Tags » ‘Headlinin’’
March 12th, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds…
• Just trying to help the team, Part One. Whoever had "16 hours" in the pool for how long it would take for the public to learn the identity of the mysterious e-mail tipster who initially alerted Ohio State coach Jim Tressel to possible violations involving Ohio State players last spring, collect your winnings: Three sources confirmed to the Columbus Dispatch that "Deep Throat" was Christopher T. Cicero, a Columbus attorney who represents the owner of the tattoo parlor that allegedly bought jerseys, championship rings and other memorabilia from Buckeye players and plied them with free ink. The offending players were dealt a five-game suspension for the start of the 2011 season, and Tressel’s failure to disclose the tip – even after the violations had been made public last December – will cost him at least two games and $ 250,000, pending further sanctions by the NCAA.
Cicero is a former Buckeye himself, a walk-on linebacker who lettered in 1983, Tressel’s first year as an assistant under head coach Earle Bruce, and he’s no stranger to suspensions: The Ohio Supreme Court suspended Cicero’s law license for one year in 1997 for leading colleagues to believe he was having sex with a judge who’d appointed him to defend a client in a criminal case. Later, a mistrial was declared in a 2002 death-penalty case because prosecutors planned to call Cicero as a witness against his own client. Days later, he was accused of striking a different client in the court room, a charge he denies [Columbus Dispatch]
• Ready the bunker. So far, Tressel has enjoyed the unflagging public support of his president and athletic director. Not so much the campus newspaper, which called for his head in a Wednesday editorial. [The Lantern]
• Just trying to help the team, Part Two. In other NCAA news, Georgia has self-reported five secondary violations related to the Jan. 28 commitment announcement for five-star defensive end prospect Ray Drew, who pledged his hand to the Bulldogs while flanked by former UGA stars David Pollack and Randall Godfrey – or, in NCAA parlance, "former letter winners who appear to be representatives of the University’s athletics interests." The violations are considered minor and expected to be met with the usual round of internal wrist-slapping. [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]
• Thank you for your contribution. Huntsville radio host Scott Moore, enthusiastic source for a barely audible recording purporting to be Cecil Newton attempting to solicit money in exchange for the commitment of his immensely talented spawn in December 2009, has apparently been fired from his gig at 97.7 "The Zone." The tapes never made it to air, and Moore is no longer listed among the station’s hosts. [WAAY TV, via SBN]
• This is Division I football. New Colorado coach Jon Embree pulled no punches in his diagnosis of his alma mater’s prior struggles going into his first spring practice: Dan Hawkins’ Buffs didn’t play hard, spent too much time looking at the scoreboard and were "awful at situational football." Which sounds exactly right, actually. "We’re starting it the first practice about understanding the situations and what it means and why you have to do certain things and think," Embree said. "We don’t know how to play the game within the game. We just showed and played last year. It’s like recess." Like recess? Or like … intramurals? [Boulder Daily Camera]
• The rap sheet. Incoming Alabama signee Aaron Douglas, a former starter at Tennessee, was sentenced to 48 hours in jail and a year of probation last week in exchange for a guilty plea on first-time DUI charges. Douglas’ new coach, Nick Saban, said after Douglas’ Dec. 24 arrest that discipline would be handled … internally. [Knoxville News-Sentinel]
Quickly… Nebraska’s new offensive strategy: Simplify, man. … Unfortunately named linebacker Michael Hunt is finished at Mississippi State because he "just doesn’t like football." … Texas hires Boise State’s offensive coordinator, so Bob Stoops makes a visit to Boise State. … Stoops also takes a dig at Oklahoma State. … Randall Mackey clears up a few misunderstandings about his strange speech impediment. … Charlie Sheen takes a weak shot at Ryan Mallett. … Pat White retires from baseball. … And Yahoo’s angel of death promises an even bigger bombshell later this summer.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
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March 9th, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds.
• Smoking gun. The e-mail chain that served as Exhibit A in Ohio State’s decision to slap coach Jim Tressel with a two-game suspension and $ 250,000 fine on Tuesday is in the public domain, thanks to a pair of local outlets in Columbus, and the information therein is what Ohio State said it was: An attorney (name redacted) alerted Tressel last April that a federal investigation into a local tattoo parlor had uncovered jerseys, championship rings and other memorabilia apparently purchased from Ohio State players, and that players may have received free tattoos; Tressel replied "I will get on it ASAP," and the e-mails stop after three messages from both men in early June.
