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Articles
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Scary Stuff NCAA repeat-violator penalties By: Richard Linde, 18 July 2003
Of course, you can always access the NCAA bylaws online by using a version of the Adobe Acrobat Reader. But virtual reality doesn’t come with Miles Brand’s autograph. He’s the head honcho of the witch-hunters that call themselves the NCAA. Getting Brand to autograph my hardcopy of the Division I Manual might take some doing, on second thought. What inspired all of this involves yesterday’s news, when it was revealed the NCAA had doubled the sanctions placed on the UW basketball program by the Pac-10. According to this morning’s Seattle Times, “The NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions placed UW's men's basketball program on probation for two years.” Last February, the Pac-10 placed the UW’s hoopsters on probation for one year, in response to improper recruiting tactics committed by assistant coach, Cameron Dollar. In addition to doubling the probationary period, the NCAA reduced the number of scholarships by one, from 13 to 12. The penalties stem from what the NCAA termed as "13 major violations and three secondary violations" that involve recruiting.” Beyond the basketball program, the violations put the entire athletic department under "a five-year window of repeat-violator status," said committee chairman Thomas Yeager. "The potential consequences with another major violation, whether it's men's basketball or another sport, increases the penalties." Whoops. Does that mean the March Madness gambling imbroglio counts as a repeat violation? The gambling fiasco happened in June 2003, while the Pac-10 probationary period for basketball started in February 2003. Several weeks ago, the NCAA had a fleet of investigators rummaging Montlake, looking for football violations, in addition to Dana Richardson’s memo, Gilby’s three-dollar wager, and a couple of Neu’s secondary violations. Always relevant, the NCAA Division I Manual, along with the outcome of the Fruit-Basket scandal of 1992, immortalized by these infamous words, “Lack of Institutional Control,” need circumspection. When it imposed additionally penalties on the football program 10 years ago – in addition to the Pac-10 sanctions – the NCAA said, “The penalties imposed, which are in excess of those imposed by the institution and the conference, reflect the committee's finding of a significant lack of institutional control over the summer jobs program in the Los Angeles area. Had the athletics department and, in particular, the members of the football coaching staff made even the most cursory examination of that jobs program during the 10 years of its operation, they would have discovered the violations.” If the latest imbroglio amounts to a lack of institutional control, this is scary stuff when you consider what can happen to a repeat violator. NCAA Bylaw 19.6.2.3.2 (Repeat Violator Penalties) talks about the “prohibition of some or all outside competition in the sport in the latest major violation for one or two sports seasons.” Yikes, that’s the “death penalty”, the one that torpedoed the SMU football program in 1987. Since then, no one else has received the death penalty, but that doesn’t mean it can’t happen again, at least as far as the media are concerned. In a special to ESPN.com (in February), Adrian Wojnarowski had an article published entitled, “Bring Back the Death Penalty.” He wrote, “Ultimately, the NCAA can't legislate morality, but they can do something else: They can make people think twice. They can make them vigilant. They can deliver these infraction committees the true power: Not to just look down the barrel of guns at those untouchable cartel (BCS) schools, but to pull the trigger…When there's no choice left, shut them down.” Continuing on, he writes, "If repeat offenders like Alabama and Minnesota don't get it (the death penalty), where these unbelievable violations are a pattern for years and years, who's going to get it?" Writing about a collision between Big and Little Football, Sally Jenkins of the Washington Post, says, "The real cause is the Bowl Championship Series alliance, a rule-the-world cartel so ruinous and corrupt that it ought to be promptly dismantled by the NCAA..." Some in the media are clamoring for a shutdown of a big-time-college-football program, and, by trying to influence public opinion, have placed the folks running the NCAA under public scrutiny. Will the NCAA Infractions Committee make the UW a scapegoat for its supposed indifference to punishing repeat violators in the past? While the Infractions Committee jackhammers the purple pylons supporting Dempsey Indoor, leaving the good ship Washington listing at Montlake, a part of the wreckage can be seen in the distance: a floatable copy of the NCAA Division I Manual is bobbing in the wake left by Rick Neuheisel's motor boat. A most readable portion of the manual is shown below. -------------------- NCAA Bylaw 19.6.2.3.2 Repeat-Violator Penalties: In addition to the penalties identified for a major violation, the minimum penalty for a repeat violator, subject to exceptions authorized by the Committee on Infractions on the basis of specifically stated reasons, may include any or all of the following: (Revised 11/1/94). (a) The prohibition of some or all outside competition in the sport involved in the latest major violation for one or two sports seasons and the prohibition of all coaching staff members in the sport from involvement directly or indirectly in any coaching activities at the institution during that period; (b) The elimination of all initial grant-in-aid and all recruiting activities in the sport involved in the latest major violation in question for a two-year period; (c) The requirement that all institutional staff members on the Board of Directors, Management Council, Executive Committee or other committees of the association resign those positions, it being understood that all institutional representatives shall be ineligible to serve on the NCAA committee for a period of four years; and (d) The requirement that the institution relinquish its voting privilege in the Association for a four-year period. Richard Linde (a.k.a., Malamute) can be reached at malamute@4malamute.com
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This
is the time of year Husky fans should be contemplating the arrival of the 2003
Football Media Guide. You know, like preparing to read Tolstoy’s “War and Peace”
for the umpteenth time. In addition to the Media Guide, I ordered the latest
version of the NCAA Division I Manual, with its entire labyrinth of bylaws.
That’s like preparing to read James Joyce’s “Finnegans Wake” for the first time.