Friday morning buffet

The tidbits, the tidbits!

• So how’s that whole Dream Team thing working out?
• Malik Ramik Wilson progresses at inside linebacker.
• Of all the lists I’ve seen, this is certainly one of them.
• Mike Gundy almost left Oklahoma State for Tennessee because of non-conference scheduling.
• Tony Barnhart wants you to know something:  “The SEC West is the toughest division in the toughest college football conference in America. This is not debatable.”  They don’t call him Mr. Conventional Wisdom for nothing, folks.
• Florida State’s DeMarcus Walker claims Alabama jammed him up with the NCAA.  Is there anything to that?  John Infante says the Tide had the means, but there’s no way to know about the motive.
• Todd Gurley was banged up at the end of last season… not that you could have known from his production on the field.
• Jeez, this is a creepy story.

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Tuesday morning buffet

Sidle on up and grab you a plate.

• DeLoss Dodds says Texas won’t schedule a game with Texas A&M because the Longhorns’ fans have hurt fee-fees.
• John Infante asks a good question about what the NCAA’s Board of Directors is up to with regard to suspending some of the new recruiting rules.
• T. Boone Pickens, whatta guy.
• I definitely don’t have a dog in this fight.
• John Helyar’s got a story that’s worth a read on the NFL’s relationship with Riddell and whether that might have played a part in undermining a company that produced a concussion-preventing helmet.
• Ole Miss getting a big head after a 7-6 season?  Oy.
• The Mountain West still ain’t happy with Mark Emmert.
• Cam Cameron on Zach Mettenberger:  film don’t lie.

“Don’t get out ahead of us.”

I’m not sure this story has gotten as much attention as it perhaps deserves, in part because the major thrust of it seems to be about restricting colleges in Georgia from adding sports programs or changing competition levels, but it’s worth noting that the state Board of Regents has decided it wants to get in the athletic department budget management business, too.

Moving forward, the University System of Georgia will periodically review athletic programs for “financial and program soundness.” There will also be annual audits of separately incorporated athletic associations. It’s too soon to say what will happen to programs found to have financial problems.

Huckaby said the policy shows the board’s commitment to making sure the money students, donors and others provide is used properly.

“Used properly” is one of those eye-of-the-beholder standards.  I’m guessing that Hank Huckaby and Mark Richt aren’t always going to agree on how athletic department moneys will be spent, and that’s going to be tough luck for Mark Richt.  Of course he’s not going to hear about it directly from the regents, because they’ll use the school presidents as their cutoffs.  Which is why I tend to discount Bernard, Jr.’s bow to academics and expect there’s something, um, more political behind this.

Georgia is one of the few fortunate schools making money off its athletics.  In an era when its new president is sensitive to money issues resulting from less and less public support for the university system as time goes by, siphoning off some of those profits that football generates sure could come in handy.  And that’s something I doubt the BOR has missed.

Maybe I’m getting too far ahead of things here.  But at a minimum, it’ll be worth keeping a close eye on this over the next few years, especially since prospects for Georgia’s athletic department to continue as a golden goose look ever stronger.

Knowledge is good.

Malkom Parrish is a south Georgia kid being recruited by the Dawgs and by Georgia Tech.  He’s worth keeping an eye on, simply because of this quote:

How do Georgia Tech and UGA compare? “Aww, I can’t really compare them,” Parris said. “I know Georgia Tech has a higher learning than Georgia…”

The StingTalk board threads write themselves, don’t they?  Regardless of where he winds up.  Although I kind of hope the Johnson Doctrine comes into play.  As once said to Bogie, it’s the romantic in me.

Mike Bobo is offensive.

Honestly, when’s the last time you heard Georgia players talking about their offense like this?

Senior receiver Marlon Brown recalled the summer practice when Bobo revealed the new wrinkles.

“When he called ‘rifle,’ I was like, ‘We’re doing rifle this year? We’re going four wide this year?’ And everybody was real happy,” Brown said, grinning. “At first, I thought he was experimenting, but when we kept doing it in practice, I was like, ‘It’s in the playbook now.’ And in the second half at Missouri, we started calling it a little more, and it started working.”

Then came the pistol formation the following week against Florida Atlantic.

“It was out of nowhere for us,” Brown said. “We were walking through the plays, and Bobo signaled some signal, and I was like, ‘What was that?’ (Bobo said) ‘It’s the pistol.’

“ ‘Like pistol, with the running back behind the quarterback? OK, it’s something different.’ ”

So, Brown is asked, what’s gotten into Bobo?

“I don’t know, but I like it, whatever it is,” he said.

And this?

“You run an offense based on what you have,” quarterback Aaron Murray said. “And if we have tons of receivers, which we do, you want to spread teams out and be able to use your weapons. And if you don’t have a lot of receivers, you know you’re gonna have to be in the I. I think right now, we have so many options, so much talent, he has the ability to spread things out and try new things. And we’re trying stuff all the time — (Monday) we were trying new things.”

And this?

Even the Georgia defensive players have taken notice of the new offensive chicanery.

“Coach (Todd) Grantham is having to reel us back in because we’re tilting to the side, trying to see what’s happening,” linebacker Christian Robinson said.

Of course, it’s way too early to assert that the page has been turned for good, but I would think even the most rabid anti-Bobo partisan would have to admit the results to date are a cause for optimism.  (Along those lines, check out Brian Fremeau’s scoring margin numbers.  See a team better than Georgia’s 90.6 on offense?  Me neither.)

