| 17 August 2011
(Note: This will not read like a regular Aaron Torres Sports piece. I already gave my initial, gut reaction to all yesterday’s breaking news on the Miami football team over at Crystal Ball Run. While I’ll still be referencing a lot of it here, this is more of a postscript to add onto what I wrote yesterday.
First off, if you haven’t read the Yahoo Report, go ahead and do it now. It’s not just a bombshell. It’s the bombshell to end all bombshells. Really, there’s not a word in the English language to accurately depict the breadth and depth of everything Yahoo accuses Miami of. I had to re-read it twice just to begin to wrap my head around all the layers involved.
But since most of you have already read the story, now it’s about trying to put everything into some kind of context. Much like the story itself, there are so many angles, so many quirks, so many layers that I didn’t get to the first time around, that I feel like I needed to take a night, and follow-up. Which is what I’m going to try to do here.
Like I said, this is a post-script, with some lingering thoughts from the whole situation.)
- First things first, let’s get to the most important truth here: As I described it to my buddy last night, if every piece of information in the Yahoo report proves to be true, than this is far and away the biggest college sports scandal of the last 20 years. Nothing is even close.
Simply put, there’s no precedent for what we’re seeing here. What you’ve got with Miami and Nevin Shapiro, is a super-booster who was basically bankrolling the Miami football program at both ends of the wick. On one side, he gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to the university, was dealing with the highest levels of the athletics administration on a near day-to-day basis, and even donated enough money to have a longue in the Athletics Department named after him. He was engrained as engrained can be, without actually being a staff member at the school.
Of course on the other end, Shapiro also spent hundreds of thousands to fill the pockets of the biggest and best football players at Miami (including countless drafted to the NFL picks) with cash, clothes, jewelry, women, cars and pretty much everything else they could possibly need. And he did that for eight years. It’s no exaggeration to say that hundreds of violations occurred due to him. If not thousands.
Again, there is no comparison with this case and anything we’ve seen. Just based on the facts listed above (expensive, lavish, over-the-top gifts for multiple high-profile athletes), the closest comparison is probably what’s going on at North Carolina right now…only if the situation at North Carolina had gone for eight years instead of one, and involved nearly 75 players instead of a dozen. In actuality, the two stories are really little comparison at all.
And as terrible as that is, there is so much more.
The first is that by Shapiro’s account, a handful of former coaches not only knew about his wheelings and dealings, but assisted him in the process of trying to land potential recruits.
According to Shapiro’s statement in the Yahoo report, former ‘Canes football assistants Clint Hurtt (now at Louisville), Aubrey Hill (now at Florida), James Southerland and Joe Pannunzo (now at Alabama), all brought potential recruits to Shapiro’s house to allow the super-booster to give a sales pitch for the school. One of the most underreported angles of this story was that Hurtt even took a loan from Shapiro (which he paid back), which alone should be easy to prove, and can get him in big-time trouble with the NCAA. Understand that I can’t blame anyone for needing cash. But taking it from a booster probably wasn’t Hurtt’s brightest move.
Also, don’t forget that on the basketball end, Miami assistants knew of a straight pay-for-commitment scenario between Shapiro and a player named DeQuan Jones. Apparently former head coach (now at Missouri) Frank Haith acknowledged it as well. And while trying to piece together what that means big-picture is near impossible, it wouldn’t shock me if- as a precautionary measure- Haith was out at Missouri before this season even started.
Finally, and what was absolutely, positively the most important nugget to this story was that Shapiro was also was the co-owner of a sports agency called Axcess Sports and Entertainment. And quite frankly, I think that right there, might be the most damning thing for Miami in this whole process.
Look, whether we want to believe it or not, there was probably a pretty reasonable chance that Miami could’ve at least argued that they had no knowledge of Shapiro’s interaction with the football team. They could’ve made the case that he was a rogue booster who used his access to the program in ways he shouldn’t have, but at the end of the day, it was impossible to know what Miami’s players were doing when they weren’t under the control of the coaches.
Interestingly, that’s what former Athletic Director Paul Dee tried to claim yesterday, when he told the Palm Beach Post, "We didn't have any suspicion that he was doing anything like this. He didn't do anything to cause concern." Dee held was Miami’s AD from 1993-2008.
Understand that to a degree, Dee’s statement makes sense if we’re just strictly talking about a booster paying players. But how can you have “No suspicion,” when that same booster also happens to be a co-owner of a sports agency? A sports agency that signed two former Miami football players (Vince Wilfork and Jon Beason) at the same time he was a booster for your program? That wasn’t a red flag? That’s the reddest that red flags can get.
- As for the punishment, let’s get one thing out of the way here right now: Miami is not, and will not get the Death Penalty. Just stop. If you hear someone even mention those two words, just go ahead and slap them across the face. They are either uneducated or just foolish. In some cases, both.
