Grades

[smusportspage]

Finally, a voice of reason. My goodness folks! This hate by Belo(or whoever it is that owns WFAA now) towards any SMU success has got to stop.

[Pony_Law]

As of today Jan 27th, at 9 am. The story is absolutely nothing except possibly slander against SMU and the coach staff. All they have is that Kimball HS is sketchy and an Assistant coach from SMU called to check on the grades of an important recruit. That get's them no where as far as showing SMU did anything wrong. At this point the NCAA has reviewed Kieth's HS transcript and cleared him to play. Any other program in the country woulds not care about this report and would do nothing until there is a lot more meat on the bone.

Here is one potential issue. SMU and the alumni have battered spouse syndrome when it comes to compliance issues. We are so paranoid and afraid as a community (which is understandable) that we tend to instantly think the sky is falling and tend to overreact the second there is even a hint of impropriety. I worry that this might lead to KF being suspended indefinitely with where the story is right now. This is not right as as mentioned above the story is nowhere right now, IMO any hint of impropriety on SMU's part at this point is slander by Shipp. Now I don't think suspending KF would largely impact the team on the court (though it would hurt some), but not standing up and defending your players could do a lot of damage in recruiting. This is particularly true in basketball where a lot of the recruits have sketchy academic backgrounds and probably will need a university to go to bat for them and defend them against stuff like this.

Keep calm and carry on. Boycott WFAA for their blatant attempt at a hit job without any facts against SMU and encourage everyone you know to join in. SMU throw down the gauntlet against this attack, send a cease and desist letter and let WFAA know you are preparing a slander/libel suit against them if corrective action is not taken (SMU has lots of legal heavy hitters in their alumni pool), deny all media access to WFAA for all sports indefinitely, grant significant access to LB/SMU sports to other local news media, put the assistant coach on Channel 4 vehemently denying anything improper was done, promote everything SMU does to make sure players like KF succeed academically at SMU and what an opportunity SMU is providing to these and many other disadvantage kids, pull all advertising from WFAA, Work with SMU's sponsors to encourage them to drop advertising from WFAA (imply that they might not be able to market with smu or be present on campus at all), and finally continue to win and sell your self as Dallas's college basketball team for everyone to enjoy.

[RE Tycoon]

Keep calm and carry on. Boycott WFAA for their blatant attempt at a hit job without any facts against SMU and encourage everyone you know to join in. SMU throw down the gauntlet against this attack, send a cease and desist letter and let WFAA know you are preparing a slander/libel suit against them if corrective action is not taken (SMU has lots of legal heavy hitters in their alumni pool), deny all media access to WFAA for all sports indefinitely, grant significant access to LB/SMU sports to other local news media, put the assistant coach on Channel 4 vehemently denying anything improper was done, promote everything SMU does to make sure players like KF succeed academically at SMU and what an opportunity SMU is providing to these and many other disadvantage kids, pull all advertising from WFAA, Work with SMU's sponsors to encourage them to drop advertising from WFAA (imply that they might not be able to market with smu or be present on campus at all), and finally continue to win and sell your self as Dallas's college basketball team for everyone to enjoy.

You think SMU has significantly more stroke than they actually do.

[Stallion]

You may not want to hear it but I believe the correct NCAA rule is that if a member school learns of a credible eligibility issue concerning a current student then they have a duty to suspend the player and immediately notify the NCAA. At that point the school can ask the NCAA to reinstate the player. If a school does that then they are subject to no further penalties if they weren't involved-if they don't suspend and notify the NCAA then all future games that Frazier plays in are subject to forfeit. There is credible evidence that Keith Frazier was ineligible to graduuate which makes him ineligible for NCAA competition because DISD conducted an investigation and found, after admissions from a Kimball employee that Frazier's grade was changed.

[StallionsModelT]

If that is truly all that Shipp has then this is a laughable attempt at "gotcha" journalism. lol. Actually flying down to Houston to ambush a HOF coach after a road win with this kind of garbage is one of the most unprofessional things I've ever heard of.

