2009 Off-Season Roundup
The News Stories You Need To Know ... May 21
By
Phil Guidry
* Tennessee is preparing to self-report a secondary
NCAA violation: a post was made to Lane Kiffin's Twitter account saying,
"It's a beautiful day in Knoxville, Tennessee today. I was so excited to
hear that J.C. Copeland committed to play for the Vols today!" The post
violates the rule that university employees cannot comment on prospects
by name. It also probably violates some kind of rule that says that
college football coaches shouldn't make public statements that read like
12-year-old girls' diary entries. This is just the latest step in the
evolution of sports and technology: coming up next, schools will just
report their NCAA violations via Twitter, too.
* Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany says of President
Barack Obama's push for a playoff, "It's very hard to be disagreeable
with a popular president. He's a scholar and a lawyer and a great
politician, but I don't think he understands the complexity of the
issue." Let's put aside Delany's whopping assumption that the president
doesn't understand the complexity of "Power conferences + Greed = BCS",
and focus on the first part of his statement: "It's very hard to be
disagreeable with a popular president." Perhaps, Jim, but it's very easy
to be disagreeable with the commissioner (of a BCS conference that has
seen better days) who is sticking up for a tired, faulty, bankrupt
system that the vast majority of fans and head coaches despise. To be
fair, Delany did parrot most of the usual BCS talking points, but we ran
out of ink to publish them.
* Notre Dame has omitted all of Charlie Weis's losing
seasons from its media guide, including those during which he was an
assistant. When it comes to his own campus's printing press, Charlie
Weis has a decided schematic advantage over the truth.
101 days and counting...
Tennessee
http://www.govolsxtra.com/news/2009/may/20/ut-report-violation-over-twitter-note/
Jim Delany
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/chi-20-big-ten-football-bits-may20,0,852249.story
Notre Dame
http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20090519/SPORTS0302/305199991