiduciary duty to the school and there would be a pretty solid argument for a breach of fiduciary duty on the trustees' part if they allowed the athletic department to bankroll a cheating account. Not saying for sure it would be a breach, but certainly arguable, and if its legally arguable, no trustee wants to participate in that.

Edit: I should add that if the trustees breach their fiduciary duty they are individually liable (though, the most likely have insurance).

 

[Muck]

It seems kind of farfetched that a trustee could be culpable for a football scandal.

Bobby Lowder likes the way you think!

 

[MasterPulverizer]

I haven't seen a comparison to the USC penalties that came down 2 years ago on this thread. So, is the OSU punishment more or less fair than the USC punishment from 2 years ago.

ESPN had a guy on last night saying OSU got off easy considering the number of players involved, the level of coaching that knew about the violations, and that the ring leader totally escaped punishment. Yeah, these were tattoos and cars, not a $750K house for Toilet Paper's parents, but still, Tressel knew about it and didn't report it.

I could go either way and ultimately OSU and USC will turn out just fine. I'm interested to hear the responses.

Are you saying that Todd McNair (USC Assistant coach) didn't know about what was going on with Reggie Bush? The fact that USC involved agents and high profile athletes in TWO different sports is what got USC in more trouble. If someone on the OSU basketball team were involved with the same stuff as the football players, the hammer would have been really dropped on OSU.

I'm not saying anything. You made your point, though, that an assistant coach knowing about Reggie Bush is worse than the head coach at OSU knowing about TP & the other guys.

 

[jaws]

I haven't seen a comparison to the USC penalties that came down 2 years ago on this thread. So, is the OSU punishment more or less fair than the USC punishment from 2 years ago.

ESPN had a guy on last night saying OSU got off easy considering the number of players involved, the level of coaching that knew about the violations, and that the ring leader totally escaped punishment. Yeah, these were tattoos and cars, not a $750K house for Toilet Paper's parents, but still, Tressel knew about it and didn't report it.

I could go either way and ultimately OSU and USC will turn out just fine. I'm interested to hear the responses.

Are you saying that Todd McNair (USC Assistant coach) didn't know about what was going on with Reggie Bush? The fact that USC involved agents and high profile athletes in TWO different sports is what got USC in more trouble. If someone on the OSU basketball team were involved with the same stuff as the football players, the hammer would have been really dropped on OSU.

I'm not saying anything. You made your point, though, that an assistant coach knowing about Reggie Bush is worse than the head coach at OSU knowing about TP & the other guys.

No, that isn't my point, There was contact between a student athlete and an agent and money changed hands. Add to that, a paid school official knew it happened and did nothing about it. It doesn't matter if you are the head coach or a running backs coach, when someone paid by the school knows, he has an obligation to bring that information to his superiors.

 

[NUance]

It seems kind of farfetched that a trustee could be culpable for a football scandal.

Bobby Lowder likes the way you think!

I wasn't aware of the Bobby Lowder story. LINK In fact I wasn't aware that the slimy underbelly of the SEC was so ... slimy.