<p>NJPeeps is correct that the college coaching staff is very thorough when checking these kids out. I have good friends that are high school football coaches. They have done countless interviews with college coaching staffs about the kids they are interested in. One friend is practically a father figure to the ones that are in broken homes and his family treats them as they belong to theirs. </p>
<p>We can’t blame college football (or any other college sport). We can’t blame the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, etc. It starts way before that. It starts at home. When lil Jr starts playing peewee ball and parents think their special snowflake is the superstar and will be in the pros. I know of a lawsuit that a friend got served because a 6th grader got hurt at a birthday party in the bounce house. The parents claim: It ruined their childs pro career in football. I’m not kidding! We have all seen it. Ask your own kids how the superstud on the football/basketball/baseball/hockey/etc team was treated in high school. They know those kids received blatant favortism. Then you got mama and/or daddy up there all the time throwing around how great their superstud kid is and “they gonna make it big”. Then all of the parents that see Jr as their meal ticket. I think we could all name names of pros that have bad families that have steered them wrong and sponge off of them. </p>
<p>Thankfully, there are some good ones out there. I know of one that his family still lives in the same 1500 sq ft house they have for 20years and have steered him to be frugal. As she told him the first pro year, “you might be making NFL money this year but you won’t always be making NFL money”. Oh, he was in the Super Bowl his rookie year. Kid has a rock solid home base with both parents. Not something most kids have nowadays. Especially some of these student athletes. </p>
<p>Good friends S1 is at UTexas. Has had a few of the football players in classes over the years. They all had personal tutors to help them with every single class. You better bet that goes on at a lot of schools. </p>
<p>Yes, we need to stop glorifying athletes. More glory to the teachers! But when we have peewee football games going out of control with parents fighting over a childs game that should be fun… it is pretty obvious the answer is much deeper.</p>
<p>Improprieties in intercollegiate athletics must be addressed whenever they occur. That said the Graduation Success Rate for UA football is 75% and climbing: </p>
<p>There’s still some ground to cover, but the improved academic performance of the team nicely correlates with its improved performance on the field.</p>
<p>Ah yes…that’s the answer. Blame everything, everybody but the perps. Good grief.
I believe 2 of them were Florida born and raised. Too bad, those asswipes didn’t stay in Florida. Guess what? It’s highly likely they would have behaved the same way. It has nothing to do with UA. Aren’t they suspended indefinitely? It’s only a matter of time before they’re expelled. Hopefully, their butts land in jail.
Unfortunately, the team is going to take a few bumps and bruises from this one but it has nothing to do with 95% of the team. Don’t you think most of those teammates want to kick their butts. It’s embarrassing no doubt…embarrassing to the human race!</p>
<p>*What exactly is the purpose of admitting someone who can barely read, to a state’s flagship university, if football is not the most important thing???</p>
<p>*</p>
<p>Another false premise. </p>
<p>Where is your evidence that Bama’s football players “can barely read”? If you knew as much as you think about Saban’s recruiting practices, you’d know that his methods (now being copied by other coaches) include a determination of the prospect’s intelligence level. Saban doesn’t have the time nor the interest in dealing with half-wits who can’t learn/follow the schemes that he and his coaches devise.<br>
*</p>
<p>As for being an ambulance chaser, fyi, I do wills and trusts. So I don’t need good running shoes, like Nikes, as you suggest.*</p>
<p>Ahh…so your hunting grounds are Leisure World and The Vil–la–ges.</p>
<p>asaunmom, I do blame the perps. They are 100% responsible for their actions. Yes, they should be punished to the fullest extent of the law. I have no problem with that. </p>
<p>Yes, they let their teammates down. BIG TIME! Yes, I’m sure those teammates would love to get ahold of them and kick their butts and I would not blame them at all. </p>
<p>These kids, for the most part (good kids from good homes can also go bad), were probably brought up in a home that was taught to think that being a star athlete puts one above the law. Why they have been having their poor behavior excused from day 1 of holding a ball because they are the “superstar”, per their parent(s).</p>
<p>These are all backup players, so I don’t see them as having that much future in football anyway. I do feel bad for Calloway, in that he got caught up in something much bigger than what he himself did, but he should have known better - and this was already his second chance. He got a big break by being considered a juvenile offended when he was 18 - wouldn’t have happened here. They have been given a great opportunity for a college education, and thrown it away by being thugs. Good riddance! I agree they deserve due process, but they have admitted what they did, and they have shown themselves to be a danger to the community. They should not be allowed back on campus.</p>
<p>I don’t agree with this. They were all freshmen/redshirt freshmen. Most freshmen do not become starters right away. AJ McCarron was a backup for two years. Eddie Lacey was a backup. So were most starters - even those who have gone to the next level. Eddie Williams was an elite prospect in 2012. He was a consensus 5 star recruit. I think Calloway and maybe Hayes were projecting 2nd on the depth charts for next year. Pettway was already contributing. Don’t underestimate the value of these players or the enormity of what they’re throwing away.</p>
<p>That said, I do think they have to go (and I’m assuming their suspensions will become permanent).</p>
<p>I know that Calloway was not considered to be a “back up” player - at least not in the long run. He was a highly recruited player. Very, very few players are recruited with the idea that they will start as True Freshman. Many are Red-Shirted with the assumption that they will be starters by the time that they are RS juniors. </p>
