PLEASE let’s have the NCAA continue to make up rules as they go along.  Any team ever has been allowed to appeal sanctions, but Penn State isn’t allowed to?  Thank god the Penn State Board of Trustees heard this and were like, “good luck with that” and filed an appeal. They stated that the University President did not have the power to enter into such an agreement and that the punishment didn’t fit the crime.  Meaning that the Board of Trustees seems fairly logical, at least the current Board of Trustees.  Especially when they said that if the NCAA denied their appeal that they would take it to Federal Court as a lawsuit.  I wouldn’t be surprised even a little if the NCAA doesn’t repeal any sanctions, BUT that’s not the point.  The point is they have been making up the rules to the game as the game is being played.  How can you just determine that a University can’t appeal any sanctions when it is their right to?  At this point they’re just bullying Penn State and its completely illogical, because the people who were involved in most of what happened are no longer even there.  I won’t even be that upset if the appeal doesn’t change any of the sanctions, it’s the fact that Penn State deserves to have the right to appeal.  Every team that has gotten NCAA sanctions ever, has had the right to appeal.

And in another twist, it was reported about three hours ago that eight former Penn State players, that played during the vacated years, are now filing an appeal.  According to a Yahoo Sports report; “The eight players are challenging the findings of the Freeh Report and saying the NCAA did not give Penn State its due process by not conducting its own investigation and not going through the Committee on Infractions to determine punishment. It’s also questioning whether the consent decree Penn State president Rodney Erickson signed without consenting the entire Board of Trustees was valid.”  First off, it almost sounds like I filed this appeal.  Secondly, this brings the number of parties filing an appeal with the NCAA up to three, including the Paterno Family, which did so last week.  While some people have praised the NCAA for their quick action, their swiftness has gotten them into a huge ordeal and saga that they never had any intention of getting involved in.  I personally am going to get some popcorn and sit back and enjoy the show.

How bout this one, how many people here reading this have heard about what is going on at the University of Montana?  Nobody? Didn’t think so.  They have had two players suspended for raping women this Summer, which has led to three investigations by federal agencies and the NCAA.  Why hasn’t the NCAA taken a “Ready, Fire, Aim” approach with the University of Montana?  Why haven’t they been banned from a bowl game for four years, lost scholarships and been fined $60 Million?  Is a woman getting raped less important than a child getting raped?  More to the point, is the NCAA not doing jack squat about this because it is not public knowledge? Absolutely.  It is an absolute disgrace that this is how the NCAA operates, but selective enforcement is their modus operandi.  The various investigations (obviously not the NCAA one because that isn’t finished or something stupid like that), have discovered that nine allegations of sexual assault had gone unreported in the last 18 months, and two more had surfaced since then.  It isn’t clear whether these are student athletes or just students, but something is clearly wrong at the University of Montana.  But let’s wait for the NCAA to conduct their in-house investigation over the course of the next 12 months, because that’s what they always do.  Unless you’re Penn State who gets blindsided and has punishment given out by a “governing” body that doesn’t have any jurisdiction, and didn’t do their own investigation.

As you can tell, I’m the NCAA’s biggest fan.  Still to this day, I will never understand why the NCAA had a rule, until 2010, saying that student athlete’s could be given jam/jelly and not cream cheese with their bagels.  You can’t even make this stuff up.  On the bright side though, the NCAA is looking to change their ways.

You can see the full article that this is from over at diehardsport.com, but here is what I previously wrote for everyone too lazy to click the link:

“The Indianapolis Business Journal summarizes the changes this way, ‘The plan calls for changing the current two-tiered penalty structure of major and secondary violations to a four-tiered concept, increasing the size of the infractions committee from 10 up to 24 in an effort to speed up the enforcement process and holding coaches individually accountable for any violations that occur in their program.  A program found to have made a ‘serious breach of conduct’ with aggravating circumstances could face postseason bans of two to four years.

In addition, the program may have to return money from specific events or a series of events or the amount of gross revenue generated by the sport during the years in which sanctions occurred — fines that could cost a school millions of dollars.  Coaches, too, would face new guidelines. They would be presumed responsible for any violations committed by their staffs. If they cannot prove they were unaware, the head coach could be suspended from 10 percent of the season to the full season.'”

This to me is a solid step in the right direction.  They need more people to step up and give themselves a more effective way to enforce the proper punishment for the violations that will undoubtedly occur.  Maybe this new enforcement committee will help keep them out of appeals and lawsuits next time around.

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