SEC Coaches Defend Oversigning.

From my perspective, you can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig....I agree completely with UF Pres. Machen's strong sentiments on the issue.

 

Let me see, any skin in the game. How about their whole job depends on them getting the best players they can get to win football games or else losing their jobs. Or getting left high and dry on signing day by players who committed and then went elsewhere.

I would submit to you that first none of us know what conversations Spurrier and these two players had, nor do we know at this point whether or not those two players will or will not end up playing for Spurrier.

You are right I will defend a guy who has a track record of being a straight up guy with the NCAA, his players and the schools he has coached at. I will also allow that even such an individual might make a mistake.

But no one here knows enough at this point to say that Spurrier has been the type of coach who does underhanded things with his players.

 

Every coach in the game faces those same risks, for some, there is little downside as they simply pull from the list stacked up offers....for the kids at the tail end of those lists, tough sh!t - a situation they may or may not be aware of - the risks are not distributed evenly.....

I'm not making any judgements as to what Spurrier did or did not tell those kids, my comments are in regard to the practice of oversigning, a practice - though perfectly legal - many knowledgeable college presidents, coaches and fans find to be contrary to the best interests of the game - myself included.

 

BT, if your comments are toward the general practice, especially the ones President Machen was addressing, then we are pretty much on the same page.

You want to use Spurrier as an example of what is wrong with the system, then we are not on the same page.

And that is based on his record as a college head coach for around 20 years where he has had, to the best of my knowledge, zero run ins with the NCAA.

 

JO'Co is right.

 

I'm not using Spurrier, I'm using the practice of oversigning, a practice that Spurrier supports and uses and one that President Machen is passionately and "morally" opposed....and yes, in my view it is wrong.

I believe JO'Co is correct as well.....the simple reason that those kids don't get schollies is because they found better players after their offer.....

 

I am personally against oversigning practice that results in a player of lesser production being relieved of his scholarship.

I will admit I think I remember an incident or two at Florida when I thought Spurrier was guilty of this....or at least it appeared so and frankly I didn't like it.

However.....as I have said when trying to field a competitive football team if a player who desperately wants a chance to prove himeself academically qualified can get a schollie offer then it's hard to blame the OBC for taking a flyer on a couple of kids and perhaps landing in an overlimit situation in which a tough decision has to be made.

It's a catch 22.

Maybe the answer is simply filling out spots with walk-ons.....period.

But that leaves some worthy....athletically gifted kids out of major college football concievably and who knows....if given that chance.....like Tony Rice was at ND.....they go on to be college grads and good human beings..

 

Well yes and no, sure they don't get 4yrs at So.Car or Ark or Alabama or whoever is doing the oversigning. But they can still go to Jr. College and work to bring their grades up and move on to a 4yr college under scholarship and finish their degree and play football. Believe me if they are good enough to be offered by SEC schools, they will get a full ride to a Jr. College, and if they do their job in the classroom and on the field there will be a scholarship waiting for them when they finish Jr. College.

 

Good point about the JC route Terry.

Seems to be a more popular solution these days.

 

Gets back to the current system is tipped towards the coaches, they get to hedge their bets on athletically talented but academically challenged kids. So far from reading that article it appears that some kids are ok and seem to understand the game and are willing to take the chance, some don't seem to understand or know that they might get left out in the cold.

Even if coaches fully explain to the kids that they might not end up having a place in the class if Player A and B qualify, some of the kids seem to say well ok I'll take that chance. But at least it should be put to them bluntly..thusly....Son if Player A and/or Player B get qualified we're not going to have a place for you in this years class and they should do it as soon as possible in the recruiting process so that the kid and his parents can make a decision as to whether or not they should pursue schools who will have a place for them no matter what.

There isn't much risk at all for the kid who isn't qualified...he's got nothing to lose. He's going to bump some kid out of the scholarship if he gets his sh$t together in the classroom and if he doesn't then he's going Jr. College.

Mostly though I'd rather see the coaches with the guys who have something to lose than the kids.

 

The oversigning issue has gotten enough attention and there is enough negative sentiment regarding its practice and potential abuse that some state legislatures are drafting legislation to protect the kids.....the Connecticut has such a proposal underconsideration currently.

I also think we're being naive if we think the uncertainty regarding academic qualification is the primary rationale for the practice......again Bill, not singling out Spurrier, just the practice itself......

 

When you look at the backgrounds of some ( some...certainly not all ) of these southern minority kids......they certainly do not meet the "Notre Dame" standards of today in most cases....so being offered a conditonal schollie may be better than them just hanging it up and going the Juco route.

Some are stars who want to play at a high level if given a shot.

I say the kids have some planned risk in this as well.

 

The whole academic discussion is just a red herring to me....I don't buy it. There are kids at risk to qualify all over the country, not just in the south. Florida doesn't do it....Georgia doesn't do it, Ga Tech doesn't do it....they're in the south.

I think the real reason can be summed up quite simply by this quote contained in a Gamecock blog.....

Wow..... :shock:

Recall that the "opponent" who deemed the practice "immoral" and "reprehensible" was the President of an SEC school not the bow-tied president of an Ivy League do gooder nor one from another region of the country or league that has banned the practice......

 

I do think Spurrier would be at odds with Machen over this issue.

 

Urbie managed to survive under the suffocating thumb of Machen's beliefs and strong opposition to oversigning during his tenure in Gainesville, why not Spurrier?

 

Well when he was at UF I doubt he would have been at odds, he built UF into a recruiting machine, he didn't need to oversign...now that he's at So.Car it's different ..doesn't make it right but recruiting at UF vs So.Car is apples/oranges.

Basically we should all be on the same ground with regards to recruiting, and the NCAA needs to review the rules and tighten things up so that the coaches don't in essence do an end run around the rules to gain some advantage.

Don't forget at one time we got by just fine without early entry, now most of the top players are early entry and since they count against the previous class, which may have had some fallout allow a few more guys to be put into one class.

The first rule I would effect would be that the guys you sign in Feb count against that years class, can't be counted against the previous years class by enrolling early. The second rule I would effect is if you sign more guys than you have space for in August and you can't get them all into school because of that you lose 1 for 1 scholarships for players who are denied entrance due to oversigning. Net result of the 2nd rule, is that if you play that game not only do you lose the player you can't get into school, but you lose a scholarship for next year. So it better be worth it....goes back to the coach having some skin in the game.

 

Agreed...

All world defensive players from Ca. and Pa. may come to UF to play football but to SouCar????.....not so much.

 

Well here's a quick way to solve that oversigning problem.

http://www2.oanow.com/member-center/share-this/print/?content=ar1568390

 

Bingo, Terry gets it.

Spurrier has also said that he still considers the two players Gamecocks and they will get scholarships if, most likely it's when, two of the other players don't qualify.

I'm not defending, but like usual I believe some people are seeing this as a black and white situation when in my opinion it is not.

What I believe is that if those two players qualify and still want to be Gamecocks they will be. Just my opinion.

I also believe that at least one of them is very unlikely to qualify.

 

:roll:
re: Auburn players

"The car, a silver Chrysler 300, is registered to Mosley."

Since when can a red-shirt freshman afford to drive a Chrysler 300? Auburn is a crooked program. These guys actually believed that they could pick up some extra spending money with a gun, because all the other laws and rules were being waived in their favor. It made sense from their point of view...