Houston Chronicle: Thad's Documentary 'Pony Excess'

[go4it]

The article states that the death penalty against SMU in 1987 was the first and only application of the punishment by the NCAA. The death penalty has actually been implemented five times:

1. The University of Kentucky basketball program for the 1952–53 season.
2. The basketball program at the University of Southwestern Louisiana (now the University of Louisiana at Lafayette for the 1973-74 and 1974-75 seasons
3. The SMU football program for the 1987 season.
4. The soccer program at Morehouse College the 2004 and 2005 seasons.
5. The men’s tennis program at Division III M acMurray College for the 2006 and 2007 seasons

Basketball at Kentucky was just as important as football at SMU; they just didn’t wait 25 years to get serious about restarting the program.

[Treadway21]

Kentucky did not Have Kenneth Pye as its president.

[Junior]

Don't like the name but I can not do anything about it.

From a person that walked on to play football his second senior year ( could not wrestle anymore ) I got stuff in my locker. really. And I was the guy that ran scout team fullback.

The only reason SMU did any of this was to be SOMEWHAT competitive to Texas and A$M.

SMU was just the small private EXAMPLE so Texas and A$M could stay in power.

Peace out.

i like BUS's perspective. it wasn't just us, it was the landscape of college football at the time.

[ponyte]

Kentucky did not Have Kenneth Pye as its president.

Man, Pye as president was worse than the DP. Its a miracle we even have athletics as Pye was diehard set on killing the athletic programs.

[couch 'em]

Kentucky did not Have Kenneth Pye as its president.

Man, Pye as president was worse than the DP. Its a miracle we even have athletics as Pye was diehard set on killing the athletic programs.

not just athletics-he was quite bad for the engineering school as well.

Where would our University be had Pye not try to reduce us to a liberal arts college?

[MidlandMustang]

Everyone was basically cheating back then. Hell, I grew up out here in Midland playing against Permian and they were just as bad as us and that was at the high school level. We were just habitual cheaters that the NCAA decided to make a scapegoat out of. A small private school that didn't draw a big fan base so let the college world know we are serious. Heck, back then about every PAC 10 basketball team was under investigation or on probation. Anyway, I don't have a problem with the title of film. Over and out.

[mr. pony]

if ut isn't documented as the driving force behind the dp then the coverup continues.

AMEN

[Longtime]

- Technically the "death penalty" refers to the repeat violator rule which was adopted by the NCAA in 1985 as a deterrent to the rampant, institutionalized cheating that was beginning to become public. So technically SMU and the other two have had the actual "death penalty" applied (the NCAA has always had the power to banish programs) and who cares about soccer and tennis?

- I saw only part of the ESPN documentary about Miami football. Did it also discuss the cheating that surely must have been going on at the same time SMU's program began to arise in the early 1980s? Miami suddenly rises from anonymity to become a national power. With a coach like Jimmy Johnson and a long list of thug players. There's NO WAY Miami got good without payoffs. Long after Miami won its national titles, it took a hit for Pell Grant fraud, but come on. There had to be more than that going on.

- The old "everybody else was doing it" argument only goes so far. Not everybody was doing it to the extreme that SMU was, and later TCU got into the act (and was given one of the NCAA's stiffest penalties just before we got the DP - I guess we didn't get the NCAA's message). Sure, UT and others were paying players, but from what I'm told it was hundreds compared to the thousands SMU was throwing around. We weren't doing what everyone else was doing, we were out-doing everyone else.

- Blame UT all you want, but remember that SMU has been pegged with getting Texas Tech and others in the SWC on probation as a result of our negotiations with the NCAA. Soon after the DP, nearly everyone in the SWC got hit with one or two years probation. This is why SMU gets blamed for the SWC breaking up, which is hogwash. Had SMU, Baylor, Tech, TCU and Houston invested in their programs the way they have since the formation of the Big 12 there might still be a SWC.

- Never forget that the ultimate blame for the death penalty stigma lies with the people calling the shots at SMU (I would have said SMU administration but we know that's not who really made the decisions). The NCAA was willing to stop short of shutting down the program if SMU would give up the names of the boosters involved. SMU refused. So to save the reputations of a group of elite boosters, whose names were likely to come out anyway, SMU allowed itself to forever be labeled as the school that received the NCAA's death penalty.

[Longtime]

Oh yeah: "Pony Excess" is a much better name than the generic "Article 19."

[BUS]

Longtime, I like some of what you say but SMU/WE were not doing more that the other schools.

Pistol happy Switzer opened up a suit/briefcase in ED's home with 45 large in it. Plus the promise of remuneration monthly. A$M gave the corvette to the same.
Just got competitive.

Do not kid yourself, we were just getting competitive.

Yes, in hindsight we should have given up the names as they did come out.

On to today and a focus on winning the right and honorable way.
Mustang Militia - March on to Victory.

[Stallion]

You can't read-that's not what the guy said. All bets are off if you are talking about Miami or OU or A&M coaching staff during the period but there is absolutely ZERO public evidence that any school in the nation has had anything close to the lack of institutional control as SMU. I hope ESPN lays out the whole sordid story and points fingers directly at the idiots involved. You can't have a story of redemption without a full disclosure of the truth. I bought that stupid argument that "everybody else was doing it" perpetuated by the exact people who were bald faced liars until the truth came out. The truth is that nobody has ever had a Board of Govenors, President, Athletic Director and Head Coach fully aware and approving a slush fund even after 5 probations in a little over 10 years. If you continue to make this argument then you lack basic reading comprehension skills. I've read every single recruiting story on illegal recruiting with Southwest schools in the last 40 years and there simply no evidence of comparable lack of institutional control. Those pointing at UT are truly ridiculous. Name a single example that isn't modest in comparison to SMU. Edwin Simmons boots? Wow!. Of course the same morons will reply but you won't see a single one post a single documented story about serious institutional cheating in the Texas football program in 40 years.

[RGV Pony]

Name a single example that isn't modest in comparison to SMU. Edwin Simmons boots?

If I google "Logan Young," "Albert Means," "Alabama," "$150,000," and "jail time," would that count as a single example?

I'll bet there were more examples than just Means. But, oh yeah, Young's not around to talk about it.

edit: I read around the Texas references in Stallion's post. So, I guess I didnt provide a Texas example. Sorry about that. I am aware of an A&M example. I'll see what I can dig up.

[Stallion]

I never knew he played at Texas. Rouge booster or coaching staff cheating does not equal the classic case of lack of institutional control at SMU.

[RGV Pony]

here you go. I'm sure there is more in the book.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Lp6TxX ... ed&f=false

[Stallion]

not within the last 40 years