Labor Day college sports round up

Hopefully y’all are having a great weekend full of football and barbecue. I’m getting ready for a move so in between football and nachos, I’m packing things up and getting this place all tidied up. This has been an eventful weekend, and I’m still full of vigor thanks to the start of the season. So what’s been happening?

SEC Players of the Week

Great news of Kentucky fans: the SEC released it’s player of the week list and Trevard Lindley was named the defensive player of the week. Congratualtions to Lindley, a two-star recruit out of high school, whose stepped up in a big way under Rich Brooks. Also congratulations to Alabama’s Mark Ingram – he was named offensive player of the week which was utterly unsuprising. Ingram had the game of his life against the Hokies and he really let people know that they Tide wasn’t just going to roll over on any games this season.

McAdoo’s Choice

In UK basketball recruiting news – James McAdoo has chosen UNC over all the other schools he was looking that. He’s going to be a Tarheel. Good choice by the junior power forward. I heard he was visiting on alumni weekend, you know, the weekend that draws the likes of Michael Jordan, and I can imagine that being there really helped seal the deal.

Isiah Thomas Renegs on Renegging

It looks like FIU will actually play UNC after all. That’s a good move for Isiah Thomas because dropping out of a CHARITY event because of a difficult opponent comes across as petulant and awful. Furthermore, playing the defending national champions will bring attention to FIU no matter what, and any attention, even if the team loses (which they will) is better than being totally ignored. Thomas, or someone who has some sway over his actions, must have seen the error of his ways.

Memphis Meltdown

Memphis is appealing the NCAA’s decision to vacate the historic 2007-2008 season (38 wins, y’all). They are not appealing any of the other punishments handed down by the NCAA, which is probably for the best. I doubt that anything will come of this – the NCAA isn’t big on having their rulings reversed, but I guess anything is possible (maybe), so we’ll just have to follow this story until it’s completely dead (hopefully soon). Selfishly, I want Memphis to win the appeal, just so I don’t have to hear any more idiotic Cal jokes or defend him to ignoramuses who barely even follow college basketball.

Bradford Bust-up

There is still no time table for when Sam Bradford will return. According to OK coach Bob Stoops, Bradford has a grade 2 or 3 sprain, either of which sounds pretty serious. Along those same lines, OK doesn’t know when Jermaine Gersham (you know, one of those players who chooses to put off pro careers so that they can make their legacy in college) will be back from a knee injury. Colt McCoy is praying for Bradford, and I’m guessing the whole Schooner Squad will be, too, especially if they wish to continue posing a Big (12) threat.

Punch Heard ‘Round the World

I’ve written enough about the Oregon player punching the player from Boise State, but if you want to read something in addition to that on the topic, try here and here.

The Phoenix Pub

I wrote a piece about NCAA violations for the Phoenix Pub. Y’all should mosey on over and check it out (to do so, click the only link in this post). I dare you.

Slow news tirade

A group of coaches got together to talk about NCAA rules and brainstorm suggestions with a bunch of compliance officers. It sounds exactly like what I would like to do with my free time (eh, who am I to talk – I am blogging about it, after all). After thinking it through, the coaches came up with suggestions like: write the manual in English; a confusing diatribe on “fairness”; increasing summer contact with returning players; and ignoring common courtesy in favor of being compliant.

Let’s take them one by one, shall we?

1. Write the manual in English – it is already in English. I checked myself.

2. Fairness? That’s rich coming from a Duke coach given how many calls have been made in Duke’s favor during games and the blind eye the NCAA turned to Corey Maggette’s amateur status violation. As far as Duke goes, NCAA seems to want to keep that overrated, mediocre program pristine. The NCAA needs to decide which violations really deserve a lot of attention and then look at every school, not cherry picking through the conferences.

3. I’m not in favor of increasing summer contact. Summer should be a time for the kids to relax, not get drilled in practice. It’s one thing to keep up with strength coaches and stay in shape – athletes need to do that. But it’s another thing entirely to take over their whole summer.

4. The compliance thing is sticky. Some things are just ridiculous, but they are there to protect the high schoolers from overzealous coaches. And honestly, it’s almost all common sense. There is a time and a place to talk to the player and their parents, and given the business nature of recruiting, I am willing to bet there are few hurt feelings due to a coach, you know, following the rules.

Look, there are a lot of things the NCAA needs to consider, especially given the way that technology may be changing how recruiting is done and how boosters/fans play a role in the process. Compliance officers can’t be everywhere at all times and it looks like the NCAA needs to prioritize. Or they could just keep picking and choosing what to enforce at random. That’ll go over well with everyone.