Okay, maybe not the most rabid partisan.

Tyler (Athens,Ga)

David What kind of discipline will Mike Bobo get for the recruiting violation he committed recently? Hopefully he will get fired.

Keep on keeping it real, Dawgnation.

Actions have consequences, even for Mark Emmert.

For those of you who don’t see the can of worms Mark Emmert opened with the decision to bypass the usual NCAA enforcement process in the wake of the PSU scandal, maybe a couple of points raised in this Pat Forde column will help illustrate what I’ve argued.

First, from Emmert’s own lips:

“One of the grave dangers stemming from our love of sports is the sports themselves can become too big to fail and too big to even challenge. The result can be an erosion of academic values that are replaced by hero worship and winning at all costs.”  [Emphasis added.]

As Forde notes, how can you play the academic card and then remain inactive in the face of the North Carolina scandal?

But here’s the real issue that Emmert has created:

And now that a “Damn the Rulebook, Do What’s Right” precedent has been established, is North Carolina’s sad academic sandal a logical second act for the Emmert Posse?

If not, I’d say the NCAA has some explaining to do. So does Josephine Potuto.

Potuto is a former NCAA Committee on Infractions member and chairwoman, and currently is the NCAA faculty athletic representative at Nebraska. She told Yahoo! Sports last month that she’s concerned about the precedent the Penn State ruling sets for the NCAA to jump outside its standard operating procedures. Now, Potuto said, the NCAA will have to explain itself every time it chooses not to get involved in an athletic issue on campus that is not directly related to NCAA bylaws.

Whether the NCAA decides to act or not in North Carolina’s case, it’s going to have to rationalize the call publicly either way or risk further erosion to its credibility – assuming Emmert cares about that, of course.

Mark Emmert’s “Pandora’s Box”

Matt Hayes pretty much nails the NCAA’s new problem:

But there’s no avoiding academic fraud; no escape from what it exposes and how it jeopardizes the lifeblood of a multi-billion dollar, tax-exempt industry. There’s no denying the reality that if this unthinkable case of academic fraud is happening at North Carolina, where else is it hiding?

It’s easy to get emotional about a pedophile, and make snap decisions in the name of children. It resonates with everyone and produces instant credibility—no matter how skewed the process.

What happens when Emmert has to make a real decision? What happens when the very existence of college sports comes into play and the general public isn’t as engaged as Joe Sixpack was with Penn State?

Hayes is right about the reaction to child rape being an easy one, but there’s another reason that’s the case.  It’s rare, relatively speaking.  There aren’t a bunch of Jerry Sanduskys running around with schools casting blind eyes to that.

Academic scandals, however?  That cuts a lot closer to home in a lot more places.  My bet is Emmert cuts back on the self-righteousness big time, assuming he’s even moved to do something about North Carolina in the first place.

Monday morning buffet

Commence noshing.

• Surprisingly, Arkansas has only sold out two of its home games for this season.
• Junior decides being a Coaches Poll voter ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.
• The SEC – Year of the Quarterback meme gathers speed.
• “I hate to admit this, but I got that from Urban Meyer at Ohio State last year in the indoor facility.”
• John Infante tells you the questions you should be asking about the Jovon Robinson mess.
• Penn State trustees grumble about being put between a rock and a hard place; NCAA yawns.
• Does style of play affect red zone efficiency?
• The low bar of Ted Roof:  “I feel like I know a lot more about the game, and that comes with Coach VanGorder and Coach Martinez…”
• Mark Richt has lost control of beer pong.

No comment.

The Pensacola paper does a follow-up on the Darius Paige story, but can’t get anyone to comment on the record, other than people at his old school.  The list of those not responding?

• Paige
• Paige’s father
• The University of Alabama
• The Alabama High School Athletic Association (which wouldn’t even comment about whether it had been contacted about the transfer)
• The NCAA

The News Journal has made a public records request for all electronic correspondence between Faucheaux and the Florida High School Athletic Association, AHSAA, NCAA and University of Alabama. That request currently is pending.

Stick with it, fellas.  That much silence is pretty eloquent.

Maybe it’s not sexy…

Mr. Emmert, with all that culture changing you’re so jazzed up about, any possibility this is on your radar?

Former Washington High defensive tackle and Alabama verbal commitment Darius Paige is headed to Foley High School in Alabama.

But that’s only the beginning of the story.

Washington High assistant coach George Schellang confirmed Tuesday afternoon that Paige withdrew from Washington and will be transferring to Foley High.

“Today, (Darius’) dad came in and withdrew him,” Schellang said. “He just came in and cleared out his locker. I saw the withdrawal form and it said he was withdrawing to attend Foley High. All of his transcripts are being sent to Foley.”

Schellang also confirmed that Paige first approached him during the summer about moving to Foley, saying it was recommended to him by Alabama assistant coach Jeremy Pruitt, who at the time was recruiting Paige.

“Darius came in the office one day during the summer after coach (Mike) Smith left and sat down and told me coach Pruitt, who is the Alabama coach who was recruiting him, wanted him to go to Foley High School,” Schellang said. “Basically, he said (Foley High) could take care of him academically.

“My reaction was shock and dismay that a Division I coach would tell a high school athlete that he needed to transfer, that they had people there to help.”

Shock and dismay?  But Alabama isn’t any ordinary Division I school, sir.

How much of this is true?  Who knows.  But one thing you can bet on – the NCAA’s lack of interest.