Included in Andy Staples’ sad but true guide to avoiding NCAA sanctions is this gem:
5. Plausible deniability is your greatest ally
Butch Davis’ name doesn’t appear in the NCAA’s notice of allegations against North Carolina despite what appears to be widespread corruption in the football program. That’s because Davis — as far as we know — built enough walls to keep himself from getting tarred. Young assistants, remember this and you’ll go far. The head coach never meets the money guy. He never meets the handler. He never meets the agent runners. All business is conducted through assistants and lower-level employees. That way, no one can count phone calls between the coach and the handler on phone lines whose records are public because of state open records laws. We know exactly how many times Tressel corresponded with Terrelle Pryor’s handler, Ted Sarniak, and we know exactly how many times Oregon’s Kelly called or texted Lyles. Head coaches, whatever you do, DON’T SEND THE HANDLER A HANDWRITTEN NOTE THANKING HIM FOR “ORCHESTRATING” SOMETHING. I’m looking at you, Chip Kelly. Follow this rule, and you can escape a scandal by sacrificing an assistant or an athletic department employee. Just remember the sacrificial lambs always must get paid…
Remember, institutional cluelessness isn’t always a state of mind. Sometimes it’s a deliberate strategy. Not that we should expect the NCAA to be able to tell the difference.
Get The Picture 
And in the case of the NCAA, institutional cluelessness is an un-deliberate strategy and state of mind.
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As we all know, shit rolls downhill. The NCAA learned this from a consulting firm. The following diagram illustrates exactly how this process takes place in consulting firms. This diagram may be easily be adapted for use by the NCAA, targeted head coaches and member schools in enforcement matters to validate plausible deniability defenses
http://www.caseinterviewace.com/powerpoints/downhill/downhill.ppt
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Like, far out dude. That’s some heavy shit.
I have one disagreement. Shit doesn’t always roll down hill. Sometimes it flows.
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Deny deny deny then when you are caught keep on denying, then fire a subordinate. The worst the mess the higher the subordinate that must be fired, it’s like an old Aztec human sacrifice thing the worst the sin the more you sacrifice. Off with their heads to appease the NCAA. If you keep firing higher and higher subordinates the NCAA is made to thing you give a Sh*T.
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Dog in Fla-We have too much in common not to meet. Is there a way? School, politics and now consulting. Technically consulted in R&D, Man., and QA for over 10 yrs in the US and various countries where US clients were located. Your crude graphs are not so crude if you have extensive experience in shit. The abscissa and ordinate labeling were especially shitty. Final Reports were always dipped in shit, but solved the problem affecting the client. They were always impressed by my aggressive unrelenting attack toward solving problems such that more than one labeled me as a bulldog. Before finishing they would know me as their Georgia Bulldog because I never lost my accent(which is also a liability in some ignorant circles).
Butch has too much experience as an N-Caa fighter and Student Hospitality Helper Enwheeling Insipid Telekinesis (SHEIIT!) which involves circling the wagons and moving innane things with your mind involving recruiting. While cleaning up after Jimmy at Miami, he kept a few instuctive items for future use. He just cashed them in.
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heh…I’m not a consultant in real life, I only play one here this morning and the graph was not mine. I stole it from the ‘shit rolls downhill’ quest for knowledge off the series of tubes (R.I.P Ted) that is the internets
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The Staples piece was entertaining, and it gets to something I’ve often wondered; just how dirty is college football? As he points out, it’s ridiculously easy to get away with cheating. In fact, it’s probably easier to get away with it the more intent you are on committing it.
So how pervasive is the rule breaking? I tend to think that every single school that competes in Div 1 has some element that is intentionally breaking the rules to gain an advantage. Not every head coach, or even coaching staff, is involved, but the idea of the schools being able to monitor the activities of everyone outside the organization who has an interest in their success, i.e. boosters, is laughable. Throw in the aspect of players not being paid for their services, and the situation almost begs for abuse.
I think that we’ve come to accept that. In most of these scandal stories as much if not more of the outrage seems to be based on the fact that the parties allowed themselves to be caught, rather than horror at the crimes they’ve committed. Like a politician caught in an affair, we’re hardly surprised they did it, just that they could be so careless as to be exposed.
The NCAA can do whatever they want to Chip Kelly or Jim Tressel, it won’t change anything. Everyone knows the death penalty is off the table. The incentive, the ability, and the rationalization are ubiquitous in college football, and as long as that’s the case, so too the cheating.
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Doesn’t Auburn have a Masters program in this?
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Mayor of WHAT?
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Oops. Misspelling corrected.
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Da nerve of dat guy! Suggestin’ dat I ain’t smart anuff to cheat right! I’m smaaaarrrt. Dem NCdoubleA guys ain’t got nuttin’ on me or my Ducks. I got writtin proof dat what we paid for was legit recruitin’ info. So what if it was lousy info? We got a bad deal on da info is all. Nuttin’ here to see.
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