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Facebook Provides New Challenge to Recruiting Rules

November 29, 2010 by

On Monday, November 15, 2010, Facebook made the NCAA recruiting rules obsolete. No one would have argued the rules were perfect before that date, but they still worked well enough. And one company didn’t do all the damage overnight. This was just the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Because on that Monday, Facebook introduced a new messaging system that blends email, text messaging, instant messaging, and social networking. And with that announcement, the NCAA membership is forced to come up with a new paradigm for how we regulate recruiting.

Much of the backbone of the NCAA’s regulation of recruiting contact is based on the medium a coach uses to get in touch with a prospect. An email is seen as different than a text message (email is unlimited starting with the junior year of high school, text messaging is prohibited). A voicemail is seen as different than an audio file sent via email (voicemails are treated like phone calls, audio attachments are mostly prohibited). Videoconferencing is treated like a phone call rather than face-to-face contact.

Social networking has always had to fit into these definitions. If a message looks like email, it’s regulated like email. If a conversation looks like instant messaging, it goes into that pigeonhole. Not to mention that social networking introduces a much more nuanced approach to the idea of public vs. private messaging.

It may seem like tortured logic to say that Twitter direct messages were like email, and thus permissible to prospects who had started their junior year. It might make you scratch your head further to learn that if the prospect received updates of those messages via text messaging, they suddenly became impermissible.

Even if it was a fiction, that fiction was still hanging on. Until Facebook created a system that might turn a text message into an email. Or turn an email into an instant message. Or where an email might trigger a “push notification,” a potential intrusion into a prospect’s life that the rules don’t even consider. All in a system that might change the nature of a message not just based on a preference selected by a user, but even by whether the user is logged into a website or not.

Facebook isn’t the first to try and meld different types of communication together. Google Wave could have resulted in sweeping change to the NCAA rules by melding email, instant messaging, chat, and document collaboration into one. Another Google product, Google Voice, mixes phone calls and text messaging with email.

The reason Facebook’s announcement disrupts the recruiting rules in a way those Google products never have is Facebook’s user base. With a few lines of code, Facebook could push these changes to over 500 million people. Besides sheer numbers, the most active users of Facebook have always included the same target demographic as college coaches: high school and college students.

When Facebook rolls these changes out to their users, there won’t be time to see how coaches and recruits use these new tools. With any marketing at all, we can expect to see a large number of prospects switch to @facebook.com email addresses right off the bat. That means coaches could find themselves in a position where a prospect is offering a means of getting touch that carries no guarantee that any message is allowed under the rules.

To fix the rules, we must first acknowledge a couple of things. We must acknowledge that trying to differentiate between different forms of text communication is no longer possible. We must acknowledge that these are the tools prospects want coaches to use to get in touch with them. And we must acknowledge that these tools put prospects in control of who contacts them through confirming friends, blocking users, and other privacy controls.

As it gets more difficult to regulate recruiting based on the medium used or the frequency of contact, the only option left is the time contact occurs. That could mean one of two things. It could mean that after a certain date (say August 1 prior to a prospect’s junior year in high school), there are no limits to how a coach can get in touch with a prospect. Or it could mean that during certain periods (like during a contact period), all recruiting contact is permitted with all prospects, and contact is prohibited outside of those periods.

The former is the easier to implement and brings greater benefits. Tying phone calls, emails, and text messages into the recruiting calendar means significant additional legislation. Some sports do not have enough time for communication in their existing recruiting calendars to allow for effective recruiting. And other sports don’t have recruiting calendars at all. Plus allowing significant contact in the junior year reduces the influence of handlers and gives coaches a chance to catch up with agents who are identifying and contacting athletes at younger and younger ages.

The idea is not without drawbacks. Opening up recruiting tends to favor prospects whose families are more prepared to deal with college coaches. One of the reasons text messaging was banned was because coaches were running up massive cell phone bills for prospects who did not have unlimited text messaging plans. That is alleviated some as communication moves to a model where coaches just get the message onto a prospect’s radar and the prospect chooses how and when to receive it.

More early contact also means more early scholarship offers and more early commitments. Hopefully the promise of unlimited contact in the junior year will reduce commitments by sophomores. A drastic solution would be to remove the early signing period entirely. That would mean more time in the recruiting process at the back-end, more time for a committed prospect to realize he or she is missing out on face-to-face contact with coaches and official visits.

Whatever solution the membership ultimately chooses, it needs to be acknowledged that the assumptions many of the recruiting rules are based on no longer apply. It’s time to treat it all contact that isn’t face-to-face as the same cheap, flexible, and valuable way for prospects to get the information they need to make a good decision and for coaches to connect directly with the people they should be selling their programs to.

The opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s and the author’s alone, and are not endorsed by the NCAA or any NCAA member institution or conference. This blog is not a substitute for a compliance office.

About John Infante

The opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s and the author’s alone, and are not endorsed by the NCAA or any NCAA member institution or conference. This blog is not a substitute for a compliance office. If you’re a coach, do not attempt to contact the author looking for a second opinion. If you’re a parent, don’t attempt to contact the author looking for a first opinion. Compliance professionals are by their nature helpful people generally dedicated to getting to the truth. Coaches should have a bit of faith in their own, and parents should talk to one directly.

Filed Under: Bylaw Blog, Feature Tagged With: , ,

Week in review: Nov. 22-26

November 27, 2010 by

News from the college sports week to digest along with the Thanksgiving leftovers:

Clash of the titans: A pair Division I presidents entered uncharted verbal territory this week when they argued about which teams are worthy to compete in the Bowl Championship Series title game.

It began Wednesday when Ohio State President Gordon Gee launched a zinger toward TCU and Boise State, currently ranked third and fourth in the BCS standings.

“I do know, having been both a Southeastern Conference president (Vanderbilt) and a Big Ten president, that it’s like murderer’s row every week for these schools,” Gee told The Associated Press. “We do not play the Little Sisters of the Poor. We play very fine schools on any given day. So I think until a university runs through that gantlet that there’s some reason to believe that they not be the best teams to (be) in the big ballgame.”