But Tressel did not get on it until the same story surfaced in December, resulting in the suspension of four offensive starters for the first five games of the 2011 season. Tressel now joins them for the first two of those games, per school sanctions. But the NCAA is yet to weigh in on The Senator’s silence, and there are three reasons it could add more pain to OSUs self-flagellation:
1. Tressel was clearly aware of potential violations before the 2010 season. The e-mails are primarily concerned with two players (names redacted) who had sold memorabilia to the tattoo parlor. In June, Tressel wrote the tipster, "[O]ur rings arrive this week for [the] 2009 Big Ten [championship] ….. any names from our last discussion?? I would like to hold some collateral if you know what I mean ….. jt" In September, though, Tressel signed a compliance form affirming he had no knowledge of possible violations, and both players played the entire season with Tressel’s knowledge that they could be ineligible. That knowledge puts all 12 Buckeye wins and their share of the Big Ten championship in real jeopardy of being retroactively stricken from the record.
2. Tressel kept the e-mails quiet after the violations became public. He specifically denied prior knowledge of violations to reporters in December, and lobbied to keep the offending players eligible for the Sugar Bowl. The time for "confidentiality" about the federal investigation had passed – Ohio State only learned about the violations because the feds came to them with information as the case was wrapping up. Still, it wasn’t until OSU counsel discovered the e-mails on Tressel’s computer in January that he was forced to confess that he had been tipped off months in advance of the season and the post-season reckoning.
3. Tressel has a history of high profile players receiving improper benefits on his watch. Before Terrelle Pryor and his classmates, there was Troy Smith; before Troy Smith, there was Maurice Clarett; before Maurice Clarett, there was Tressel’s star quarterback at Youngstown State, Ray Isaac. Tressel was able to successful distance himself from each of those cases, but they demonstrate a pattern that undermines any appeal to an honest, one-time lapse of judgment.
A multi-game suspension and $ 250,000 fine is hardly a slap on the wrist. But the NCAA didn’t enjoy the bullet it took for allowing the offending Buckeyes to play in the Sugar Bowl, and if its recent verdicts against USC, Bruce Pearl and Dez Bryant have taught us anything about the way the Association operates, it’s that the perceived cover-up is always worse than the crime. And cover-ups don’t come much clearer than this. [610 WTVN, @kgordonosu, Columbus Dispatch]
• Rest of country: Take note. Notre Dame has officially banned hydraulic lifts from practices, opting for remote-control cameras instead after a student videographer who fell to his death when one of the lifts toppled in high winds last October. The Indiana Occupational Health and Safety Administration’s investigation into the death is ongoing. [Associated Press]
• Storm Troopers. California Golden Blogs and Uni Watch have independently uncovered the existence of a white Cal helmet, apparently on tap to replace the traditional navy blue lids for at least one road game this fall. Judging from the results of the CGB poll, fans have already deemed the look a white-on-white crime. [California Golden Blogs, Uni Watch]
• Get well soon. USC defensive lineman Armond Armstead has been released from the hospital, where he spent five days after being admitted with an unknown medical condition last week. (Leading rumors include a heart condition or some kind of virus.) His availability for the start of spring practice in two weeks is undetermined, leaving the Trojans surprisingly thin along the front four. [Orange County Register]
Quickly… A look at Washington’s use of recruiting services. … Ringers in the Iron Bowl, circa 1895. … Someone actually compiled a stat sheet from Auburn’s "pro day." … Ryan Mallett is slow. … And even Uncle Luke is trashing that Sports Illustrated cover story on criminal records in college football.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
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March 9th, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds.
• Come and get us, coppers. As expected, the NCAA has requested documents connected to Oregon’s payments to at least two recruiting services run by men with connections to eventual Duck recruits. The university continues to insist the payments were entirely above board and approved by the compliance office, and the Eugene Register-Guard’s George Schroeder writes that there really is nothing to see in its relationship with Los Angeles-based B2G Sports, to which Oregon paid $ 5,000 in 2009. He’s less certain, though, about the Ducks’ eyebrow-raising, $ 25,000 payment to a Texas-based service run by Willie Lyles, a personal trainer, scout and alleged middle man who could give the NCAA an opening to act against the rising influence of AAU-style "street agents" in football recruiting. [Associated Press, Eugene Register-Guard, New York Times]
• Get well soon. Confirming message board rumors that began swirling last Wednesday night, USC said defensive lineman Armond Armstead was hospitalized and undergoing tests for undisclosed medical condition. Coach Lane Kiffin said Armstead was in "stable condition" on Friday morning and "looking forward to getting back with his teammates soon," but didn’t elaborate on the nature of the condition or what prompted the hospitalization. [Orange County Register]
Another Trojan defensive lineman, James Boyd, reportedly cleaned out his locker last week and is expected to transfer, severely cutting into an already thin depth chart. [L.A. Daily News]
• The rap sheet. Rising Iowa State seniors Jacob Lattimer – the Cyclones’ best pass rusher and tight end Rocky Howard have been suspended indefinitely after being arrested in the wee hours Saturday morning for allegedly assaulting a police officer and interfering with official acts (Lattimer) and drunk driving (Howard), respectively. No details on what, specifically, constituted "assault" against an officer on Lattimer’s part, but given his actual resemblance to the fictional Lattimer from "The Program," you can make your own assumptions. [Des Moines Register]
• First come, first serve. If LSU fans are secretly (or not so secretly) hoping JUCO transfer Zach Mettenberger takes command of the starting quarterback job, he’s going to have to take it away from the incumbent, according to coach Les Miles: "Right now, if we had to start, first reps would certainly go to Jordan Jefferson," Miles told the Baton Rouge Advocate, specifically praising Jefferson’s offseason conditioning. "I don’t know that we’ll be in a quarterback ‘situation.’ But we’ll let those guys that might naturally throw throw, and those guys that might naturally have athletic ability and movement to do the things they do." [Baton Rouge Advocate]
Meanwhile, in Tuscaloosa, Nick Saban will tell you what you need to know about Alabama’s quarterback derby, when you need to know it, peasants. [al.com]
• Yo! SEC Raps. Artist: Former Auburn hoopster Francis Aihe. Genre: Activist hip hop. Track: Can’t Forget Our Tree (Toomer’s Corner).
