A couple of posts at Red Cup Rebellion caught my eye this morning.
This one charts the hit Freeze took with this year’s recruiting class, while this one sounds a bit wistful about Ole Miss’ predicament.
Yea, the NCAA situation hurt Ole Miss this recruiting cycle. A couple of hours after piecing together the country’s No. 30 overall class on National Signing Day, Hugh Freeze himself referred to 2017 as “a penalty” and griped about other schools using the ongoing investigation for negative recruiting.
It was a decent class considering the limitations, but the reality is that the Rebels can’t have another like it and continue to compete with the top of the SEC (this year’s class ranked 12th in the conference). Ole Miss needs a bounce-back cycle in 2018.
Whether or not the NCAA will break camp by next Signing Day is anyone’s guess, though it’s hard to believe they can drag this thing out for another full year.
It’s the NCAA, sunshine. I wouldn’t be too sure about anything, when it comes to the NCAA.
And that’s the thing. We all know in an age of enormous conference television contracts, no program is ever going to get slammed with the death penalty again. But slow playing an investigation so that a program’s recruiting suffers over a period of a few years while the sword of Damocles dangles overhead? Yeah, I can see that. If you think about it, that’s a pretty effective penalty in its own way.
The only thing I’m not sure of is if the NCAA is actually that clever. If it is, though, that’s something an overly aggressive head coach might have to factor into his approach on the recruiting trail. Assuming there’s a next time, of course.
Get The Picture 
The old standby: The process is the punishment.
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If you’ve truly been in that situation in some manner whether legal or governmental oversight or licensing etc., it can be excruciatingly frustrating and absolutely maddening.
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Don’t like it, don’t cheat. Or at least don’t get caught.
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Would they be going through this if they hadn’t won 2 in a row over Bama? I wager not.
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Would they have won 2 in a row over Bama if they didn’t deserve going through this? I wager not.
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I wager they don’t deserve this any more than a few teams in the west.
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That is a bet that I will not take.
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Which gets back to my point, Ole Miss traditionally should not be in the race to win the west and order will be restored, especially if Bama is in the middle of a dynasty..
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boo friggen hoo
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Exactly. They suddenly pull in a top 5 recruiting class out of the blue, and we’re supposed to think they didn’t cheat? To be honest, their recruiting this year is probably about where they usually rank when they aren’t cheating. If anything, the NCAA just made them honest.
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Maybe Ole Miss are the ones getting the Tunsilectomy after all.
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HEY-O!
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Remember New Coke? After its introduction, demand for Classic Coke, or Coke as it was known then, spiked tremendously. When the company killed New Coke they were asked whether the whole thing was simply a marketing ploy. The reply came that they were neither that smart nor that stupid. I suspect the same is true for the NCAA. Although, in my mind, they are ridiculously stupid.
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It was genius. Not only did everyone hoard Classic Coke, but they went out to try the New Coke…it was quite the marketing coup.
Remember when Delta’s employee’s “volunteered” (there’s a whole story there) to buy the company a brand new jet? Supposedly dreamed up by a Flight Attendant, I think. It was on the front page of every newspaper and on every newscast when it was unrolled. “The Spirit of Delta”…
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I don’t know this is still Ole Miss. Something tells me Ohio State or Alabama would have no problem continuing to recruit at a high level with the same uncertainty hanging over them. Especially when we know Ole Miss won’t actually be punished at the end of the day.
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If true, they should call the NCAA’s bluff and go back to cheating.
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They still have the coolest helmets….except for possibly Navy.
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….and everyone in the Navy…in the whole military…gets PROPER training on using a gas mask. Not that that has anything to do with anything.
To be honest, that incident wasn’t really a reflection on OM…just the individual, as far as I’m concerned.
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Speaking of helmets, the shooter makes sure the catapult is ready to launch a Built Ford Tough truck, the Ram Tough truck is properly configured to launch, all personnel are in their proper Built Like a Rock position and any observers are behind the Chevy Runs Deep foul lines
https://twitter.com/michael_hendrix/status/828646268800991232
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…and let’s not forget the properly fitted helmet for the pilot.
Expensive, but give ’em credit on a creative alternative to waterboarding.
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I like it, the old death by a 1000 cuts. This was a favorite trick when I worked at the IRS back in the 79’s and 80’s. The longer the audit stayed open the more the taxpayer sweated and the more they were ready to agree when an agreement was finally offered just to get it over with.
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Damn, 69…Why don’t you just say “I really feel the need for people to hate me”?
I’ve always been told that if the IRS got after you to be as uncooperative and belligerent as you can…they have so many “candidates” to choose from that they’ll settle for almost nothing so they can put another, easier fish in the frying pan. I actually got the opportunity to test this theory..over just a few hundred bucks…The IRS was wrong but wouldn’t admit it. I finally got a letter saying that I owed, I owed, but it was less than one dollar so they were forgiving it. Do not go gently into that long IRS audit.
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It’s just like an athlete holding off his commitment until the last possible second.
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Just waiting for the deposit to clear, guys.
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Yeah, it has to be the NCAA investigation. It couldn’t possibly have anything to do with their 5-7 record this year.
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After Ole Miss handed the NCAA the results of a bull shit investigation it’s not surprising the NCAA wants to take their time and double check everything. I bet thr NCAA would have wrapped everything up by now if Ole Miss had fired Freeze after the Tunsil incident.
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Well, it takes a while to check the servers for emails to the complaint department.
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