That got the attention of Boise State President Bob Kustra, who told the Idaho Statesman: “Maybe President Gee doesn’t go to the games of the teams that are not in his Big Ten, but he’s playing some easy marks.”

In case he didn’t make his annoyance clear, Kustra added: “I just hope that when he speaks about his research profile or the quality of his university he’s a little more believable than he is about athletics, because he’s just so wrong on this one.”

TCU Chancellor Victor Boschini stayed on the sideline for the spat, but his athletics director, Chris Del Conte, weighed in: “To start throwing stones at your house, they must be jealous … (when) someone starts taking shots at TCU, that means we’ve arrived.”

Other reaction:

Gordon Gee was right, Boise State and TCU can deal with it (Andrew Sharp, SB Nation)

Ohio State president: Boise State and TCU don’t deserve BCS title shot (Tyler Reisinger, Sports Grid)

Gee’s bluster blows holes in BCS (Dan Wetzel, Yahoo! Sports)

On a related note, Penn State’s Graham Spanier said he anticipated little change in the FBS postseason approach for “the next several years, for sure, and maybe for longer.”

In the wake of the Gee matter, Kustra said he wasn’t so sure: “We probably need to sit down and think about a playoff system,” he said. “The only outliers are the presidents of the schools in the large conferences.”

Finally, as Division I’s Football Bowl Subdivision approached the end of its regular season, it remained uncertain whether enough teams would qualify to fill the 35 bowl games. As of Friday, the math seemed to favor enough qualified teams, but suffice to say it will be close. Nick Carparelli, chair of the Division I Football Bowl Licensing Subcommittee and associate commissioner of the Big East Conference, told USA Today earlier this month that his group is committed to filling all the slots, even if there is a shortfall.

Turner, CBS execs talk tournament: Sean McManus, president of CBS News and CBS Sports, and David Levy, president of sales, distribution and sports for Turner Broadcasting, recently discussed their new partnership with the Division I Men’s Basketball Championship.

Sports Business Journal reporter John Ourand interviewed the duo, and while the conversation didn’t yield any major news, it did provide detail into how the NCAA/CBS/Turner agreement came to be and how the networks view their partnership going forward. (Note: Registration and payment are required for Sports Business Journal content.)

Newtonian math: Tobias Moskowitz and L. Jon Wertheim, writing for Sports Illustrated, used some fundamental math to arrive at a suggested salary for Auburn quarterback Cam Newton. (They compared the salary of Indianapolis Colts quarterback Peyton Manning to annual Colts revenue, derived the percentage and then applied that percentage to Auburn football revenue.) The figure for Newton was $3.5 million.

“NCAA policymakers might be shocked by that idea,” they wrote, “but the economics faculty at member schools surely will be less surprised to see signs of a free-market economy.”

In fact, policymakers would not be shocked since they’ve all seen figures like this before.

Moskowitz, a University of Chicago economist, and Wertheim were using the SI platform to shill for their upcoming book, “Scorecasting: The Hidden Influences Behind How Sports Are Played and Games Are Won.”

For what it’s worth, NCAA President Mark Emmert does not offer much hope for those who want to pay players.

Olson outburst: On Tuesday, ESPN’s Diamond Leung noted the NCAA’s response to the assertions of former Arizona men’s basketball coach Lute Olson, who last week turned aggressive in assailing the NCAA infractions process in the wake of a finding against his program.

A few follow-up thoughts:

  • Olson evoked conspiratorial images in his outburst, often vaguely referring to “they” and “the NCAA.” As he well knows, the infractions process involves particular groups: the NCAA enforcement staff, which is paid to investigate charges of wrongdoing (similar to how police investigate crimes) and the Division I Committee on Infractions, which serves as a jury of membership peers in adjudicating the case. Why either the staff or the committee would have an agenda against Olson or the University of Arizona was not made clear in his rant.
  • The Committee on Infractions often determines that the staff has not met the burden of proof required to support a finding. Olson’s assertion that any challenge to the process is futile or may lead to retribution is false on the surface.
  • The finding was issued July 29, and the university (and Olson) had 15 days to appeal. They chose not to do so, even though the Division I Infractions Appeals Committee historically has exhibited a willingness to overturn findings.
NCAA Insider is an occasional take on college sports issues, as viewed by NCAA communications staff member David Pickle. Opinions are his alone.

About Dave Pickle

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Caught Being Good: Cory Nikkel

November 23, 2010 by

Cory Nikkel vividly remembers his first time.

As a fifth-grader, he began helping others by raking leaves for the elderly. From then on, the Central College junior was hooked, as evidenced by this “Dutch tight end Nikkel feeds addiction to serve” story.

“My parents stressed that I am blessed to have a warm home, to have the energy and the youth to be able to play all day,” he said. “There’s people out there who can’t even leave their houses and rake their own leaves, so I was so excited to be able to do that. That was definitely the first point I remember being like, ‘Hey, I love helping people.’ ”

Nikkel’s service habit has taken him to Peru and Mexico. His next stop?  Nikkel will head to Australia, where he’ll spend three months this spring with a mission organization providing assistance to Aborigines.  The 21-year-old said he can’t imagine what the experience will be like, but he knows it’s going to change his life.“Here I am sitting in the dorm room and I have everything I need in just one little room,” said Nikkel, who will miss spring football practice and graduate a semester late to go on the trip. “I’m going to go out into the Outback and live with people who don’t even have running water, no electricity, their possessions are miniscule. And yet they’re living a happy life, they’re content with how they are.

“So I’m very excited just to learn from them, but also have a chance to help them. “

Nikkel plans to write a first-person account of his Outback experience for NCAA.org, checking in monthly when he has access to the Internet back in Townsville, Queensland.

About a year ago, the English and secondary education major began writing a motivational book tentatively titled “For the life of me; or what could be you” about dealing with the relationships, temptations and changes that many college students encounter. His trip to Australia will no doubt be a source of inspiration for the budding author.

In altruistic fashion, Nikkel has put his English as a Second Language and Arabic classes to good use by working with an Iraqi refugee support program in Des Moines. Several other Central student-athletes have been involved, including a couple of basketball players.