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Comment: None. [War Eagle Reader]
Quickly… Offensive coordinator Mike Dunbar abruptly escapes retires from New Mexico State, to DeWayne Walker’s chagrin. … Defensive back Marcus Trice is transferring from Oklahoma. … Backup quarterback Jacob Karam "made himself look better" in Texas Tech’s weekend scrimmage. … Inside Washington’s offseason workouts. … Art Schlichter speaks from prison. … Urban Meyer and Tim Tebow play an impromptu football game, say nothing. … And Chuck Smith’s rambling attempt to clear the air about his departure from Tennessee makes the situation way, way more confusing.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
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March 8th, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds.
• It’s not all doom and gloom. Ohio State is expected to issue an official response today to Monday night’s report that coach Jim Tressel knew about potential NCAA violations involving improper benefits to prominent Buckeye players at least eight months before the university was informed by the U.S. Attorney’s Office last December. In the meantime, the doomsayers are having their moment – up to and including projections that the allegations could eventually cost Tressel his job if proven to be true. Well, as long as that if is hanging there, anything is possible.
Even at this stage, though, the specter of the chopping block is at the extreme end of the scale. More pressingly, the Buckeyes stand to (symbolically) lose the 12 wins and Big Ten championship earned last year with four offending players in the regular starting lineup, and possibly those players themselves, who all remain with the team and are set to return this fall after serving a five-game suspension through the first week of October. At this point, with an allegation hinging on the word of a single, anonymous source, the rubric for prospective Buckeye pain looks like this:
As entrenched as he is after a wildly successful decade on the job, Tressel will be the last to go – after the ’10 season, after the remaining eligibility of the suspended players, after future scholarships. That’s a pretty significant buffer. [Columbus Dispatch, Sports Illustrated]
• The Rebel’s Speech. All quarterbacks trying to get on the field have something keeping them off: Too small, too slow, not enough of an arm, poor grasp of the offense, etc. Ole Miss’ Randall Mackey, however, may be the only QB in the country relegated to the bench because he struggles to verbalize the play calls. He gets the calls – he just can’t get them out of his mouth. "Mackey can roll out, he can throw it far, he can get it where it need to be," running back Brandon Bolden told the (Jackson) Clarion-Ledger. "It was, basically, the only thing about him, it was just in the huddle, he knew what he wanted to say, it just couldn’t come out." Mackey, a junior who redshirted last season as a hyped junior college transfer, said he’s worked through the issue since suffering a concussion in the eighth grade: "It just never went away." [Clarion-Ledger]
• Cowboy up. Oklahoma State kicked off spring practice Monday with a bit of a role reversal: Rather than the players learning the system from the new coach, it’s offensive coordinator Todd Monken trying to get up to speed on the system that made the Cowboys one of the most explosive attacks in the country last year under departed play caller Dana Holgorsen. "Basically in three weeks, you’re cramming for a test," said Monken, who comes from four years coaching the Jacksonville Jaguars’ wide receivers. "Not only are you now coaching quarterbacks, you are learning a new offense and you’re running the offensive meeting." The transition has been eased by Monken’s relationship with quarterback Brandon Weeden, a former minor league baseball player, because Weeden "is like 38 years old. The guy has been around a while. It’s like dealing with an NFL guy. … He’ll tell you he doesn’t like it, where a young guy won’t, they’ll just sit there and say, ‘Yes, coach.’" For the record, Weeden is 27. [The Oklahoman, Associated Press]
• The new class. The National Football Foundation released its annual list of candidates for the College Football Hall of Fame Monday, running 79 players and nine coaches long. Among the first-timers on this year’s ballot: Alabama linebacker Derrick Thomas, Nebraska quarterback Tommie Frazier, Arkansas offensive lineman Brandon Burlsworth and coaches Jimmy Johnson, Lloyd Carr, Fisher DeBerry and R.C. Slocum. They’ll have to get in line behind the likes of Brian Bosworth, Eddie George, Deion Sanders and Bill McCartney, only four of the dozens of worthy names returning to the ballot after being snubbed on previous votes. [College Football Hall of Fame]
• Friday of the Children of the Corn. New Big Ten rivals Nebraska and Iowa have moved their season-ending match-up to the Friday after Thanksgiving for at least the next two years, continuing the day-after-Thanksgiving tradition the Cornhuskers have forged against Oklahoma (Big Eight) and later Colorado (Big 12) since 1990. Bonus points if you can name the division the ‘Huskers and Hawkeyes will play in without looking. [Lincoln Journal Star]
Quickly… Running back Deantre Lewis looks like he’ll be ready for spring practice at Arizona State, less than a month after being hit in the backside by a stray bullet. … The trials of Jedd Fisch en route to becoming Miami’s offensive coordinator. … Syracuse’s first day of spring practice gets snowed in. … A Rose Bowl cartoon from 1937. … And Pitt may be trying to block Villanova’s Big East ambitions in football. Sounds familiar.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
Dr. Saturday – NCAAF – Yahoo! Sports
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March 4th, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds.
