Miami booster has detailed ALL to the NCAA- Wow!

[Alaric]

Sounds like the stuff the UT employee was doing...Miami's private and relatively small. They might get hit pretty hard but this death penalty talk is ridiculous

[EastStang]

5% chance of a death penalty, Miami is private and we all know what public schools wish would happen to Div. 1 private schools. And the U has been notorious for quite awhile. The thing in Miami's favor is that they are in Florida and the ACC schools need to make trips to Miami to recruit South Florida, so the DP would punish them to some degree. This probably eliminates them from any SEC discussion.

[SMU89]

Assume this means we will be seeing more Pony Excess on ESPN.

[RednBlue11]

i remember that reporter going on the dan lebatard show to speak about busting the sweater-vest's world up and then at the end of the interview saying that he had something MUCH bigger that he'd be rolling out in august...wow, this really takes the cake.

[Harry0569]

Among the specific incidents, Shapiro or other sources say Hurtt, Hill, Stoutland, Pannunzio and Allen all delivered top-tier recruits to Shapiro’s home or luxury suite so the booster could make recruiting pitches to them. Among the players who were ushered to Shapiro while they were still in high school: Eventual Miami commitments Ray-Ray Armstrong, Dyron Dye and Olivier Vernon (prompted by Hurtt); eventual Florida commitments Andre Debose (Hurtt) and Matt Patchan (prompted by Stoutland and Pannunzio); eventual Georgia commitment Orson Charles (Pannunzio); and eventual Central Florida commitment Jeffrey Godfrey (Allen).

If this stuff is true, Godfrey is donezo.

http://blogs.ajc.com/uga-sports-blog/20 ... oo-sports/

[RednBlue11]

apparently this is based on 100hrs of interviews and 20,000 financial documents that were sifted through during an 11 month period....this [deleted] is air tight, or at least the stuff that hasn't been eliminated by the statute of limitations, which is most of it admittedly

[RednBlue11]

and actually there is a clause the NCAA could invoke that could allow them to go back 9 yrs and investigate all the violations from the beginning of Shapiro's activities w/ players and coaches

[RednBlue11]

THIS is the story this all came from....matt hinton is piggy-backing off of Charles Robinson of Yahoo Sports

http://sports.yahoo.com/investigations/ ... its_081611

KEARNY, N.J. – A University of Miami booster, incarcerated for his role in a $930 million Ponzi scheme, has told Yahoo! Sports he provided thousands of impermissible benefits to at least 72 athletes from 2002 through 2010.

In 100 hours of jailhouse interviews during Yahoo! Sports’ 11-month investigation, Hurricanes booster Nevin Shapiro described a sustained, eight-year run of rampant NCAA rule-breaking, some of it with the knowledge or direct participation of at least seven coaches from the Miami football and basketball programs. At a cost that Shapiro estimates in the millions of dollars, he said his benefits to athletes included but were not limited to cash, prostitutes, entertainment in his multimillion-dollar homes and yacht, paid trips to high-end restaurants and nightclubs, jewelry, bounties for on-field play (including bounties for injuring opposing players), travel and, on one occasion, an abortion.

Nevin Shapiro and a second source said this photo of the booster and Kellen Winslow Jr. was taken in Shapiro’s VIP section of Opium Garden nightclub in 2003


Multiple sources say this photo was taken in Nevin Shapiro’s VIP section at Opium Garden nightclub in Miami Beach in 2003. From left to right are Devin Hester, Shapiro and Vince Wilfork.

[RednBlue11]

scroll down just below the twitter feed and the 1st interview is the one Dan LeBatard did w/ Charles Robinson on the radio last night, it's stunning.

http://www.790theticket.com/lebatard.aspx

[Dutch]

i was thinking this morning. yes, what the NCAA did to us was bad, but our detriment was what we did to ourselves policy-wise. the NCAA may look at what we've done over the past 3 years since we (finally) decided we were going to commit to having a good football team, and think that it won't completely destroy a program and it's history so long as the school commits to bringing back football. With the money involved these days, who wouldn't - schools almost NEED it to support all other athletics.

the NCAA may view it as a viable punishment again.

[RGV Pony]

i was thinking this morning. yes, what the NCAA did to us was bad, but our detriment was what we did to ourselves policy-wise. the NCAA may look at what we've done over the past 3 years since we (finally) decided we were going to commit to having a good football team, and think that it won't completely destroy a program and it's history so long as the school commits to bringing back football. With the money involved these days, who wouldn't - schools almost NEED it to support all other athletics.

the NCAA may view it as a viable punishment again.

you're right. Baylor basketball couldve/shouldve been decimated after the penalty they got..they chose to take it another direction, right or wrong, and didnt wander in the wilderness for a couple decades

[RGV Pony]

Sorry, no way Drew isn't dirtly. They've just done a better job of keeping a lid on it...so far.