At Central , coaches and teammates have encouraged and been encouraged by Nikkel. One in particular is Zach Van Arkel, a graduated team captain whom Nikkel said also has a heart for service. (While studying abroad during the spring semester in 2008, Van Arkel worked at The Passage, a homeless shelter in London.)

Along with last year’s senior class, Van Arkel put together a Lift-a-Thon. The money was used to buy toys for the children’s hospital in Des Moines.

“Ten cents per pound adds up to be a bunch of money when you lift about a thousand pounds of weight,” Nikkel said.

About Kristen Porter

Filed Under: Caught Being Good, Feature Tagged With: , ,

Abusing the unabusable

November 23, 2010 by

A few months back, Eamonn Brennan looked at the proposed men’s basketball summer school rule. The rule, as embodied in Proposal 2010-58, has a couple of major components:

  • An assessment of every incoming or continuing men’s basketball student-athlete to decide if they need summer school;
  • The opportunity for coaches to have eight hours per week of required athletic activity, with no more than two of those hours devoted to skill instruction for an eight week period in the summer;
  • A requirement that any student-athlete involved in those activities enroll in six credits during the summer and pass six credits (three for incoming freshmen); and
  • A requirement that schools offer summer school aid to walk-ons who fail the assessment.

After looking at the rule, Brennan could find nothing wrong with it and issued a challenge:

Please, college coaches: Abuse this system. I’m having a hard time finding anything wrong with it.

Brennan’s point was that even if a coach attempts to abuse this rule by prioritizing athletics over academics, academics still wins. It doesn’t matter if you’re bringing freshman in early or keeping returners over the summer for basketball or books, books still get a fair share of attention.

And it is tough to poke holes in the rule. Georgia Tech head coach Paul Hewitt objected to the potential for a prospective student-athlete to become eligible then fall ineligible:

“I am somewhat concerned about the double jeopardy you’re putting a kid in,” said Hewitt, a member of the National Association of Basketball Coaches board. “If a young man goes to summer school and for whatever reason—maybe a family emergency—if he did not pass his hours, you could be putting him in jeopardy of being ineligible.

Hewitt’s example is flawed because in the case of a family emergency, the student-athlete would have an excellent chance of being granted a progress-toward-degree waiver to take the court in the fall. But Brennan is incorrect that the rule cannot be abused. Because once you get past the freshman year, there doesn’t need to be any double jeopardy.

Bylaw 14, covering eligibility, along with Bylaw 12 (amateurism) form the heart of the NCAA Manual. Those two sections dictate who can and cannot take the practice field or compete for an NCAA institution. Boiled down to its essence, Bylaw 14 establishes the following requirements for a continuing student-athlete to be academically eligible:

  • Enroll as a full-time student (usually 12 credits);
  • Pass six credits every term;
  • Pass 18 credits (27 at quarter schools) during each academic year (no summer school);
  • Pass 24 credits (36 at quarter schools) before the start of the sophomore year;
  • Declare a major by the start of the junior year;
  • Have completed 40% of your degree by the start of the junior year followed by 60% at the start of the senior year and 80% before the fifth year; and
  • Stay at or near the required GPA for graduation at the school (usually 2.0).

If a student-athlete is at a semester school in a 120 unit degree program (one of the most common situations), those degree progress percentages translate to 24 credits every year, just like freshmen. It’s at the intersection of the 18-unit rule (sticking with the semester rules from here on out), the degree progress requirements, and the new summer school requirement that the rule can be abused.

Simply put, the new summer school requirement does not require a men’s basketball student-athlete to earn any additional credits. Assuming that a freshman men’s basketball student-athlete passes 18 units during the academic year and six units during the spring, they can be eligible by passing six units over the summer. If they participate in summer practice, they can be eligible in the fall by passing the same six units.

This has the effect of reducing the incentive for a coach to promote sufficient academic progress during the academic year. Say a coach intends to have every returning student-athlete participate in practice over the summer. Every player on the team will need to pass six units in the summer to be eligible. What incentive does the coach have to promote passing all 24 units (on average) that a student-athlete needs to stay eligible during the academic year if they’re just going to have to pass six more in the summer?

The difference between 24 units and 30 is a big deal, because it’s the difference between a four- and five-year graduation track. Throw in the summer bridge program for freshman and a couple of extra classes here and there and we can get to the ideal: a 3.5 year graduation track that means student-athletes who drop out of school after their senior season to prepare for the draft have already graduated (still hurts the APR though).

The solution would be to allow only student-athletes who have achieved eligibility for the following fall at the conclusion of the academic year to participate in summer practice. That would provide a real competitive advantage to programs that promote greater academic achievement in the fall and spring. Plus it would make all the credits earned in the summer “new credits,” not previously required. The trade-off is that some coaches may dissuade student-athletes from taking summer school if they feel the risk of losing eligibility for the fall is too great.

Every rule can be abused. Every rule is going to be picked over by people looking to gain an advantage, or in this case get something (summer practice) for nothing (extra academic achievement). The challenge is not to make rules that have no loopholes. The challenge is to make rules with loopholes that we can live with.

The opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s and the author’s alone, and are not endorsed by the NCAA or any NCAA member institution or conference. This blog is not a substitute for a compliance office.

About John Infante

The opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s and the author’s alone, and are not endorsed by the NCAA or any NCAA member institution or conference. This blog is not a substitute for a compliance office. If you’re a coach, do not attempt to contact the author looking for a second opinion. If you’re a parent, don’t attempt to contact the author looking for a first opinion. Compliance professionals are by their nature helpful people generally dedicated to getting to the truth. Coaches should have a bit of faith in their own, and parents should talk to one directly.

Filed Under: Bylaw Blog, Feature Tagged With: , ,

Week in review: Nov. 15-19

November 20, 2010 by

The news week of Nov. 15-19 started slow, with follow-ups on the Enes Kanter eligibility decision leading the way. The pace picked up in late week with an unusual issue involving Saturday’s Illinois-Northwestern football game and discussions about athlete violence and fallout from an infractions case.

Balanced reaction to Kanter: Media didn’t gravitate one way or the other in reacting to the NCAA’s decision that Kentucky’s Enes Kanter’s competitive experience in Turkey rendered him a professional and therefore permanently ineligible for competition in Division I (Kentucky has indicated it will appeal the decision).