<p>Losing players in this way can be a huge hurt. These players are being trained and groomed to be able to step in when older players graduate. That’s why it’s wrong to assume that Bama “turned a blind eye” during recruitment. It’s just too difficult to lose a player after you’ve invested a year or so training them to eventually be First String players. </p>
<p>Imagine that you have a highly specialized business and it usually takes you 24 months to train an employee to be “customer ready”. You’ve carefully recruited these employees because of all that is ahead of them. You then spend thousands of dollars and thousands of hours training them. Then, in the 22nd month, an employee must be fired for committing a crime. The response isn’t, “well, he wasn’t one of my best salespersons anyway.” No, the feeling is, “dang, now I have to start from scratch and I have another employee who is retiring in 6 months.”</p>
<p>Where are these kids now? Still on campus, attending classes?</p>
<p>I don’t know. I suspect that they’re not on campus and attending classes. They likely know that they’re in the process of being expelled. If anything, they are probably being escorted to their dorms to pack up their things. </p>
<p>As for the recent previous arrest of one of the perps…some have wondered why he wasn’t immediately kicked off the campus. I’m not sure that when students are arrested by non-UA police that the school is soon contacted. I can’t imagine that’s the case anywhere. If a Harvard student is arrested by another agency, is Harvard contacted immediately to expel the student? I don’t think so. I’m not sure that the various agencies are legally obligated to immediately contact a person’s school or work to report that their student/employee has been arrested. </p>
<p>I’ve been told that Bama does have curfews for its athletes, but it sounds like they are loosened during the “off-season”. Maybe that also needs to change as well. As we all know, violence increases after midnight.</p>
<p>I could see giving Calloway a 3rd chance- Buying snacks with a stolen ID isn’t as serious as beating & robbing someone. Don’t know what he knew or how involved he was.
The other guys should be expelled.</p>
<p>I hope so. It’s not very comforting that we do not have the official word from the university stating that this particular safety risk has been removed from campus.</p>
<p>Idinct- according to the posted police records, Calloway admitted he used the card knowing it was a stolen card. Action cards are debit cards, so this is more serious than using another student’s ID. The actual charge is fradulent use of a credit/debit card. And he made multiple purchases (again as reported on the police report).</p>
<p>UA’s integrity is on the line here. I’m counting on the administration to do the right thing and punt these student-criminals as far out of bounds as they can.</p>
<p>Calloway has to go now as well. He committed credit card/debit card fraud knowingly using numerous times a card that belonged to someone else. Whether it was to buy soda and potato chips or a new tv doesnt make a difference. It is a felony no matter what the purchases are. Just because he wasnt the actual thief doesnt make this any better. UA needs to send a huge message to everyone on that campus that this type of behavior will not be tolerated.</p>
<p>Bama isn’t going to keep these students. Saban has essentially said, “good riddance.” Now, appropriate procedures are in action. </p>
<p>No need to hand-wring about this. When people lament that football has become too important, they’re missing the most important point…Bama isn’t keeping these students. Only when priorities are misplaced would kids like this be kept on. Consequences are being imposed. Isn’t that the proof that some things are more important than sport victories? </p>
<p>As for Calloway’s involvement…knowingly using a stolen credit card is serious business. While it doesn’t rise to the level of beating someone up, it’s still serious enough that dismissal is likely. Saban doesn’t want his players thinking that it’s ok to use a stolen credit card or that they’ll only get a slap on the wrist. </p>
<p>Saban doesn’t view these kids solely as “athletic bodies to win games,” he views them as students needing an education and future husbands, fathers, and employees. He and the coaches that he selects are all on the same page in that regard.</p>
<p>(I don’t even want to think about what Miss Terry is saying about all of this! She’s probably already given Saban a 10 point plan to prevent these things from happening again.)</p>
<p>The mere fact that the school is not going to keep criminals on the team is not sufficient evidence, as you assert, that priorities are not misplaced. No one would expect these kids to remain on the team, even if one of them was the star running back.</p>
<p>The fact that kids who would assault and rob other students were accepted into the University in the first place IS evidence that priorities are indeed misplaced.</p>
<p>I suspect that if one were to delve into their academic backgrounds, that these students were not qualified to attend a flagship state university, or perhaps any university. I doubt they were 4.0 students in high school. I also suspect that this was not the first time they had problems with the criminal justice system. You just don’t go out and rob and assault someone for the first time at college.</p>
<p>Many of these students probably had ZERO interest in obtaining an education. They were on the team as a means to make the NFL. So I doubt the accuracy of your statement that the coach views them as students in need of an education, rather than merely bodies needed to win games, when the kids themselves don’t view themselves in that light.</p>
<p>I assume they were suspended pending action by Judicial Affairs. Suspension means they were allowed to collect their things and were then escorted off campus and are now banned from campus.</p>
<p>That’s an awful lot of assumptions Floridadad, not based on facts. This type if situation could and has happened at other schools. The difference is, how Alabama handles it. As the mother of an incoming honors student, I am pleased with how the University is handling this extremely serious matter.</p>