Les, in your sacred quest for SEC fairness, you could be a real mensch and advocate that the conference schools immediately drop their individual drug policies. What was that? Sorry, I couldn’t hear you over the crickets.
Of course, that’s not gonna happen for one simple reason: if SEC schools don’t test for marijuana, then that responsibility falls to the NCAA, and the NCAA penalty for drug use is an automatic one-year suspension. The SEC, like nature, abhors a vacuum.
So what you’re left with is a hodge-podge of procedures and punishments determined by each school. And that’s how they like it.
SEC Commissioner Mike Slive said a conference-wide standard has been discussed at least twice during his 10-year tenure but that league members have opted against one to this point.
It’s sort of like letting local governments decide things important to their constituents. Who wants some SEC bureaucrat deciding whether a star linebacker has to sit for toking a little weed when “Alabama allows the athletic director, head coach and its Sports Medicine Committee to determine what, if any, penalty is warranted after a first positive test”? It’s always easier when the decision makers are the constituents.
By the way, this has to be my favorite drug penalty evah:
Currently, a second positive test at Mississippi might simply mean the loss of free tickets for family and/or community service.
They actually need a “might” and an “and/or” for that. Tough stuff, indeed.
Ladies and gentlemen (and Les), this is your SEC. Cherish it. After you stop chuckling, that is.
Get The Picture 
The inability, or unwillingness, to address the drug issue is all you need to know about the lack of leadership in the SEC. How 14 ADs and Presidents can walk away from setting a tough, non-yielding standard on disciplinary issues is beyond me. My comment is about what the law should be, just that not following rules should have a consistent punishment. Schools like UT, SC, and Florida in our division have made a mockery of disciplining athletes by allowing several chances, or choosing which games punishment will be administered. It is just as bad in the West, with The aU, Bama, and LSU.
Are these guys really adults? Are they considered leaders? Do they run their homes this way?
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Should be “NOT about what the law (s) should be”. (I personally think the drinking age should be 18, and there should be more relaxed marijuana laws, but discipline is adhering to the laws and being held equally accountable. But just because I felt that way did not drive me to raise my children to break laws that we did not feel were just.)
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Actually, they probably do.
It’s easy to be tough on drugs until it’s your own kid who gets arrested.
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“How 14 ADs and Presidents can walk away from setting a tough, non-yielding standard on disciplinary issues is beyond me.”
$
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Governance in the SEC has devolved into Lord of the Flies, with Mike Slive playing the role of Piggy. He professes to strive toward structure, justice, organizing principles by which the league will operate — but at the end of the day is just a nut-less, craven and ultimately powerless voice in the midst of actors who crassly pursue bald self-interest at every turn. Of course, I am beginning to think this analogy is an insult to Piggy, who actually believed the things he said. Whereas, Slive seems to be as soul-less as the rest of them – exhibit A might be his contemptible effort during Cam-gate.
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This is why we should always ask questions about articles, such as “what is the slant and possible bias?” Does the article compare SEC penalties to other schools? Let’s look at the lead-in about no SEC schools matching the NCAA one year suspension. No BCS school does.
Aol Fanhouse actually received the drug use penalties from 60/68 BCS schools (Pitt didn’t reply, and of the 8 private schools, only Duke replied). http://www.aolnews.com/2010/12/20/fanhouse-report-bcs-football-program-drug-policies-revealed/
In fact, if you break down the numbers, the SEC is inline if not harsher than almost all BCS conferences. In the below list, teams not dismissing in the 3rd offense allow a player to go to a 4th of even 5th offense.
ACC: 11 respondents
1/11 punish on a first offense
10/11 punish on a second offense (Avg suspension 1.7 games)
6/11 dismiss on a 3rd offense
Big East: 7 respondents
1/7 punish on a first offense
7/7 punish on a second offense (Avg suspension 1.6 games)
4/7 dismiss on a 3rd offense
Big Ten: 11 respondents
0/11 punish on a first offense
10/11 punish on a second offense (Avg suspension 1.5 games)
4/11 dismiss on a 3rd offense
Big Twelve: 8 respondents
1/8 punish on a first offense
8/8 punish on a second offense (Avg suspension 1 game)
6/8 dismiss on a 3rd offense
Pac-12: 10 respondents
0/10 punish on a first offense
9/10 punish on a second offense (Avg suspension 2.6 games)
4/10 dismiss on a 3rd offense
SEC: 13 respondents
2/13 punish on a first offense
12/13 punish on a second offense (Avg suspension 2.7 games)
9/13 dismiss on a 3rd offense (A&M is a possible dismissal, so 8/13 if you exclude that wording)
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Good research there.
I’m not arguing your point, but it wasn’t where I was headed with my post. The reality is that there’s plenty in the SEC that isn’t proportionate, to use Miles’ term. He’s just focused on the one he feels benefits his program the most to change.
No school wants the NCAA handling drug testing.
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