Here’s a sampler of post-decision commentary:

Kanter fallout at Kentucky, Kansas’ waiting game with Selby and more (Seth Davis, SI.com)

Blue about a big man (David Roth, Wall Street Journal)

Maybe the NCAA got it right (Darrell Cartwright, Scout.com)

Explain this: Millionaire Parker can play but Kanter can’t? (Gregg Doyel, CBSSports.com)

The Davis piece contained an important point that many observers miss: “Rip the NCAA all you want − just don’t blame the NCAA. What I mean is that too often people rail against ‘the NCAA’ without specifying who they are talking about. This decision came from the staff at the NCAA’s headquarters in Indianapolis, but the rule, like all legislation, was proposed and passed by the member schools.”

Davis speaks the truth here. He goes on to lament that the enforcement of the rule (assuming it stands) makes it less likely that elite international players will compete in Division I basketball.

Later in the column, Davis fielded a question about why initial-eligibility certification seems to take so long. “I am also miffed that the season is starting this weekend without a verdict,” Davis said. “I realize the NCAA processes hundreds, if not thousands, of eligibility requests each year, but I think there needs to be more accountability to get these matters settled before the first game.”

Everybody can agree with Davis’ sentiment about timeliness, but the real world may get in the way in complicated cases. Those who are interested in this topic should read Michelle Brutlag Hosick’s description of NCAA Eligibility Center process on NCAA.org. “If (certification is) taking a long time,” Eligibility Center President Todd Leydon told Hosick, “there’s usually a reason for it …. (W)e need to be thorough and fair.”

Cornell pins conventional wisdom: The Nov. 14 New York Times contained a great article from Bill Pennington (one of the most thoughtful sportswriters around) about the emergence of Cornell as a wrestling power.

The Big Red enters the season as the No. 1 team in the nation, which is virtually unheard of for Ivy League and East Coast wrestling programs.

The entire article about how Rob Koll built the program is fascinating, but one especially interesting part was Koll’s take on how Cornell, as an Ivy League member, functions at such a high level without giving athletically-related financial aid. 

Here’s the excerpt: “We have a tighter group of guys because there’s no resentment over who is getting a full ride and who isn’t,” said Koll, whose athletes can qualify for need-based financial aid, which can be significant. (Three of his 10 starters are paying the entire cost to attend Cornell, which is more than $50,000 annually.) Scholarships can also make the coach-athlete connection feel more like an owner-athlete relationship. That’s when guys start thinking of their sport as a job.”

Emmert insight: More stories are describing what Mark Emmert might seek to accomplish as NCAA president. Inside Higher Education’s Doug Ledderman conducted an assessment after Emmert’s appearance at Thursday’s Association for the Study of Higher Education meeting in Indianapolis. Earlier in the week, the Baton Rouge Advocate posted a question-and-answer session.

For more information about Emmert, visit the NCAA President’s Page at NCAA.org.

The confines of Wrigley Field: The week’s oddest story involved the configuration of the field for Saturday’s Northwestern-Illinois football game at Chicago’s Wrigley Field. As the field was laid out in the venerable baseball stadium early in the week, the east endline was so close to the right-field wall that the goal post came almost straight up from the barrier.

The Big Ten Conference dealt with the issue by having all offense point in one direction.

Many fans with an interest in playing rules might not be aware that rules for NCAA sports are available for viewing at no charge on NCAAPublications.com. Here’s the link to reach the football rules book, which contains the relevant field specifications on page FR19 and the actual rule on page FR24.

Concerns expressed about athlete violence: Katherine Redmond, who advocates against violence by athletes, met Wednesday with NCAA President Emmert and other officials.

Here are some recaps:

Katherine Redmond pitches NCAA for victims of athletes’ crimes

NCAA needs to address violence – against women

NCAA explores ways to curb violence

Bowl qualification quandary: As the college football regular season wound down, the possibility emerged that there might not be enough teams with .500 records or better to fill the 35 certified postseason bowl games in Division I’s Football Bowl Subdivision. The problem was discussed early in the season, but circumstances became more urgent over this week as it became apparent that the number of qualifiers is going to be tight.

NCAA Insider is an occasional take on college sports issues, as viewed by NCAA communications staff member David Pickle. Opinions are his alone.

About Dave Pickle

Filed Under: Feature, NCAA Insider

A Campus Perspective on Initial Eligibility

November 16, 2010 by

The initial eligibility certification process is still a mystery to most people. The idea of initial eligibility started in 1983, when university president adopted Prop 48, which became effective in 1986. The original requirements were a 2.0 GPA in 11 core courses and at least a 700 SAT or 18 ACT. Over the ensuing years, the core ideas have remained, but the methods tweaked and the numbers raised. A single minimum GPA and test score gave way to a sliding scale. The ACT composite score was changed to the sum of the individual sections. And the 11 core courses slowly but inevitably rose to the 16 required today.

The process has changed as well. A decade after Prop 48 was enacted, the NCAA Initial Eligibility Clearinghouse was established. Run by the same company that administers the ACT, it was designed to ensure that everyone was working off the same information. That gave way in 2007 to the NCAA Eligibility Center, now a part of the NCAA itself. And along the way the process picked up new characteristics. Instead of simply saying “This is what the list of courses are and this is which ones are on the transcript,” the Eligibility Center asks whether the courses are really core courses, whether the work was properly done to put them on the transcript, and whether the high school itself is academically sound for student-athletes. On top of that, a review of the student-athlete’s amateur status was added in 2007 as well.

The NCAA is correct when they say this process goes smoothly in the overwhelming majority of cases. So to say the system doesn’t work is incorrect. If the idea of centralized initial eligibility certification doesn’t work, it fails or is flawed in a tiny minority of cases. Cases like Enes Kanter’s tend to highlight the flaws in the system, but also point out how outside influences can bog down the system.

Providing Information

It should go without saying that an initial eligibility case cannot start until the prospect registers with the Eligibility Center and answers the amateurism questions. After that, the amateurism certification staff may request additional information and documentation. Gathering all that takes time.