• Worth every penny. Auburn and Oregon combined to lose nearly $ 1 million on their trip to the BCS Championship Game, mostly due to eating costs on unsold tickets: Auburn took a $ 781,825 hit from 2,456 unsold seats that it was obligated to buy from the game, and Oregon lost $ 555,575 – this on a game that was reportedly one of the hottest tickets in sports history before kickoff. (Note that "unsold" doesn’t mean they were available and people didn’t buy them: The school gave them to certain bigwigs and other members of the traveling party.) If not for the ticket racket, both schools would have come out in the black despite traveling halfway across the continent with a cast of hundreds. [Birmingham News, al.com]
• Next you’ll be telling me there are no leprechauns. Sincere readers will be shocked – shocked! – to learn that the well-traveled 31-second audio file purporting to be a voice message from infamous stage father Cecil Newton attempting to solicit money from someone named "John" is "not authentic," according to the man on whose phone it was reportedly left, former Mississippi State quarterback John Bond. On Wednesday, Bond promised during an interview on a Huntsville radio station to provide a "snippet" of a conversation between himself and Cecil Newton that will "exonerate" Bond and a former MSU teammate, Bill Bell, in the alleged pay-for-play scheme that threatened Cam Newton’s eligibility last fall. But the fuzzy, barely audible clip that made the rounds this week is clearly "fake," according to Bond’s attorney, as well as pretty much everyone who strained to decipher it. [Clarion-Ledger]
• The rap sheet, "feets don’t fail me now" edition. Washington running back Johri Fogerson was arrested early Thursday morning for possession of marijuana and resisting arrest after allegedly fleeing police on foot during a routine traffic stop (a headlight was out on his Lexus), only to turn himself several hours later. According to Washington State Patrol, Fogerson – a former Seattle Times State Player of the Year as a high school senior in 2007 – bolted after police spotted "a baggie" of weed in the car and tried to handcuff him, but called a dispatch center to give himself up after conferring with his mother. [Seattle Times]
• I resemble that remark! Former Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt defended his team from the implication in this week’s Sports Illustrated cover story that the Wannstedt-era Panthers were leaders in college football thuggery, telling the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that a string of violent arrests last summer was just one of those things: "We had an unfortunate stretch of incidents last summer but I am very proud of our body of work during my six years with regards to players behavior," Wannstedt said. "Every player [we recruited] was evaluated and scrutinized and we tried to project whether they would become productive members of our football program as well as the university at large. … [A]lmost all of the incidents resulted in either a suspension or a player being eliminated from our program and many of the incidents in question did not result in a conviction of any kind. Our players understood their responsibility, they graduated and for the most part, they did the right things." [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]
Quickly… Despite rumors to the contrary, George O’Leary says incoming quarterback DaMarcus Smith is "100 percent a Knight." … Shocking crosstown vandalism at SMU. … Al Golden’s talkin’ ’bout practice. … Oklahoma State quarterback Brandon Weeden, former pro baseball player, also has a "nice little jumper." … Tennessee lineman Cody Pope on playing through a career-threatening injury. … Brandon Boykin likes Georgia’s hunger. … Cool newsreel footage of Alabama and Cal in the 1938 Rose Bowl. … And one guess which school woos recruits by having the former secretary state talk to them about Moammar Gadhafi.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
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March 3rd, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds.
