Chip Towers has a pretty damning assessment of the NCAA rule book that caused Georgia to report a secondary violation from Dawg Night as a result of this:
… The alleged infraction took place at the end of UGA’s “Dawg Night” prospect camp on July 16 in Athens. The Bulldogs supposedly ran afoul of NCAA regs when I snapped a picture of assistant coach Stacy Searels posing with recently-committed prospect Zach DeBell at the end of the night. Apparently the key here is that they’re posing arm-in-arm and looking into the camera. For that and other reasons, it was determined to be a violation of Bylaw 13:10.1: “Presence of Media During Recruiting Contact.”
I thought DeBell, who recently turned 17, summed it up best. “I kind of laughed about it really,” the 6-foot-7, 260-pound lineman said. “They told me and I was, like, ‘it’s a violation to take a picture with my coach?’ OK, if you want to violate me for that, go ahead.’”
That being said (and I agree with Towers to some extent), I’m afraid this kind of attitude would get you labeled a “bad guy” if your beat were in Gainesville:
As for my part in it, I have no apologies.
Get The Picture 
Just ask Dustin Johnson about stupid rules.
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You’re dead wrong.
As a PGA professional, it’s my job to know the rules. If I have the slightest doubt, I call a rules official over and get it clarified.
There was a notice in the locker room that ALL bunkers were to be played as hazards, even though it was likely that spectators would stand and/or walk in them.
It’s Dustin Johnson’s fault in two ways- 1)not reading the supplemental rules notice in the locker room and 2) not asking the rules official THAT WAS WALKING WITH HIS GROUP!
He assumed he knew the rule and you know what assume means- it makes an ass out of you and me.
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This is a UGA football fan blog so I do not want to take up much space here with this. However, the bigger question posed by what happened to Dustin Johnson is the silliness of the Rules of Golf themselves, which was the point I was making. Any rule that adds strokes for something you said or did is plain stupid. Penalties for kneeling on a towel (to not get pants dirty) while playing a shot and inadvertently kicking away a rock in a hazard while taking a stance have gotten players who were winning the tournament DQd. The Rules of Golf used to be able to be written on the back of a scorecard. Now they are in a paperback book that is over 100 pages and also a 2 volume bound set called the “Rules Decisions” that is hundreds of pages long. If you hit a tee shot and can’t find it, you are supposed to go back to the tee and hit again. Try that on a weekend at your local muny and you might get a knuckle sandwich. If you think the Rules of Golf are OK as they are now then I feel sorry for you because you are a sicko. By the way, even if all bunkers were to be played as hazards that patch of sand sure didn’t look like a bunker and the Rules guy was AWOL at the time. If that thing was a bunker then the muny I grew up playing had 1000 bunkers on it, too.
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Go look at the videotape.
He was standing right there. It is not his job to tell the players the rules; it is his job to interpret them for the players if they ask.
It’s the player’s fault, nobody else’s.
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How many times did Dustin Johnson hit the ball on that hole? Five times. He made a five. Adding two strokes for a supposed rules infraction where he got no benefit from the supposed infraction is worse than stupid. It misstates the truth about what actually happened. If you address the ball on an iron shot and by accident the ball moves you are supposed to put it back exactly where it was and in the same lie, but then you are assessed a 1 stroke penalty. Why? You put the ball back exactly where it was and have gotten no undue benefit yet you are penalized. But if you address you tee shot and accidentally knock the ball off the tee you replace it without penalty. Does that make sense? Stupid rules made by self-important USGA snobs are ruining a great game. The 2010 PGA Championship is just the latest example.
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Sorry, but if I know about that rule, Chip Towers damn sure should know about it.
No more camera for you, Chippy.
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Dumb rule? Yes. The dumbest rule? Perhaps. Foolish of Coach Searels to not know the rule? ABSOLUTELY. I tend to judge a rule’s obscurity by whether or not I knew about it beforehand, and I knew this one.
How did I know it was a violation? Once upon a time I had to go to a sports banquet where the featured speaker was none other than Georgia Tech head coach Chan Gailey. Before the dinner, fans had the opportunity to pose for pictures with the coach. I declined, not feeling confident in my ability to restrain myself from throwing my arms around him and begging him to coach Tech for-ev-er and then asking him to sign my 51-7 T-Shirt. But, I was standing nearby when Gailey refused to take a picture with one of the high school stars from the area. This was in Dalton, and the player was Cam Mayo, who ended up signing at Tennessee. I started asking people if Mayo had slighted Tech in some way in the recruiting process, and then I had this stupid NCAA rule about coaches posing for pictures with potential recruits. Laughable, but hey, Gailey knew the rules and he was on the alert.
The NCAA needs to take a machete to the rule book. But until then, it simply isn’t an excuse to not know the rules. Searels should have known the rule, and frankly, *TOWERS* should have known it, too, and not put the coach and player in that position to begin with. I think it’s reasonable to expect a reporter to familiarize himself with the rules governing media issues like photographs and act accordingly.
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+1.
Good post.
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The NCAA rule book is only slightly shorter than the tax code. It’s not possible for anyone to know every rule. Especially the minor rules, such as this one.
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Did you ask Chan Gailey to touch your baby?
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There is no person to blame in this situation, especially not Coach Searels. The picture for which the recruit and his future coach were posing was taken by a family member, an action completely in line with the rules. Chip, as described on his blog, came up behind the family member and snapped a photo on his own accord. It’s not like they were posing specifically for him. So in this situation is Stacy Searels supposed to police every media personality walking around with a camera?
If you want to blame something, blame the asinine rulebook.
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But pictures of a Playmate in the locker room are ok?
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Those are always okay. 🙂
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+1.
Good post.
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I’m just a little concerned that DeBell is asking someone to violate him …
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Perhaps he meant violate only as in the “Orange Pride Hostess” style of violation.
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Perhaps he meant violate only as in the Spurrier-says bring it on, “poke on everything” Hotel Whitney style of violation.
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Tempest in a teapot. Reporters are probably as bored with the off season as the rest of us but they have to write about something. Got to pay the rent, you know. Does the NCAA need to modernize and simplify the rule book? Of course. But when has that group of eggheads ever simplified anything?
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