The solution to this problem has been to tie elements of the recruiting process to the initial eligibility process. An institution can’t provide a prospect with a National Letter of Intent unless they register with the Eligibility Center and complete the amateurism questionnaire. They can’t be provided an official visit unless they register and send the school a transcript and test score.

On a side note, this has the unintended consequence of allowing anyone who controls a prospect’s registration with the Eligibility Center and/or a prospect’s academic record to control their recruitment. Don’t want a prospect to sign in the early signing period? Keep them from registering with the Eligibility Center. Don’t want a kid to take an official visit to a certain school? Refuse to send them a copy of the prospect’s transcript.

Who Steps Up

It should come as no surprise that the Eligibility Center likes dealing with member institutions rather than prospective student-athletes directly. If you work with prospects, you’re signing up to deal with hundreds of thousands of individuals who come to the process with little or no prior knowledge and go through the process once. On Division I campuses, there might be fewer than 2,000 individuals who would ever have any reason to contact the Eligibility Center. Realistically, you’re looking at maybe a few hundred to a thousand people who contact the Eligibility Center on a regular basis from member institutions in each division (I and II only).

Add in the fact that Bylaw 12.1.1 places the responsibility on member institutions to ensure their athletes are amateurs. The result is that an initial eligibility case really doesn’t get moving until either the Eligibility Center knows for certain where the prospect will enroll, or a member institution steps up and agrees to shepherd the prospect through the system. Because the onus is on the member institution, you don’t want universities trying to jump in midstream and getting up to speed, especially if other universities might have critical information sitting on their campus that they are unwilling or unable to share.

It’s tempting to look at the Kanter case and say “Everyone knew this was going to be a problem, someone should have started this sooner.” But every fan should take a second before getting up in arms. As passionately as fans follow recruiting, and as angry as some get when a coach cannot secure a commitment from a certain prospect, imagine how livid they would be if that institution helped the prospect get eligible and watched as the prospect enrolled somewhere else.

No He Said, She Said

One of the most important and time-consuming phases of a difficult amateurism case is the fact-finding stage. That comes from two key features of amateurism certification. First, the fact-finding stage is not concluded until everyone (prospect, institution, and Eligibility Center staff) agree to the facts. Second, the opportunity to introduce additional facts after the fact-finding stage is severely limited. The goal is to produce an environment where everyone is motivated to offer as much information as possible.

The same goes for the interpretive stage, which does not commence until the fact-finding stage is over. Here, all the parties involved agree to a certain set of rules that are going to control the case. Then the case is forwarded to the student-athlete reinstatement staff for a decision. After conflicting reports of the facts arose in the Kanter case, Kentucky fans feared that the Eligibility Center would side with the professional team in a he said, she said debate. That can’t happen in an amateurism certification case because the case doesn’t move forward until everyone says the same thing.

At each point, there is a group of NCAA staff the institution works with. There is also a committee made up of NCAA member institution staff to hear appeals and offer guidance at each stage (specifically the Amateurism Fact-Finding Committee, the Legislative Review and Interpretations Committee, and the Student-Athlete Reinstatement Committee). In contrast to the American court system, the NCAA allows, promotes and in fact requires interlocutory appeals, that is appeals before the case is concluded.

As long as the process takes, the alternative is worse. Each step would still take some time, but you’d see cases move through the process multiple times as institutions respond to adverse decisions by raising new facts they had known all along and asking for reconsideration of interpretations. It might not seem it, but the process is as cooperative as it can be right now, which helps competitive equity on top of faster decisions. Make it adversarial between the Eligibility Center and the institution/prospect and the compliance arms race, currently bubbling beneath the surface, would begin in earnest.

Solutions

I struggle with solutions because I’m not sure the process is broken. Even as far as tweaks to the system, there are big costs involved. A more proactive approach by the Eligibility Center to reach out and deal directly with prospects sounds like utopia. But I’m sure I’m not alone amongst compliance professionals who have nightmares about receiving a call regarding a prospect that begins “Hello, I’m the attorney representing Johnny Bluechip in his case against the NCAA Eligibility Center.”

The key reform necessary is to not make the certification process harder for a while. I’m of the belief that what appears to be more vigorous NCAA enforcement over the last six months or so is actually more experienced NCAA enforcement staff members maintaining the same commitment they always had. The same goes for the Eligibility Center. Every case teaches the staff something, and that knowledge will go toward faster and more accurate decisions in the future.

It’s tempting on campus to see the Eligibility Center as “one stop shopping,” especially because it sees itself that way. Want more information on prospect’s recruitment? Let’s do a recruiting certification! Want to deregulate recruiting contact put it the hands of the prospects? Hey, the Eligibility Center can run a “do not call” list! As the ones who decide what the Eligibility Center’s job is, let’s not make it harder until we’re sure that the certification of academic and amateur eligibility is as effective and efficient as it can get.

But one change in the rules that could make this worse is a proposal currently making its way through the governance structure. Proposal 2010-42 would ban all offers of athletic scholarships prior to July 1 before a prospect’s senior year. The intended effect is to eliminate verbal commitments prior to that date. Which means coaches and administrators would be extremely reluctant to saddle up for difficult eligibility cases until then. Plus the proposal requires a five-semester transcript to be submitted before a verbal offer is made, offering another opportunity for someone with control of a prospect’s transcripts to control the recruiting process.

The best course is to continue the current one. As someone who works with this process every day, it works much better than it seems, even when the results don’t come out the way you expect. Everyone involved, especially the NCAA staff and compliance professionals on campus just needs a chance to get better at it. Above all, that means keeping the NCAA members from shooting ourselves in the foot with new initiatives and rules that will start the process even later for the hardest cases.

The opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s and the author’s alone, and are not endorsed by the NCAA or any NCAA member institution or conference. This blog is not a substitute for a compliance office.

About John Infante

The opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s and the author’s alone, and are not endorsed by the NCAA or any NCAA member institution or conference. This blog is not a substitute for a compliance office. If you’re a coach, do not attempt to contact the author looking for a second opinion. If you’re a parent, don’t attempt to contact the author looking for a first opinion. Compliance professionals are by their nature helpful people generally dedicated to getting to the truth. Coaches should have a bit of faith in their own, and parents should talk to one directly.