I dont deny that Drew and everything about Baylor hoops is slime. They're staying ahead of the lynch mob though so far

[Harry0569]

Interesting takes on the U
http://cfn.scout.com/2/1096569.html

By Russ Mitchell
Follow me on Twitter @russmitchellcfb

At least 72 athletes for eight years…names, dates and details…six coaches…cash, booze and hookers…bounties for penalties and injuries…

If just half of what Yahoo! Sports' Charles Robinson uncovered in his damning report on the U is accurate, than Miami might become the second school to get the NCAA “Death Penalty”.

And that’s just football…the basketball program could get its own set of penalties.

“A pattern of willful violations” indeed. Major men’s college sports is about to fall off a cliff in south Florida, and it’s going to take UM president Donna Shalala with it.

First things first – if there’s any doubt that Yahoo! Sports has cemented its position as the preeminent sports investigative reporting organization of this time, leave it at the door.

Second, you have to know that every Tom, [deleted] and Betty with a grudge and a story has dropped a dime to Dan Wetzel, Charles and crew. If you thought this was going to stop at OSU or Oregon (or now even Miami), your picture was just uploaded in Wikipedia under “naive”.

Strap into that seat belt, baby – the next couple of years are going to be a fast, bumpy ride.

The magnitude of the brazen wrongdoing in this story, IF accurate, is going to change college football as we know it – first and foremost for the sport’s regulatory body, the NCAA. The NCAA can choose to be as aggressive as it wants in meting out punishment going forward, but it’s clear the organization is woefully understaffed, antiquated and misdirected.

As we have noted many times, the power resides at the edges with the Universities, not with the NCAA. With federal lawsuits looming, questions about the authority of the BCS mounting, and brand name programs going down left, right and center, it may finally be time to overhaul the entire, deeply flawed collegiate athletic system.

Thank God that’s not my job.

Next comes the money, honey. If I’m ESPN, or Fox, or any of the other vested parties in the broadcasting game of college football, I’m going to soon start asking for money back, if I haven’t already. Certainly for postseason play.

If I can’t have for postseason play (and we’re stretching here now for emphasis) USC, OSU, Oregon, Miami, Auburn and any other brand name properties that have been tainted in recent days (Alabama, LSU), or are soon to be the latest target in Yahoo! Sports bulls eye, than I'm not getting the product I paid for, am I.

Or if current or future sanctions effect the quality of regular season play, in terms of scholarships lost, etc., I’m going to start asking for some money back. Or more likely, I’m going to push back the next time you, Mr. Conference Commissioner, ask for more TV revenue.

The only thing we’re sure of is this is just the beginning of what will prove to be a material restructuring in the way our sport does business.

[Harry0569]

By Matt Zemek

When the University of Miami had such a difficult time filling its football coaching vacancy following the exit of Randy Shannon, who knew just how undesirable this job would become several months later?

In the piece from Yahoo! Sports, it has become clear that the culture and values of the football movie Any Given Sunday have been flourishing … at a college program.

Over 70 players allegedly receiving benefits. Prostitutes supposedly lined up. Abortions allegedly financed (after the prostitutes were lined up). Strip clubs paid for… and not for Fiesta Bowl officials, either.

After “The U” and “Pony Excess” graced America’s television screens on the nights of the past two Heisman Trophy ceremonies, this nation’s college sports community has been brought in touch with yet another big-league scandal. It’s not quite SMU, and it’s definitely nothing close to the Dave Bliss-enabled mess at Baylor, but it’s substantial; at least it’s substantial enough that it makes Ohio State, North Carolina, and USC as wholesome and virtuous as Mister Rogers. Miami football will have a chance to win championships this year… in Oxford, Ohio.

“The U” will be off the grid(iron) for a decade at the very least. We know this. It’s a massive story to be sure, but after Luther Campbell and the wild days of the 1980s and ‘90s, this doesn’t own any shock value whatsoever. It’s sad, but it doesn’t defy logic or disturb one’s allowance for wrongdoing. It doesn’t move the needle or upend one’s sensibilities.

What matters in this story? What matters in the wake of a scandal that carries so many repercussions in so many directions? Let’s start with the poisonous ingredient the NCAA displays more frequently and copiously than anything else: hypocrisy.

Former Miami Athletic Director Paul Dee, according to CBSSports.com reporter Bryan Fischer, served on the NCAA’s Committee On Infractions (COI) for at least 85 cases. Moreover, Dee was the chair of the COI when it levied its substantial penalties against USC in 2010. Today’s thoroughly-documented reports plainly indicate that Dee presided over an athletic department at Miami that willfully looked the other way when it saw (at least a portion of) what Nevin Shapiro, the man at the center of this scandal, was doing.

This scandal doesn’t just make NCAA President Mark Emmert’s recent week of preaching so transparently and laughably bogus. It doesn’t just reinforce the extent to which amateurism is absent from big-ticket collegiate sports. It doesn’t just underscore the extent to which the pillars of the NCAA’s very reason for existing have utterly collapsed and crumbled. No, it’s not enough to say that the NCAA is fraudulent, broken and hollow. The most important point to emerge from Miami’s second swim in a cesspool of scandal is that this ungodly mess unfolded under the (non-)watch of the very man who was given a particularly powerful enforcement position by the very same NCAA.