• The hatchet man can. As if expansion and the formation of a conference network wasn’t proof enough, here’s more evidence that Pac-10 commissioner Larry Scott means business around here: After enduring years of a hard-earned reputation for incompetence, the conference is ditching 11 football officials who worked Pac-10 games last year in its transition to the Pac-12 this fall. The outgoing cast will be replaced 16 new officials from the Big 12, Mountain West and WAC, according to interim officiating coordinator Mike Pereira, whose mercenary mission in the role now seems perfectly clear. "I’m not saying [the officiating] was horrible, but it was not at the level that it deserved to be and that this conference deserves to have," he told the Seattle Times. "We felt like these 16 were better than the 11 that did not have their contracts renewed." On the bright side, some of the exiles will be asked to assist in replay booths, and there won’t be any ax to grind with Pereira’s permanent successor.
OK, here’s one more, for the Husky fans:
Basketball refs, watch your back. [Seattle Times]
• Whatever y’all wanna do, I’m right behind you. New NCAA president Mark Emmert said Wednesday he’d be perfectly willing to oversee a college football playoff – but only if university presidents ask him nicely. "If the leadership of those universities … want to move in that direction, then the NCAA knows how to run championships and we’d be happy to help," Emmert told the Rotary Club of Baton Rouge, where he formerly served as LSU’s chancellor. On the other hand… "Kids love playing bowl games. Schools love participating in bowl games and everybody knows that, so it’s finding that right balance that I think is going to be challenging." [Associated Press]
• And here come the subpoenas. North Carolina investigators have issued a search warrant for financial records of NFL agent Gary Wichard in the ongoing Secretary of State investigation into whether Wichard broke state sports agent laws by funneling money to former UNC defensive lineman Marvin Austin. Yahoo! Sports obtained multiple documents last year tying Wichard to Austin, who allegedly traveled to and stayed in California on Wichard’s dime in 2009, and former Tar Heel assistant coach John Blake, a personal friend, who was accused of taking money from Wichard and steering clients toward his agency, Pro Tect management.
Whether or not they committed any crimes, all three major players in the case have suffered professionally: Wichard was suspended for six months by the NFL Players’ Association, Blake was fired by North Carolina and Austin missed all of his senior season last fall, submarining his team and his draft stock. [Associated Press]
• Get back. Texas’ Alex Okafor, once hyped as the No. 1 incoming defensive end in the class of 2009, is moving back to defensive end after spending most of his sophomore season as a 260-pound defensive tackle. "When we went through offseason drills — watching the way he moves, watching the way he works — we felt like he had the athleticism to be outside," said new defensive coordinator Manny Diaz. "So we wanted to give him the opportunity to start out there." Which he should, opposite equally hyped sophomore Jackson Jeffcoat – although there’s still no good answer for the tackle spot Okafor occupied last year next to Kheeston Randall. [Austin American-Statesman]
• The rap sheet. Washington State linebacker Louis Bland was charged with felony assault in the wee hours of Saturday morning, when Pullman police were allegedly called to an apartment twice to break up a dispute between Bland and his girlfriend. The first time, around 3 a.m., officers reported that they were unable to find cause for an arrest and left. They received another call about 30 minutes later reporting "a female screaming from the same residence," and this time found evidence to back up claims that Bland had elbowed the woman in the back, hit her in the head and choked her. They also found some evidence for Bland’s claim that he was acting in self-defense, but determined that he was the "major aggressor" and booked him on a class b felony, which can result in a 10-year sentence and $ 20,000 fine upon conviction. [Spokane Spokesman Review]
Quickly… Arizona boots receiver Bug Wright for "a chronic problem that hasn’t rectified itself." … Tommy Streeter’s looking for a fresh start in Miami after three disappointing seasons. …Geno Smith says he’s "full go" for West Virginia’s spring practice. … Colorado lowers season ticket prices. …
A somewhat personal defense of oversigning from a beat writer caught in the crossfire. … And no, I am not touching this.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
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March 2nd, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds.
• Wow, those number sound high. Wait, are those numbers high? Sports Illustrated goes large today with its cover story on crime rates in college football, the result of a six-month investigation in collaboration with CBS Sports that finds, among other things, that 7 percent of players on teams ranked in SI’s 2010 preseason top 25 had some kind of criminal record in their past, almost 40 percent of which were "serious" incidents. Only two teams in the study, Oklahoma and TCU, perform formal background searches on recruits.
The article is long on anecdote – including the story of Pitt defensive end Jabaal Sheard, right, who was allowed to return to the team after allegedly throwing another man through a window last summer – and woefully short on context. Questions you won’t find answered:
How do those numbers compare to the college population at large? Best answer after 10 minutes of research: About 3.5 percent of college students have a criminal record, according to a 2009-10 study – half the rate of players in the SI/CBS study. But as Slow States points out, less than two-thirds of the players who make up the piece’s Big Number – 7 percent – were convicted, pled guilty or "paid some penalty" for the crimes represented in that number, bringing the football players’ rates within one percent of their peers’.