Filed Under: Bylaw Blog, Feature Tagged With: ,

Week in review: Nov. 8-12

November 13, 2010 by

National media feasted on comfort food for the week of Nov. 8, with familiar fare of media deals, eligibility and potential infractions dominating newspapers, blogs and websites. Commentators also revisted the familiar territory of pay-for-play:

Horns o’ plenty?: A website that exclusively follows the University of Texas athletics program reported Monday that Texas will receive $12 million per year in a deal with ESPN for distribution rights to a Longhorn Network starting in fall 2011.

Orangebloods.com reported that the agreement would include an up-front $10 million payment. USA Today said that with the addition of an anticipated $20 million from the Big 12, Texas would become the nation’s top revenue-producer for television rights, earning close to $30 million next year and more than $32 million beginning in 2012-13.

It’s a big deal, in every sense of the expression. As they say on the Texas promos, “What starts here changes the world.”

Pay-for-play brigade: The Cam Newton episode at Auburn this week set off an outburst of commentary to pay student-athletes in revenue-producing sports (the thinking apparently being that the Newton story, with an as-of-now uncertain set of facts, demonstrates the hopelessness and hypocrisy of the current system). The PPP proponents ranged from Ben Watanabe at LehighValley.com to National Public Radio’s Frank Deford, a perennial NCAA basher. Unrelated to Newton, a fresh round of opinion from Maryland basketball coach Gary Williams about athlete compensation showed up Wednesday on a basketball blog on About.com.

A personal observation: Writers should be more careful about what they mean when they say they want to “pay” student-athletes (Wantanbe deserves credit for making this distinction, even if we disagree about his conclusion). Do they mean market-based pay, as we do with the traditional notion of compensation, or do they mean provision of a stipend? They are entirely different concepts, and yet they too frequently are used interchangeably.

It’s worth noting that NCAA President Mark Emmert has raised the possibility of changing Division I financial aid packages so that they reflect the full cost-of-attendance. If the cost of attendance were covered, would that satisfy the provide-a-stipend crowd?

Kanter decision: The NCAA student-athlete reinstatement staff Thursday ruled that Kentucky basketball student-athlete Enes Kanter is permanently ineligible, based on payments above actual and necessary expenses when he played professional basketball in Turkey.

Whether people agree or disagree with the Kanter decision, they should remember that amateurism regulations have been shaped over the years through votes of NCAA member colleges and universities. The membership also has shaped the eligibility-review process, including the appeal to which Kanter remains entitled.

For those who are interested, NCAA.org’s Michelle Brutlag Hosick provides an overview of eligibility certification.

Conference realignment: The aftershocks: The official slogan of Fort Worth, Texas, is “Where the West Begins,” so it is more than a little ironic that the latest conference realignment chatter has hometown school TCU possibly considering membership in the Big East Conference.

North Dakota State and the Big Sky Conference also appear to be discussing a relationship.

There was actual action Thursday when the Western Athletic Conference, which was been repeatedly affected by Division I conference realignment, invited Texas State and UTSA as new members in all sports and Denver as a member in all sports but football. That action created buzz in the Northwest, where Seattle University had hoped to hook up with the WAC. Montana also had been reported to be in the WAC mix, but the Grizzlies remained with the Football Championship Subdivision’s Big Sky Conference.

Plus or minus $79 million: You’ll have to pay ESPN Insider to see Shaun Assael’s five lawsuits that could change the NCAA. However, the teaser to the story contains some serious misinformation when it states that the NCAA paid $84 million in legal fees last year. The most recent set of NCAA tax documents shows the Association paid about $5.1 million in legal fees in 2008-09. The same $84 million figure showed up two weeks ago on the SportsBizBlog.

Emmert faces the faculty: NCAA President Mark Emmert used the Faculty Athletics Representatives Association Fall Forum as the platform Thursday to deliver one of his first public speeches. The Chronicle of Higher Education captured several of his thoughts.

Call ’em as they are: Charleston (S.C.) Daily Mail columnist Jack Bogaczyk produced a good column Thursday on efforts to make basketball officiating more consistent nationwide.

“The idea,” prominent official Curtis Shaw told Bogaczyk, “is to referee the game the way the rules are written … call the game according to the rulebook. If a shooter’s elbow is hit, no matter the clock, it’s a foul. If you get into this ‘allow the players to decide the game’ stuff, the guy who committed the foul is deciding it.

“It’s not the job of the referees to choreograph the game. It’s their job to officiate the game. We’re going to hold officials accountable. The ones that are will be rewarded with big games and postseason tournaments. The ones that don’t, won’t.”

Recommended reading: The Nov. 8 issue of Sporting News contains an excellent interview with Michigan State men’s basketball coach Tom Izzo. An excerpt (discussing guard Kalin Lucas): “You have to continue to be a better teammate, be a better leader, because he’s quiet. Some people will say, ‘That’s just his personality.’ I get a kick out of those people. When a parent sends a kid to college, they want you to make him a better person, make him a better student. If he’s not a very good dribbler, make him a better dribbler. If he’s not strong enough, change his body. If his jump shot is broke, fix his jump shot. But if his personality is broke, leave it alone? That doesn’t make any sense to me.”

NCAA Insider is an occasional take on college sports issues, as viewed by NCAA communications staff member David Pickle. Opinions are his alone.

About Dave Pickle

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Making a ‘Splash’ on YouTube

November 13, 2010 by

Ever think you would see your campus president in a swimsuit? What about in front of a third of the student body? And all for a good cause? Well, you can think again, thanks to a group of DePauw University seniors challenging their president, Dr. Brian Casey, to a swimming race for what started as some old-fashioned competition but turned into a $5,000 venture for the senior class gift fund.

“I tend to talk a big game, but when it comes to swimming, I think Dr. Casey has the same personality as I do. He told me any stroke, any distance – he would beat me,” remembered Alex Kriegshauser, the senior responsible for instigating the challenge.

Dr. Casey has room to talk. The former Division I swimmer was a captain while competing for Notre Dame and continues to swim most mornings with DePauw’s Division III swimming teams.

An added element of intrigue (which helps this story become relevant to this blog, mind you) is how this challenge played out in the world of social media.