There is zero reason to suspend Keith Frazier. He took summer classes, was cleared by the NCAA Clearinghouse, took and passed the SAT, and has passed his classes thus far at SMU. You do not suspend the kid period. Stand by him and let everyone know that when garbage like this happens SMU will have your back. This will be watched closely by the Dallas AAU community so SMU needs to be very pragmatic in its response to this.

It boils down to this for me. Its a DISD issue. SMU coaches calling to check on a recruit's grades?! Please. I promise you every major program is checking on their borderline kids on a daily basis. Shipp has nothing. He knows it. What he doesn't know is that SMU has some very powerful and influential people that are not going to stand for this. I hope WFAA and Shipp know what they're doing....for their own sake.

[RE Tycoon]

You may not want to hear it but I believe the correct NCAA rule is that if a member school learns of a credible eligibility issue concerning a current student then they have a duty to suspend the player and immediately notify the NCAA. At that point the school can ask the NCAA to reinstate the player. If a school does that then they are subject to no further penalties if they weren't involved-if they don't suspend and notify the NCAA then all future games that Frazier plays in are subject to forfeit. There is credible evidence that Keith Frazier was ineligible to graduuate which makes him ineligible for NCAA competition because DISD conducted an investigation and found, after admissions from a Kimball employee that Frazier's grade was changed.

My interpretation from the story last night was that SMU found out, but the summer school/online courses were to rectify the grade change eligibility issue. I would assume this is what kept him from enrolling earlier.

My conjecture would be the clearing house/SMU/DISD all knew about the grade change issue, and they were scrutinizing and waiting for the summer school/online courses to be certified.

[Pony_Law]

Keep calm and carry on. Boycott WFAA for their blatant attempt at a hit job without any facts against SMU and encourage everyone you know to join in. SMU throw down the gauntlet against this attack, send a cease and desist letter and let WFAA know you are preparing a slander/libel suit against them if corrective action is not taken (SMU has lots of legal heavy hitters in their alumni pool), deny all media access to WFAA for all sports indefinitely, grant significant access to LB/SMU sports to other local news media, put the assistant coach on Channel 4 vehemently denying anything improper was done, promote everything SMU does to make sure players like KF succeed academically at SMU and what an opportunity SMU is providing to these and many other disadvantage kids, pull all advertising from WFAA, Work with SMU's sponsors to encourage them to drop advertising from WFAA (imply that they might not be able to market with smu or be present on campus at all), and finally continue to win and sell your self as Dallas's college basketball team for everyone to enjoy.

You think SMU has significantly more stroke than they actually do.

Everything I laid out is very doable by SMU. Now SMU is not such an institution that the media ban and advertising boycott won't hurt the same way it would if UT did it but they should pursue it because it sends a message and makes WFAA have to deal with it. Additionally, SMU might not have a lot of sway or power but our alumni do. Seriously, SMU alumni in Dallas have just as much if not more sway in this city then UT grad do. SMU needs to galvanize these people to help stick up and defend their university.

[shadowman]

You may not want to hear it but I believe the correct NCAA rule is that if a member school learns of a credible eligibility issue concerning a current student then they have a duty to suspend the player and immediately notify the NCAA. At that point the school can ask the NCAA to reinstate the player. If a school does that then they are subject to no further penalties if they weren't involved-if they don't suspend and notify the NCAA then all future games that Frazier plays in are subject to forfeit. There is credible evidence that Keith Frazier was ineligible to graduuate which makes him ineligible for NCAA competition because DISD conducted an investigation and found, after admissions from a Kimball employee that Frazier's grade was changed.

This can turn into Memphis again when they learned that Rose had SAT fraud but continued to play him instead of suspend him after finding out. SMU has to suspend Frazier now and ask for reinstatement, timing is good since he is hurt anyway. Now that SMU is aware, we cannot risk playing him until we get a ruling from the NCAA.

