Trust me, this is the most epic thing you’ll read all day.
As many of you continue to bask in the warmth of amateurism, here’s reality in a couple of sentences:
“If I told you right now the [team] would win the SEC this fall and go to the Playoff, but only if you gave me 10 grand, would you do it?”
“Shit, man … will you take a check?,” the bartender asks. “But if you could really do that, I’d probably get the cash together in a day or two.”
Get The Picture 
In the immortal words of Slim Pickens, “Now I AM depressed.”
LikeLike
That…was…awesome!
Thanks Senator!
LikeLike
Great article. I can picture a few people reading it and sort of tugging at their collars.
LikeLike
“I don’t view what I do as a crime, and I don’t give a shit if someone else does, honestly.”
This quote makes me believe this particular story is false. The bag men exist, but know to be careful because of the potential backlash if caught. The real ones care. If this interview is even true, then he’s just an idiot booster that thinks he’s helping…the most dangerous type.
I personally believe UGA has a system, but it’s kept far from Richt enough that he can even ask a little bit (not too much) and get firm denials. This very likely makes us less effective than, say, Auburn where I damn well believe the HC is fully aware of who, how much, when, etc. My guess is Saban knows, but keeps it away from himself, same for Spurrier.
But the article is correct…even with a $40k salary, more money will be slipped into pockets.
I least I can take comfort that gambling interests aren’t involved….
LikeLike
Is what he’s doing technically illegal or is it just against the NCAA rules? I don’t think I’ve ever heard of someone going to prison for paying a student athlete…
LikeLike
It is illegal in some states. I can’t remember exactly, but I am pretty sure the Albert Means saga resulted in boosters in jail.
LikeLike
Technically off-the-books pay is untaxed and thus illegal, right?
LikeLike
I’m no lawyer, but I am a CPA and I did take several tax classes at UGA, and I think these payments would qualify as “gifts” as opposed to income.
Now here comes my inner nerd: Gifts are only taxable to the giver, and only if they exceed $13k/year for individuals and $26k per year for married folks. AND, now here’s where non-CPAs and non-tax attorneys are going to be like “huh?”, the excess of $13k or $26k first goes against your lifetime exemption which, if I recall correctly, is about $1M (it could be more though cause it changes every year). The giver only gets taxed on the excess of $13k/$26k that goes in excess of the $1M lifetime exemption.
Lol say wutttt? Now you know why you pay someone else to do your taxes…
In a nutshell though, if they are classified as gifts then nothing is illegal until they exceed their lifetime exemption and fail to pay taxes. It would take a LOT, and I mean a LOT, for that to happen.
LikeLike
That was well thought out. But I don’t see boosters using their lifetime exemption like this. But then again, how about Endowed Boosterships? Not only tax free for the student athlete, but also tax deductible for the donor…..
LikeLike
The exemption is now unified with the estate tax exemption at $5.3mm per person indexed. But I was referring to NCAA punishments handed to the school if such payments are discovered.
LikeLike
That is a good point. Make it above board and taxable and you’d close any budget shortfalls in Alabama or Mississippi
LikeLike
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logan_Young
Albert Means booster. Lots of charges. I also think that it is illegal to interfere with the amateur status of a athlete in some states.
LikeLike
“I can take comfort that gambling interests aren’t involved….”
Thank goodness…
LikeLike
“I know one of our guys once stopped putting in big bucks, way more than what I do, just because a head coach cussed too much on the team plane. [The coach] was losing anyway, but because he took the Lord’s name in vain, that guy was offended by his morality and stopped illegally paying college football players.”
Had me shaking my head. Can’t imagine one of these people being offended by someone else’s morality.
LikeLike
I know, right? Someone enlightened enough to make a mockery of the immoral rules of amateurism (codified and perpetuated by a private, self-interested entity) getting offended by swearing! Who woulda thunk it?!? What a fucking country we live in, huh?
LikeLike
“Meet the Bag Man” is so good that somebody who knows a focker in a trailer near the nicer part of Phenix City has already made a movie out of it
LikeLike
Say, nice boobs.