Yes, that’s the very same NCAA which gave Ohio State Athletic Director Gene Smith the 2011 chair of the Division I Men’s Basketball Committee. It’s the same NCAA that gave disgraced Connecticut AD Jeff Hathaway the 2012 chairmanship of the D-1 Men’s Basketball Committee. The people in college athletics who preside over alarming scandals at their own programs – scandals that are substantial not so much for the actions themselves, but because administrators intentionally and willfully refused to police them – are the ones who receive plum committee assignments.

Forget for the moment the probability that Virginia Tech is now likely to win the ACC Coastal through 2020, which might mean that it has less incentive to bolt for the SEC. Forget the political fact that with North Carolina and Miami on ice, the nature of conference realignment could be profoundly affected.

Temporarily cast aside the harsh reality that Al Golden’s career is on hold. Forget the fact that former Miami coach Frank Haith had a strip club visit paid for by the rainmaking Mr. Shapiro, thereby placing his position as Missouri’s basketball coach in jeopardy. Those stories will be examined in the wake of this tsunami of scandal, but the foremost object of national concern in the crumbling kingdom of college sports should be the NCAA’s utter lack of trustworthiness.

So now, after all the curious recent NCAA rulings, and all the questions about how the Ohio State, Auburn, and USC situations were handled, call this the big test case for Emmert and the NCAA. Miami’s timing couldn’t be worse, and for the NCAA, it’s time to show what kind of teeth you really have.

[Harry0569]

Pete Fiutak


This one’s just plain creepy.

The Ohio State tattoo issue was silly. The North Carolina problems are sad. The Oregon-Willie Lyles situation is sloppy. The Stanley McClover allegations were fascinating. But Miami’s alleged problems with Nevin Shapiro, an uber-booster who allegedly took things to a whole other level over the last decade, at a whole other level of bad, and now just by NCAA standards. But remember, even with all the evidence compiled, Shapiro is as shaky a subject as it gets. Not every part of this story appears to be kosher, but there's enough here to potentially get Miami in a ton of trouble.

As I’ve argued countless times, there’s nothing wrong with getting a bag of cash. There’s nothing wrong with some Copeland booster giving a player a car. There’s nothing wrong with being given perks. Miami’s supposed problems this time around are different with allegations of prostitution, an abortion, and lots and lots and lots of dough, gifts, and other fun things provided for recruits and top players. Considering the program’s past and the nose-thumbing of NCAA rules a few decades ago, it’ll be very interesting to see what the NCAA does with this.

And what’s really so bizarre is how Miami actually appeared to be turning things around.

The on-field results have been a mega-disappointment since Miami joined the ACC, the off-the-field issues appeared to have stopped. There was the Bryan Pata scandal, and there were a few other incidents, but for the most part, Miami was clean compared to what the program was like in the 1980s.

Former head coach Randy Shannon appeared to make a major effort to instill discipline to the players and really did seem to bring in a slew of good citizens and students – Miami was in the second-highest percentile in the latest Academic Progress Reports, along with Stanford and Navy. But no one can stop a rich booster, and now Miami will be in huge trouble.

Yahoo! appears to have been able to come up with documentation and proof that Shapiro funneled money into the system and to the players through agents and a recruiting service, and that’ll make all the difference. No, you can’t prove a $100 handshake, but you can prove a systematic scheduling of payments made that ties in star players like Vince Wilfork to the agents they signed with.

No, there won’t be any Death Penalty, like Shapiro seems to brag that there could be. SMU got blown out of the water because the program was rotten to the core, and despite warning after warning after warning, the cheating didn’t stop. Miami, at least in this case and with the first glance, appears to be the victim of not knowing what was going on.

Miami will probably get the USC-Plus treatment with a massive reduction in scholarships and bowl bans, but unlike USC, who’ll be back to normal about ten seconds after the sanctions are over, this could be a decade-long blow for the Hurricanes.

Lost in the brand name and in all the football success is that Miami is just a small little private school. It doesn’t have a massive fan base, it doesn’t fill the stadium, and it doesn’t have the ability to withstand a huge blow from the NCAA without suffering some major repercussions.

Now it’ll be a free for all for Miami talent. The Canes would normally get a bulk of the top players to stay close to home, but Florida, Florida State, and South Florida should all get several prospects they wouldn’t normally have a shot at, and nationally, a few would-be Hurricanes will trickle into the bigger name powerhouses. If all the allegations are true, Miami has just become Florida International when it comes to recruiting.

This is bigger than a few Georgia Tech players getting a few bucks from an agent, and it’s bigger than Ohio State’s problems – at least what the NCAA is punishing the Buckeyes for. Sadly, it’s not surprising, and even more depressing is that there’s going to be another scandal from some major program just around the corner.

Hopefully it’s not as icky as this one.