[Pony_Law]

You may not want to hear it but I believe the correct NCAA rule is that if a member school learns of a credible eligibility issue concerning a current student then they have a duty to suspend the player and immediately notify the NCAA. At that point the school can ask the NCAA to reinstate the player. If a school does that then they are subject to no further penalties if they weren't involved-if they don't suspend and notify the NCAA then all future games that Frazier plays in are subject to forfeit. There is credible evidence that Keith Frazier was ineligible to graduuate which makes him ineligible for NCAA competition because DISD conducted an investigation and found, after admissions from a Kimball employee that Frazier's grade was changed.

This can turn into Memphis again when they learned that Rose had SAT fraud but continued to play him instead of suspend him after finding out. SMU has to suspend Frazier now and ask for reinstatement, timing is good since he is hurt anyway. Now that SMU is aware, we cannot risk playing him until we get a ruling from the NCAA.

But there is no evidence that this even raises a credible eligibility issue given the additional steps KF took to qualify and having previously been cleared to play by the NCAA

[ReedFrawg]

It's good to be the king. We're relevant. Meanwhile, unless they have ulric on tape asking kimbrall brass to change his grades, who cares... This story is gonna blow over and smu is gonna have so much street cred.

Agree. And that was a BS move at the LB press conference.

[StallionsModelT]

If you suspend Keith Frazier with no evidence of wrongdoing then you run the risk of alienating the entire Dallas AAU community. You want to play that game?

[SMU 86]

You may not want to hear it but I believe the correct NCAA rule is that if a member school learns of a credible eligibility issue concerning a current student then they have a duty to suspend the player and immediately notify the NCAA. At that point the school can ask the NCAA to reinstate the player. If a school does that then they are subject to no further penalties if they weren't involved-if they don't suspend and notify the NCAA then all future games that Frazier plays in are subject to forfeit. There is credible evidence that Keith Frazier was ineligible to graduuate which makes him ineligible for NCAA competition because DISD conducted an investigation and found, after admissions from a Kimball employee that Frazier's grade was changed.

This can turn into Memphis again when they learned that Rose had SAT fraud but continued to play him instead of suspend him after finding out. SMU has to suspend Frazier now and ask for reinstatement, timing is good since he is hurt anyway. Now that SMU is aware, we cannot risk playing him until we get a ruling from the NCAA.

Grade changes happen all the time but illegal grade changes do not. I am sure when SMU brought him on board they thought it was a legal grade change. Since this does not seem to be the case Frazier will probably suspended and an appeal filed to have him reinstated.

[Stallion]

You may not want to hear it but I believe the correct NCAA rule is that if a member school learns of a credible eligibility issue concerning a current student then they have a duty to suspend the player and immediately notify the NCAA. At that point the school can ask the NCAA to reinstate the player. If a school does that then they are subject to no further penalties if they weren't involved-if they don't suspend and notify the NCAA then all future games that Frazier plays in are subject to forfeit. There is credible evidence that Keith Frazier was ineligible to graduuate which makes him ineligible for NCAA competition because DISD conducted an investigation and found, after admissions from a Kimball employee that Frazier's grade was changed.

My interpretation from the story last night was that SMU found out, but the summer school/online courses were to rectify the grade change eligibility issue. I would assume this is what kept him from enrolling earlier.

My conjecture would be the clearing house/SMU/DISD all knew about the grade change issue, and they were scrutinizing and waiting for the summer school/online courses to be certified.

If in fact that is true-ie that the summer school classes rectified the class which involved a grade change then I can buy that argument. But this is more than a "DISD issue". Its an allegation that has already been investigated and determined through an apparently final DISD administrative hearing process.

[StallionsModelT]

OK. Even if that true, it has to be proven that SMU was aware of a grade change and decided not to suspend Keith Frazier. How do you prove that? Could SMU not say that it is currently looking into the grade change and that the investigation is still ongoing?

[StallionsModelT]

Also, Frazier made it through the NCAA Clearninghouse after all of this stuff happened. Wouldn't they be more apt to take notice to wrongdoing? I would assume that SMU's position is that he took the summer classes, took the SAT, got the approval of the NCAA Clearinghouse, and that was the end of it. Shouldn't the burden of proof be on the part of those crying foul?