How does that compare to the entire population at large? Best answer after 10 minutes of research: Based on 2000 Census data, about 6.6 percent of the population will serve prison time at some point in their lifetime. That number jumps significantly (to somewhere between 9 percent and 11 percent) for males, higher than the simple "criminal record" rate in the SI/CBS study, which includes very players who were actually incarcerated. About 4.4 percent of the population was arrested for some kind of crime in 2009.
That’s without an attempt to take into account the much higher arrest and incarceration rates for young, black males – 1 in 9 black males between ages 20 and 34 was incarcerated in 2008 – a group that is significantly overrepresented (compared to the population at large) in the sample size of the SI/CBS study. This is a subject that deserves a book, and for six months’ work, you’d think we would have gotten at least a good summary chapter of that book. Take two pages with a very large grain of salt. [Sports Illustrated]
• The rap sheet. Another piece of anecdotal evidence for the mill: Auburn running back Eric Smith was arrested on suspicion of domestic violence on Feb. 22, prompting his dismissal from the team over the weekend. Smith was also arrested (and suspended for a game) on third degree assault for allegedly striking another student in July 2009. [al.com]
• Get well soon. Diminutive but hyper-productive Oregon State receiver/return man James Rodgers underwent a second surgery last week on his right knee, putting his return for the fall in further doubt. Rodgers has already been granted a fifth year of eligibility by the NCAA following a season-ending injury in early October, but still isn’t certain to be back at full speed by the start of the season. [The Oregonian]
• Freak is freakish. Speaking of "full speed," the best 40-yard dash time at the 2011 NFL Combine officially belongs to Miami cornerback Demarcus Van Dyke, who turned in a blistering 4.28 on Tuesday. The most impressive showing of the entire weekend, though, might have come from LSU cornerback Patrick Peterson, who tied for second with a 4.34-second dash at 219 pounds, raising his profile as the possible No. 1 overall pick next month. [NFL.com, Baton Rouge Advocate]
Quickly… Dan LeBatard glowers disapprovingly in the direction of ex-Miami athletic director Kirby Hocutt in the wake of his departure to Texas Tech. … Ranking the all-star coaching staffs by conference. … And if this is actually true, Miami’s in a lot of trouble.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
Dr. Saturday – NCAAF – Yahoo! Sports
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March 2nd, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds.
• No turning back now. The first photographic evidence of Ole Miss’ new "Rebel Black Bear" costume is beginning to leak, to the inevitable alienation of both the diehards who remain bitter over the exile of Colonel Reb and the visionary reformers who can accept nothing less than Admiral Ackbar, the mascot that was too perfect to exist. At least they can’t charge the school with false advertising: The real thing appears to look exactly like the mock-ups – which, now that we can see it "in the flesh," is basically just an angrier version of Smokey the Bear. [Red Cup Rebellion]
• Happy trails. Purdue receiver Keith Smith, a first-team All-Big Ten pick in 2009 with a league-best 91 catches for 1,100 yards, was denied a sixth year of eligibility by the NCAA Monday, ending his college career. Smith went down with a season-ending knee injury in the Boilermakers’ second game last fall – one of three knee injuries that cost the Boilers their top quarterback, running back and receiver by the end of September – the ongoing rehab of which would have prevented him from working out at this weekend’s NFL combine even if he’d learned his fate earlier. [Fort Wayne Journal Gazette]
• Darron don’t lose that number. Oregon quarterback Darron Thomas is executing the rare mid-career jersey swap, opting to wear No. 5 this fall after three seasons at the top of the roster as No. 1. I would make a joke about the Ducks having to order new jerseys to accommodate the switch, but, well, you know. [Eugene Register-Guard]
• Ol’ Dirty Ball Coach. The Wall Street Journal, having already set its sights on Nick Saban in a pair of articles last year, turned to three other SEC coaches to defend the practice of oversigning – knowingly signing more players to scholarships in February than the school has to give under NCAA limits in August – on the record. Arkansas’ Bobby Petrino and Ole Miss’ Houston Nutt both frankly characterized oversigning as insurance against inevitable player attrition, claimed they’re always "very upfront" with recruits they’ve pegged as potential grayshirts and would never tell a player "oh by the way you don’t have a scholarship" at the last minute. Petrino’s usual recruiting strategy, he said, includes signing players who have "absolutely no chance" to qualify academically, so that "they feel a commitment to us" after a year or two in junior college – a tactic Nutt has specifically embraced in the past.