After the challenge was set, the confident president took some unique initiative and issued a dose of pressure to the competitors via YouTube.

“I went to one our students who was working on another video project and I said, ‘I need to make a trash talk video for this’ and we did it completely on the fly,” Casey said.

Here is Casey’s challenge:

So, it was official. This little idea for a swimming challenge was bound to be something bigger – and so it became the Splash for Cash.  It needed rules. It needed a goal. And most importantly…it needed a rivalry!

The Rules: Casey and Kriegshauser agreed on the rules: Kriegshauser could field a team of four swimmers to compete against Casey in a 100 meter swim. Casey, though, made sure that no current or former DePauw student-athletes were on the team as an effort to make the race more fair.

The Goal: It was determined that the loser would have to find a way to get $5,000 into the senior class gift fund: Casey would write a check, and Kriegshauser would be responsible for coordinating fundraising opportunities to reach the $5,000 mark before graduation.

The Rivalry: Kriegshauser just couldn’t let Casey have the last word, so he enlisted his production crew and issued a response. From the front steps of Casey’s house, nonetheless.

The videos caught on and the challenge eventually became a big campus event.

“Once the videos went up, you could feel the event explode,” Casey said. “The night of the race, we were turning students away at the door because the facility only seats 380.”

Well, the outcome of race didn’t work in Casey’s favor, and he will be warming up his check-writing hand soon.  But aside from showing his competitive side, he also solidified himself as a forward-thinking, humorous guy that can still rock a Speedo with confidence.

And chances are this isn’t the last challenge we will see on video.

“Hopefully he will call for a rematch soon.  Maybe he can get a faculty team to take on our student team,” taunted Kriegshauser.

“This story is not finished, yet,” Casey replied.

“This was my first communication to our students on YouTube and it certainly won’t be the last.”

Sounds like a “stay tuned” is in order.

Watch the race.

About Dana Thomas

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DII commissioners take a crack at wood bats

November 12, 2010 by

An important Division II baseball constituency recently took another swing in the wood-bat arena. Time will tell whether it was an extra-base hit or something less.

At its October meeting in Phoenix, the Division II Conference Commissioners Association agreed on the following language:

“The D-II Conference Commissioners Association endorses and supports the idea of wood bats, with the intention of NCAA Division II moving toward a wood bat-only division by 2012-13.”

So, what does that mean?

In short, the commissioners are trying to move their conferences toward wood for regular-season competition in 2012-13. If they are successful, they hope the Division II Baseball Committee would mandate wood for Division II postseason competition beginning in 2013.

baseball batsDivision II Baseball Committee chair Jeff Schaly of Lynn said he has not heard from the commissioners since the committee met at the Division II College World Series last May. At that time, the committee expressed a reluctance to mandate wood bats for any region and said that such change would have to come from the bottom up rather than being nationally required.

With that in mind, Peach Belt Conference Commissioner Dave Brunk and Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference Commissioner Dan Mara made the pitch for wood at the October meeting of the DII CCA, citing myriad benefits, including a return to the roots of the game; lower-scoring, shorter contests (with more time available for student-athletes to pursue social and academic experiences); better marketability to fans; and better training for hitters who aspire to play professional baseball, where only wood bats are permitted.

Nineteen of 22 commissioners were present and voting at the CCA meeting, and the vote reportedly was 13-4 for wood, with two abstentions, although at least some of the “no” votes might have indicated skepticism more than opposition.

Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference Commissioner Butch Raymond said the CCA commitment, while significant, is merely another step in the process.

“We didn’t necessarily say that we’re definitely putting wood bats in for 2012-13,” said Raymond, who chairs the commissioners’ group. “We’re going to start working toward that process. We feel like we’re going to have to work from the bottom up. In other words, we’ll probably have to go region by region, conference by conference.

“We support the concept. We have all agreed to do what we can working toward that, but it’s certainly not a mandatory thing for 2012-13.”

After the CCA vote in October, the commissioners reported back to their conferences. One commissioner reported that a straw vote in his conference was 8-7 in favor of wood, with the principal concern being that wood bats, because they break, will prove to be more expensive than metal over the long term. Some coaches also believe that quality wood is in short supply and that the “good wood” will be taken by professional baseball.

Additionally, some coaches have deals with metal-bat manufacturers, although the proponents of the change believe that most Division II arrangements are not that substantial and that alternative deals with wood-bat manufacturers would be available in an all-wood environment.

“That was really one reason why we were discussing 2012-13, to give conferences time to perhaps get their own deal, or DII-wide deal or institutional deal,” Brunk said.

The change, if it is implemented, would not require a division-specific playing rules exemption since the rules permit both wood and metal. In inter-division play, the type of equipment can be determined by mutual consent of the competing teams. Under the commissioners’ approach, wood composite bats would be permitted in practice to reduce breakage, but they seek to use actual wood – defined as “a single piece of wood, from a tree” – for competition.

If Division II chose to go use wood-only, it would have no effect on how the other two divisions approach the game. ESPN reported earlier this year that sentiment at the top levels of Division I are decidedly pro-metal. For the upcoming season, all bats will be required to meet more wood-like standards.

NCAA Insider is an occasional take on college sports issues, as viewed by NCAA communications staff member David Pickle. Opinions are his alone.

About Dave Pickle

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The Delicate Balance of Amateurism and Education

November 10, 2010 by

Both Jay Bilas in his call for the NCAA to reform itself (subscription req’d) and John Gasaway in his article on amateurism in the NCAA (purchase req’d) argue for the same thing. Ignore all the fluff in the two articles. At the core, the two pieces argue the same three points.

  1. The NCAA’s view of amateurism is based on a historical ideal with elitist roots.
  2. The place in the world for the NCAA’s version of amateurism has been under attack if not gone from the moment the NCAA was formed.
  3. Allowing student-athletes to receive compensation from third parties and have agreements with agents would not further damage the NCAA’s amateur principles.

The first point is at the very least useful for the NCAA and its member institutions to keep in mind. However, the fact that the world that existed when the principle was created was much different from the world that exists now is not sufficient reason to throw away the principle. I disagree with Gasaway’s characterization of amateurism as a simple state of being though. To me the NCAA promoting their version of amateurism is no different than the Salvation Army promoting their version of generosity. The issue is whether you agree with the mission of the organization promoting the virtue.

