The Keith Frazier saga is emblematic of the corruption and cynicism in big-time college sports. Not once in the kid’s reported comments does he say anything about, you know, academics and how he enjoyed the school, as opposed to enjoying being on the basketball team. And now he quits the team, so evidently he wasn’t having such a great time as a member of the squad. Has anyone bothered to tell this kid that he is tossing away an opportunity that a lot of eager students will never get. Black males especially need higher education, but apparently kids like Frazier have been hoodwinked into getting on board a sports wagon train that in all likelihood will never reach its destination.
In general I don’t disagree with your point but this student is probably not the one to make it with. Too many contradictory statements:
“It’s not something that just started,” Johnson told the Morning News. "Keith has been having a tough time since he got there
He felt like the stuff that happened with SMU and coach Brown being suspended, he felt like everybody was looking at him to blame
Too much that’s incredible:
Frazier, who was ruled academically ineligible during the second semester of 2015, has said he was not aware the assistant was doing his work.
Some of these basketball programs can’t be compared to other athletic programs where students really are students. Kentucky has been featuring a ‘one and done’ mentality for several seasons now. The ‘students’ don’t even pretend to be students because they aren’t returning for another year so don’t care if they are academically ineligible for the following year.
I don’t think it shows there is ‘corruption and contempt’ in all college sports. In fact, I think this shows that the NCAA is on top of it, and since this guy didn’t follow the rules, wasn’t doing his part as the student in ‘student-athlete’, he’s out. SMU isn’t exactly known for following rules either.
Often, all manner of distortions of academic integrity (not to mention the law) go unnoticed.
Take Urban Meyer’s tenure at the University of Florida:
The recent troubles at FSU, which prompted a lengthy exposé by the NY Times a couple of years back, have prompted few prosecutions and correspondingly few suspensions. The most prominent example was Jameis Winston, who’s happily playing for the Buccaneers and has never been suspended by the NCAA despite the widely publicized rape accusations against him, with a disciplinary record that’s hardly exemplary even if we set that case aside.
On the bright side, Winston served a half-game suspension (mandated by FSU, and not the NCAA) after several reports of Winston shouting “(expletive) her right in the (expletive)” at the student union, which proves the real crimes don’t go unpunished.
Maybe it’s just Florida, or maybe the NCAA isn’t doing its due diligence in holding colleges accountable.
Just to be clear, the NCAA isn’t a law enforcement organization. They have a role in enforcing the NCAA rules, with the goal being to create fair competition and “establishing a positive competitive environment for student-athletes”. If the rules are broken, they can assign penalties.
Rape, assault, burglary, etc., isn’t something they would prosecute. Those are left up to the institutions themselves (and regular law enforcement).
For example, colleges, following their own standards, would do random drug testing of athletics. If the student-athlete failed a test, the college may issue a suspension. The NCAA does random PED testing, as this falls under it’s rules for creating a competitive environment. If a student-athlete is found to be using a PED, the NCAA will issue the suspension, not the college.
I’m more that willing to beat up on the NCAA! However, in these cases, you have to give them a bye.
Notverysmart, that test for dumb jocks was from 15 years ago. And the NCAA caught it. NCAA absolutely not perfect as the stories from Duke will show, but they do catch a lot.
I have a daughter who is a scholarship athlete. I thank God for the NCAA and its rules (and her coaches and their extra rules) every day! She is drug tested. Fine by me. She had study tables until she made grades her first semester, and some of her teammates still have study tables because their GPA’s aren’t high enough. She can’t drink 24 hours before any practice or 48 hours before any game. I think that’s great. She was 17 when she started college, and I could do all the warning and threatening I wanted about her drinking, but it did no good; the coach and NCAA have her attention and her coach did suspend 2 girls from the first game because of drinking in violation of the rules (for an event that happened 2 months before the game suspension). Nothing serves as a deterrent to my kids better than other kids getting in trouble for something. She gets peer pressure from her sorority sisters to go out on Friday nights but she won’t because she has a game or practice. I know she’s walked away from other students smoking pot because she doesn’t want even a trace to show up from a test.
If the athletes want to act crazy or do illegal things, I’m sure they can get away with it. The coaches can enforce or not enforce the rules and guidelines. I think the teams used to be a lot more controlled when the football and basketball players all lived in athletic dorms and their choices were fewer, but now most upperclassmen live off campus and seem to get into more trouble than they used to. Watch some of the ESPN 30-for-30 shows and you’ll see the bad old days when the NCAA didn’t care, when SMU and UMiami were totally out of control.
The issue of one-and-done b’ball players is not something that the ncaa can do much about. Unless the NBA changes its entry rules by collective bargaining, kids will take classes for one semester and then polish their game in the second semester.
Do you really want the ncaa getting involved in investigating criminal activity? After all the threads we’ve had on Title IX investigations?