Steve Spurrier, on the other hand, admitted to being less than upfront with two longstanding verbal commitments with borderline grades, Jordan Montgomery and Lorenzo Mauldin, whose scholarship offers were abruptly pulled the day before they were set to sign last month because South Carolina’s bulging class had run out of room. "What we probably could’ve done earlier in the recruiting is tell them that this could happen," Spurrier said. "But then again, we didn’t know it was going to come up. It’s a ticklish situation." I’m not sure "tickled" is the right word to describe Montgomery’s high school coach, Walter Banks: "I told them this was foul," Banks said. "I didn’t have a clue until 18 hours before signing day, and if they say anything else, they’re lying." [Wall Street Journal]
• Hey, who’s running this media hegemony anyway? ESPN has threatened legal action against Conference USA for the conference’s recently announced deal with FOX Sports, claiming its existing contract with C-USA mandated that ESPN have an opportunity to match any competing offers. ESPN execs said they had an oral agreement with the league and were working to finalize an agreement when C-USA abruptly broke off negotiations on Jan. 4 and announced its deal with FOX the next day. The conference counters that it was under no such obligations and opted for FOX because it offered "terms clearly more favorable than those offered by ESPN" – specifically, a dramatic increase in rights fees and no more games on Tuesday and Wednesday nights. [Sports Business Journal]
• Mean streets. In a story right out of "Law & Order: Los Angeles," Pasadena Police are investigating a homicide after a man’s body was found in the parking lot of the Rose Bowl. Residents in the surrounding hills reported gunshots near the scene around 3 a.m. Monday morning, and the man was discovered outside the stadium about two hours later. [Los Angeles Times]
Quickly… UNC-Charlotte’s fledgling football program hires a new coach from Wake Forest. … Auburn boots oft-troubled running back Eric Smith for unspecified reasons. … Former Alabama and LSU player Chris Keys denies talking to HBO, or being paid. … And even the columnists in Alabama are getting impatient with John Bond and Bill Bell.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
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February 28th, 2011 by admin
Making the morning rounds.
• Apropos of nothing in particular… … we lead Monday with a picture of Auburn coach Gene Chizik feeding a calf in a Cam Newton jersey:
No, that’s not a metaphor for the weekend’s NFL Combine. Why do you ask? [@DawgFarker, via @edsbs]
• Not dead yet. Elsewhere on the Plains, there is hope yet for the most celebrated trees in the history of Alabama, slim though it may be. Soil samples from 6-8 inches below the surface of the 130-year-old oaks at Auburn’s Toomer’s Corner – infamously poisoned by a disturbed Crimson Tide fan after the Tigers’ comeback win at Alabama last year – showed lower levels of herbicide than the initial surface tests, raising the odds of their survival. "The good news is the concentrations are much lower than we initially detected in the beds around the trees. The bad news is we still detected herbicide," horticulture professor Gary Keever told al.com. "Is your glass half full or half empty? … I choose to be an optimist because we’re doing the right thing." Officials will test Monday for contamination of ground water, which they don’t seem to view as a very likely threat. [al.com]
 • Get behind me, Washaun. Georgia running back Washaun Ealey (right) has been reinstated to the team "in full standing," according to coach Mark Richt, this less than three weeks after being suspended for an undisclosed violation of team rules. His return as the Bulldogs’ No. 1 back in spring practice should ward off the feared transfer, but only until hyped, puppy-hoisting freshman Isaiah Crowell hits campus in the fall with high aims of his own. "I want to be a freshman All-American," Crowell said Saturday, after accepting an award from the Atlanta Touchdown Club as the national high school back of the year. "I want to run for more than 1,000 yards," easily beyond Ealey’s team-best totals the last two years. [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]
• Jacquizz Rodgers is composed of iridium. Oregon State defensive lineman Stephen Paea stole headlines by setting an NFL combine record with an astounding 49 bench-press reps at 225 pounds, but at the other end of the scale, OSU running back Jacquizz Rodgers measured in slightly below 5-foot-6, the shortest official height available. But Quizz is also packing 196 pounds into that frame, or roughly three pounds per inch, making him one of the densest players on hand – one explanation, perhaps, for his distinctly non-blistering 40-yard dash time. [NFL.com, The Oregonian]
• Players are getting slower. Or else the timing is getting much better, to the detriment of their boasted speed. Fifteen guys were clocked with sub-4.4-second 40 times in 2006; another 15 came in under 4.4 seconds in 2007, and another 15 in 2008. Beginning in 2009, though, the peak times have plummeted with the move from the RCA Dome to Lucas Oil Stadium: Only four players beat the 4.4 mark that year, followed by four more in 2010. Over the weekend, new membership in the sub-4.4 club was up to five: Maryland’s Da’Rel Scott (4.34), Abilene Christian’s Edmond Gates (4.37), Fort Valley State’s Ricardo Lockette (4.37), Auburn’s Mario Fannin (4.38) and Alabama’s Julio Jones (4.39). [NFL.com]
• RIP. A volunteer intern at Ohio State, Jake Nickle, collapsed Friday during a pickup basketball game in the football facility and was later pronounced dead at Ohio State Medical Center. The cause of death wasn’t immediately known. Nickle, a former defensive end at nearby Capital University, was 22 years old. [Associated Press]
Quickly… Miami athletic director Kirby Hocutt, a Texas native, is leaving for Texas Tech. … Julio Jones gets his first Under Armour commercial. … The SEC Championship Game isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. … Tracking the final days of Dave Duerson. … And Charlie Weis is still making way, way more money than you.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
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February 28th, 2011 by admin
 Making the morning rounds.