The second point in both article ignores an important caveat. It’s legitimate to question whether the NCAA’s view of amateurism holds water … in a world where the NCAA is the de facto final developmental step for two major professional sports leagues. Or worse, it assumes that the NCAA desires or created that condition. I would agree however that some of the NCAA rules, much like the critics of those same rules, don’t seem to take into account that very important fact.

I have a great deal of disagreement with the third point, the solution that Bilas and Gasaway both propose. Part of that comes from the fact that the argument assumes that the NCAA should not be an idealistic organization. In fact, it would be the height of hypocrisy if the NCAA, a non-profit entity, was not striving for some version of a better tomorrow, whether you agree with it or not.

This is where Bilas’s version of the argument runs off the rails. If the NCAA’s principles are “intellectually dishonest” and “fairy tales,” then why does Bilas present what purports to be a passionate defense of the organization? If one of the chief means of promoting and enforcing those principles is “profoundly immoral,” why does the Association deserve to be rescued from the brink? And how is the NCAA saved at all by eliminating or drastically changing one of its core principles?

If a critic of the NCAA believes the organization has outlived its usefulness, then they should argue for the abolishment of the NCAA. Because while arguing for reform of this degree sounds like preservation, if the NCAA adopted such a reform, it wouldn’t be the NCAA anymore. Sure, the letterhead might say “National Collegiate Athletic Association,” but the substance of that organization would be something totally different.

The two core principles of the NCAA, amateurism and education, also cannot be divorced from each other. Amateurism helps allow for education and education is the reward offered for choosing amateurism. That’s where Gasaway’s idea of “doubling down” on academics, namely requiring increased academic standards in exchange for deregulating agent agreement and benefits misses the mark.

It’s not that allowing agents and outside compensation just ruins the amateurism ideal. Whether student-athletes are truly amateurs still is a point on which reasonable people can differ. The same goes for a debate about the degree to which welcoming third parties into the structure of the NCAA would further damage efforts to promote the amateur ideal.

It’s that allowing, even legitimizing third parties who seek to make a quick buck by getting an athlete to leave school early, the ability of the NCAA and its member institutions to promote a college education is also harmed. And while paternalistic arguments are tougher to defend, its important to note that many times the student-athlete leaving based on the advice of those people is to their detriment.

The NCAA has a principle regarding education, just like it has a principle regarding amateurism:

Bylaw 2.2.1 – Overall Educational Experience.
It is the responsibility of each member institution to establish and maintain an environment in which a student-athlete’s activities are conducted as an integral part of the student-athlete’s educational experience. (Adopted: 1/10/95)

Over all those principles hangs the general principle of the Association:

Bylaw 2.01 – General Principle
Legislation enacted by the Association governing the conduct of intercollegiate athletics shall be designed to advance one or more basic principles, including the following, to which the members are committed. In some instances, a delicate balance of these principles is necessary to help achieve the objectives of the Association.

Just as you can’t separate amateurism from education, you can’t separate education from amateurism. Total deregulation of agents and outside compensation is not a tweak, it is a major philosophical change. And even if that deregulation promoted amateurism, it is anything but delicate. But just as Bilas and Gasaway pointed out that the NCAA’s vision of amateurism has its roots in the early 20th century, so too does the NCAA’s vision of education.

Back in that time, a postsecondary education was for the learned professions and the sciences. Undergraduate education was still firmly rooted in the liberal arts, and was a very elitist institution. It was not until the middle of the 20th century that college shifted toward what it is today, where it’s a virtual requirement for most white-collar professions and there is a struggle to provide access to college for as many people as possible.

The rules could be updated to address this change by expressly allowing, even promoting two majors: sport performance and sport education (i.e. coaching).

Such a move would reinforce the idea that college should prepare you for a professional career. It would acknowledge the idea that professional athletics is a viable career, even if only for a minuscule portion of the student-athlete population. The relatively small number of graduates making a living as full-time artists, musicians, or philosophers has not killed off those majors.

It would also promote the idea that the study of athletic performance is a meaningful academic endeavor, just as the study of musical or artistic performance is. That would open an avenue for increased study of issues like concussions and overtraining. And it would provide a new source of professionally trained coaches, particularly needed as specialization, injuries, and money continue to grow at the youth level.

Courses in a sport performance major could include the type of education that elite athletes have needed, such as courses on personal investing and accounting, public relations, and media training. Schools that already have or choose to develop a sports management program could teach student-athletes the business of the professional leagues they are entering. Not to mention some sort of credit for practicing and playing the student-athlete’s sport. The coaching major would be similar, but with more education mixed in.

There would be a host of details to be worked out, from how classes fit into practice limits and whether funneling of students to such majors needs to be watched to how coaches fit into the faculty structure of a university and who accredits these programs. It’s a move for the small minority of student-athletes who will be going pro in sports, in some fashion. But it even as it clearly stakes out territory for the NCAA and its member institutions in preparing students for professional athletics, it also ties the athletic department closer to the university and potentially increases faculty control of athletic department spending and policies.

Preparing student-athletes to make a living playing their sport or teaching it to others reinforces the principle of education to help train athletes for a potential professional career or to help them use their athletic skill in a related field. It assists amateurism by striking a better bargain for athletes and providing a place for the individualized instruction necessary to help athletes make good decisions about their professional careers. And it does a better job striking that delicate balance than simply throwing the doors open to anyone who wants in.

The opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s and the author’s alone, and are not endorsed by the NCAA or any NCAA member institution or conference. This blog is not a substitute for a compliance office.

About John Infante

The opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s and the author’s alone, and are not endorsed by the NCAA or any NCAA member institution or conference. This blog is not a substitute for a compliance office. If you’re a coach, do not attempt to contact the author looking for a second opinion. If you’re a parent, don’t attempt to contact the author looking for a first opinion. Compliance professionals are by their nature helpful people generally dedicated to getting to the truth. Coaches should have a bit of faith in their own, and parents should talk to one directly.

Filed Under: Bylaw Blog, Feature Tagged With: , ,
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