LikeLike
Great article. All sort of makes sense and I can totally see how it all works.
Also I think that this article highlights the great difference in SBNation and Bleacher Report. On the surface both are a collection of sports blogs, but for my money SBNation is on a whole other level.
great.
LikeLike
I agree with your assessment of the article and your comparison of Bleacher Report vs. SBNation. As for a whole ‘nother level … this is my favorite …
LikeLike
The video interview at the end was even more enlightening.
LikeLike
I think that story is stretching the truth a country mile, but it’s a good question – who’s left to tell? Because if it’s the man’s money and that’s how he wants to spend it, I don’t see how it would be a crime.
LikeLike
What I can’t figure is why none of these guys rat after they’ve left college. Are they all so loyal? I don’t doubt that shady stuff happens but I just have a hard time believing that it is as ubiquitous as described. I just can’t believe that there hasn’t been some ex-player who has an ax to grind has buried somebody. Hell, if you had a bag man you could record him and blackmail him for life if you wanted to.
LikeLike
Some speak out. Nothing happens because, according to Selena, “it’s industrial strength football.”
http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/9131624/auburn-tigers-coaches-bribed-players-altered-grades-broke-recruiting-rules-gene-chizik-according-report
LikeLike
If they got paid in cash and spent it, what kind of proof would they have?
LikeLike
Cash has always worked best for me!
LikeLike
Are you now or have you ever been part of any three-way conversations between the NBA Commissioner, the Communist Party of the United States and/or Emmert?
LikeLike
I plead the fifth! 🙂
LikeLike
I agree. For it to be as ubiquitous as that story would make us believe, you would think we would have seen some disillusioned bag men or players come clean somewhere along the way. I don’t know how you keep tens of thousands of people absolutely quiet for decades.
LikeLike
The first rule of being a ‘Bag Man’ is that you never talk like a ‘disillusioned Bag Man’. If you do, you’ll be attacked because you were asking for it by the way in which you use your accessories
(h/t Tennessee Dawg and GM)
LikeLike
You hurt the players that came after you too.
LikeLike
The legacy thing must be a corollary to Rule #4
http://www.thewire.com/entertainment/2013/08/who-said-it-adolf-hitler-vs-taylor-swift/68906/
LikeLike
A lot of them do blow the whistle after they have left school. The Auburn/AL probation war from the mid-90’s was all about guys like Gene Jelks and Eric Ramsey who gave up information after their eligibility was complete.
LikeLike
You’re right, awesome article. I know its not about Georgia because they talk about covering up arrests and no bank accounts, two rules we obviously know nothing about.
Of course, its about Auburn but probably applies to most schools.
LikeLike
We go 11-2 in 2010 if AJ had demanded cash or bitcoins were around. Wonder if they get much use in the semi-pro league?
LikeLike
Geoffrey Norman spent time 1985 with both Bama and Auburn during the season and wrote a book called Alabama Showdown about the rivalry. In it he recounts a conversation over dinner at Dreamland with a group of Tide assistants. They told him that a member of another coaching staff (unnamed school) was sleeping with a prize recruit’s mother. Seems like that would be pretty hard to compete against.
LikeLike
That’s old hat. Certainly you read about the agent (accused) that did that fairly recently. One such story occurred with a big UGA recruit, but the AAU connection with the guy was what the media went after. If you wanted to parse the author’s words, you may find that some of the paid influencers were sleeping with the recruit’s mother because they were his father.
Think this is a mix of true events mixed with concoctions, guesses and bullshit.
LikeLike
No way, that is coming out now… Isn’t there a retention period on this stuff?
LikeLike
I was getting pretty worried till I read this “Once properly vetted, your money usually buys you first or secondhand access to information most fans (or journalists) would kill for: player run-ins with the law that go unreported, ” – Whew, can’t be a UGa bag man…
LikeLike
Still, because of the words SEC, Southeners, people in the South; etc, UGA still gets the shit rubbed all over by inference. I didn’t like this author’s concoction of payment methods (he rubs recruit’s mother’s faces with shit also) as being definitive espec ially since he didn’t even mention the Wal-Mart cards.
LikeLike