• He’s OK, folks. Arizona State running back Deantre Lewis, second on the team last year with 909 total yards and six touchdowns as a true freshman, is recovering after being – in the words of a famous man – shot in the buttocks Saturday while visiting his family in Los Angeles. The bullet was an apparent stray from elsewhere in the neighborhood, and hit Lewis while he was celebrating the birth of his niece; it was removed at a local hospital. Coach Dennis Erickson said he’s spoken to the family and expects Lewis to make "a full recovery," but no word on arrests, charges or other injuries related to the shooting. [Arizona Republic]
• The Rap Sheet. Tennessee sophomore Brent Brewer was suspended indefinitely Sunday after being charged with domestic assault, putting both of the Vols’ starting safeties in doubt for the season in a little under a week. Last week, it was All-SEC pick Janzen Jackson, who withdrew from school for personal issues and will miss at least the rest of the semester; Brewer, who gradually earned a starting job last year over the course of his freshman campaign, is likely out through at least spring practice, too, pending the results of his case. (Details of the incident that led to his arrest aren’t yet available.) He was released Sunday on $ 1,500 bond. [Knoxville News-Sentinel]
In other legal news, Washington State cornerback Tracy Clark was suspended last week after being charged with residential burglary and second-degree theft, both felonies, for allegedly stealing a laptop computer from a dorm room. Campus police ID’d Clark, a true freshman who redshirted last year, by tracking his Internet use on the computer. Hope he kept it clean for the court records. [Spokane Spokesman-Review, KXLY TV]
• The Rap Sheet, Coach Edition. Short-lived Pittsburgh head coach Mike Haywood has entered a court diversion program in Indiana in an effort to expunge the domestic battery charge that cost him his new gig after just 17 days on the job. The original charge, for allegedly choking and throwing the mother of his young son in an argument on New Year’s Eve, was a Class D felony, carrying possible jail time with a conviction. Instead, the deal will require Haywood to undergo a psychological evaluation and perform 60 hours of community service in exchange for having the charge dropped after a year. [Associated Press]
• Lawyerin’ up. The Fiesta Bowl has retained a defense attorney, Nathan J. Hochman – a former federal prosecutor and one time head of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Tax Division – apparently in response to an Arizona attorney general’s probe into illegal campaign contributions by Fiesta Bowl employees. The state AG’s office launched an investigation last year in response to an Arizona Republic article that claimed bowl employees contributed $ 38,000 to various politicians between 2000 and 2009 that were later reimbursed by the Fiesta Bowl – a drop in the bucket compared to the millions the bowl spent over the same period to (legally) wine, dine and otherwise fete the same power brokers, but still a potential violation of campaign-finance laws that prohibit contributions by "non-profit" organizations. (When your CEO makes $ 592,000 a year, you get square quotes around "non-profit," and that’s not even counting the zero-interest loans.) The anti-playoff crusaders at Playoff PAC called on the IRS to enter the investigation last year, but (as always) the Tax Man will neither confirm nor deny its involvement. [Arizona Republic]
• What, that insulting letter? Bygones! UConn has patched things up with Robert Burton, the rogue booster who fired off an angry, six-page letter last month demanding the athletic department return millions of dollars in donations and take Burton’s name off the football complex after failing to consult with him in the process of hiring Paul Pasqualoni as the Huskies’ new head coach. Burton said in a statement he was angry because of "unmet expectations and displeasure with the process," but "came to the conclusion that I’m not going to let one experience change the relationship my family and I have with UConn." No word on whether he would still like to fire "unqualified" athletic director Jeff Hathaway. [Hartford Courant]
• Happy trails. The Pac-10′s transition to the Pac-12 will include a "restructuring" of its officiating hierarchy: Longtime Pac-10 ref Dave Cutaia is out as the league’s officiating coordinator (reportedly at his request), and former NFL vice president of officiating Mike Pereira is in on an interim basis. If you don’t know Cutaia’s name, you almost certainly do know his work as the head official of the most unfathomably bad call I’ve ever seen, the botched onside kick/review that enabled Oregon’s late victory over Oklahoma in September 2006:
Cutaia and his entire crew were suspended by the conference in the aftermath of the Sooners’ loss, and if this blog existed (and it should), Cutaia’s decision to award Oregon a loose ball that a) Had been illegally touched before traveling the requisite 10 yards and b) Was clearly recovered by Oklahoma anyway would be on the masthead. Respect. [Los Angeles Times]
Quickly… Houston Nutt says he didn’t cut nobody. … Kyle Prater’s comeback will be slowed by a villain to at least half of his home state.
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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.
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