The Kansas/Selby ruling -- why it is unfair...and the SLU rape cases, and MORE basketball news..

Josh Selby, the 5-Star Kansas freshman, has finally been cleared -- but here's the deal --
The NCAA went incredibly soft on him -- they ruled all the cash and goods he got were just "impermissible benefits" and not money from an agent prior to initial eligibility!!!

The NCAA ruled that he received at least $5,757.58 in impermissible benefits...
(you can bet he got other stuff that NCAA couldn't find or prove as well!)..
so they have penalized him 9 games and he must repay the money...
(there is an appeal and Kansas is already apparently asking the amount be reduced to $4,607.58)

Now -- I suppose it really doesn't matter to me because it was a given all along that they were going to allow the kid to play -- after all this is Kansas -- and Kansas makes a lot of money for the NCAA....and they get obvious breaks from NCAA all the time despite their history of cheating.

But -- this is MONEY the kid got from PROFESSIONAL AGENTS!! In fact, the MAIN agent in question is Carmelo Anthony's own personal business manager and agent!!! --- so it is exactly the same as the Enes Kanter case (Kentucky) and thus the kid Should be declared a PROFESSIONAL athlete and should be barred from ever playing in college!
NCAA also just banned a couple North Carolina FOOTBALL players for precisely the same thing!!

But...... considering the kid gets exactly the same penalty that Bradley's Patrick O'Bryant got for inadvertently receiving a few hundred dollars....
(suspended 30% of the games and must repay the money)
this is a complete insult!
On top of that BU got hammered additionally with other penalties and probation for the POB incident, but of course Kansas U. ain't gonna get any penalty -- even though all their scandals and cheating keep happening while they are still on probation from the last time they got caught cheating!!

Let's face it -- if the NCAA found $5757 that this kid received in impermissible benefits, then there's probably $20,000 more they did NOT find -- and the kid got the money from pro agents -- not inadvertently from a summer job.
This is the same violation the NCAA used for Marcus Canty, Howard Porter, and Enes Kanter -- even the same rulings that were so blatant with Reggie Bush & OJ Mayo -- to ban them forever and even forfeit any wins they had -- so why is the kid not banned forever from college sports??

This is just the kind of crap we see all the time...
the press will say great-- the NCAA acted properly, but when you look at the details, they did not act properly...they need to penalize the cheating going on...
In effect -- the kid gets NO penalty at all -- he just pays back the $$ (or probably the agent does it for him) and he gets to start playing in a couple weeks...and of course the school gets nothing as well.

How do think this is ever going prevent kids from taking money from agents? What the hey ---this ruling basically says they might as well do it -- they have little to lose ---
even if they get caught, all they do is pay back what the NCAA bumbles across and finds, and they get declared eligible anyway, maybe missing a few games.
But given how horrible 5-Star Harrison Barnes looked last night for UNC (0-12 from the floor), maybe a 9-game mini-redshirt isn't a bad idea anyway!

What we've seen lately with NCAA pardoning USC basketball entirely even though OJ Mayo got tens of thousands of dollars' worth of goodies, and Mississippi State's Renardo Sydney getting off scott free except docked a few games, even though his family got nearly a MILLION dollars of freebies!!! In fact the Sydney case was so dirty - that even though the kid and his family moved to LA and planned to go to USC, the folks at USC, who were cheating like he** anyway -- still didn't want to touch Sydney and pulled their offer!! What does that tell you??
Yet the NCAA is still ever so soft on these cheaters -- especially the ones going to BCS schools....so it's not gonna change....
to get change you have to penalize the offenders.....but instead, NCAA looks for a free pack of gum some Bradley kid might have gotten, or a coach who says "work harder" during the summer, or they hammer SEMO three more times for minimal violations!
Meanwhile Kansas looks for other ways to get rich and get ahead like black market scalping several millions in tickets -- and the NCAA won't bother them at all on that!
I say follow the money -- see where all that black market cash went to -- and I'll bet some went for some nice cars and things (like rifles being shot out of the dorm windows) that are being enjoyed by the players.



I am not the only one who thinks this NCAA penalty is ridiculous..read this...
CBSSports' Gary Parrish agrees...this penalty is absolutely NOTHING --
so he's mockingly telling all the top recruits to go ahead and take the gifts and freebies the agents toss their way...

"..I've got some advice: Take improper benefits.

Seriously, just do it.

(Get it? Just Do It!)

Take flights and hotel rooms, cell phones and cash. Drive a nice car, get a
"recruiting advisor" who works with NBA players, grab your mother and tell
her to do it, too. More than likely, you won't get caught because, well, it's
just hard to prove these things. But even if you do get caught -- like Kansas
freshman Josh Selby got caught -- you'll merely be asked to repay a few
thousand dollars, and then you'll be reinstated before the start of league play.

The reward clearly outweighs the risk."

...It's compared to robbing a bank, then living the life of luxury all along on the money you got illegally, then in the end, when your fun is over, just repay some of the money and all is forgiven!!
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/story/14325013



THEN JUST A BIT OF FOLLOWUP ON THE SAINT LOUIS RAPE CASES..
that were mentioned in this blog last Wednesday...
http://bubravesblogger.blogspot.com/2010/11/more-promotion-of-unusual-special.html

I hate to belabor the point, but there's a new article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch...and they seem to deal pretty lightly with this whole thing as if this is just the usual, expected college stuff!!!
But had this stuff happened at Bradley -- not only would all the players be gone in an instant, but there'd be deafening, daily demands that the entire coaching staff be fired and the entire athletic department as well -- and I honestly think I'd be one of those asking for such firings...
Yet -- of the four basketball players involved in this mess, two transferred out on their own -- and the other are being welcomed back and will likely be back on the team starting 2nd semester...

So -- why is the atmosphere for tolerance of this kind of behavior so very different in Peoria from St. Louis and elsewhere??

BTW- there are links to the actual police report -- and this article really didn't do it justice..as it is far more explicit and graphic..
Remember -- the police did virtually nothing and the prosecutors just ignored it...
but when the Saint Louis University student court reviewed this incident and actually heard the evidence and heard the testimony from the woman and the men -- it unanimously called for all the student-violators to be expelled...not just suspended from basketball - but kicked out of the school entirely! The school then followed suit and expelled them....
So obviously it's the consensus of the people there who have heard and know the facts, that these guys all are guilty of violating long time, standard guidelines for behavior on campus -- and were dealt the most severe penalty the student court could issue.
Meanwhile -- the woman and her family and lawyers never could interest the cops and prosecutors so the perps go scott free.
http://www.stltoday.com/sports/college/slu/article_b0d76ac8-3ceb-5bd9-badd-a0f0aa2d1173.html




The Sun Times has a great feature -- check any Chicago area team with detail and pics..
(sorry no downstate teams -- they just don't have the $$ to spend on gas, I guess..)

Here's a picture of ISU recruit Jonny Hill...
http://i.dailyherald.com/stories/324/324766.jpg

and here's the main pages...several general articles......
http://basketball.dailyherald.com/boys/
http://basketball.dailyherald.com/story/?id=413850

AND -- This page allows you to search any school in the area and get details...
http://basketball.dailyherald.com/teams/boys/

For example -- here's Al Biancalana's York...
http://basketball.dailyherald.com/teams/york/boys/

I know this is a big city, but the Sun Times has done a great job here!!!