Understand that the way it’s written into NCAA Bylaw, the Death Penalty is known as the “repeat violator rule.” Emphasis on repeat. You can only get the Death Penalty if a second major violation takes place at your school within a five year period of being put on probation for similar offenses. In other words, it’s not so much how bad your actions were, but the circumstances that surrounded them.
So while you might argue that the breadth and depth of what is accused of happening at Miami is just as bad, if not worse than what happened at SMU when they were hit with the Death Penalty, the circumstances were much worse at SMU. SMU’s football program had already been on probation twice within the previous decade or so for very similar offenses, and really, the only reason the NCAA gave SMU the Death Penalty was to save the program from itself. The way the NCAA saw it, the only way to clean up the football program, was to actually take it away.
Don’t expect the same to happen at Miami. Now, had Nevin Shapiro gotten caught giving money to Miami players five years ago, and Miami was put on probation… and then this story broke yesterday, then we could talk Death Penalty. But not given what we know now.
- There was one parallel that I found interesting to the SMU story, and that’s this: If you remember back to the documentary that ESPN ran on SMU (“The Pony Excess”), you’ll remember that the program was quite literally a perfect storm for a major, major NCAA infractions case.
They were in the old Southwest Conference (eight schools in Texas, all doing whatever it took to land recruits), in an era and area where money wasn’t an issue because of an oil boom. Add in that SMU was situated squarely in Dallas- not Austin, not Waco, not Lubbock, but Dallas- a place with multiple newspapers and multiple news stations all competing with each other for stories, and as they said in the documentary, “SMU was a ticking time bomb.” Simply put, there were dynamics in Dallas that just weren’t an issue with any other school in the SWC, if even the entire NCAA.
Well to me, it seems similar to what happened in Miami.
I’ve spent enough time in Miami to know that it’s a place where image is everything and substance is nothing, and it’s much more important to have $1,000 in your pocket than in your bank account. From my experience there, nobody cared about saving for tomorrow, when they could spend on new cars, clothes and jewelry today. It’s about keeping up a certain appearance, even if that wasn’t who you truly are. Understand that’s not how everyone in Miami is, but there are plenty who lived life that way.
Anyway, this Nevin Shapiro guy seemed to epitomize that lifestyle to a tee. This was a guy who didn’t seem to care about anything other than the appearance of being the biggest, baddest, wealthiest dude on the block. Remember, the guy stole near a BILLION dollars in a Ponzi scheme, just to keep that appearance up. Think about that for a second.
Well with all that said, what helps that image better than hanging with the most recognizable people in town? I can’t think of anything. Miami was the perfect storm, for this story. You’ve got a city who only cares about image, and a man willing to do whatever it took to uphold his.
This was a story that couldn’t have happened in Norman or Columbus, Tuscaloosa or Ann Arbor.
Only in Miami.
- Going forward, Miami is likely to face some very bad punishment from the NCAA. Here is what I wrote last night at Crystal Ball Run:
Simply put, it’s impossible to say what will happen, but if everything that comes out from the report holds up to be true (and almost everything Yahoo! reports does), than we should be looking at sanctions unlike anything we’ve seen recently.
By now you’ve heard about the well-publicized Reggie Bush case, where he and his family accepted thousands of dollars in impermissible plane tickets, hotels, cars and even a house. The NCAA also claimed that former assistant Todd McNair knew about it as well, and there was the added effect that much like Yahoo!’s allegations against Miami, USC’s basketball program was involved as well. Former coach Tim Floyd allegedly paid O.J. Mayo $1,000 cash.
You also probably by now know the penalties that USC received: The athletics department was hit with a "Lack of Institutional Control" charge, and the football program was hit especially hard with massive scholarship reductions and a two-year bowl ban.
With that as a background, it’s hard not to see Miami getting hit with worse than what USC did. Understand that USC’s case primarily involved one football player and one basketball player. They were the highest profile in each sport, but the problems were isolated incidents, hardly a program-wide epidemic. In the case of Shapiro’s claims, you’re talking about 72 players (the number given by Yahoo!) over the course of eight years, with multiple assistant coaches, across sports in the know. This – by every stretch of the imagination – is worse than what happened at USC. As Felder said, “It’s Reggie Bush on steroids.”
Then, you’ve got to add in that this all happened under the watchful eye of the Miami athletics department.
Understand that in the USC case, Lloyd Lake was the proverbial no-good "street agent” who we've heard so much about. Well, what is going to happen in a case where Shapiro was also actively involved with the University of Miami’s athletic department and a donor who gave tens of thousands of dollars a year? What about the added effect that he was the co-owner of a sports agency at the same time? Simply put, this is substantially, significantly, overwhelmingly worse than what happened at USC. If this isn’t the dreaded one-two combination of “Lack of Institutional Control” and “Failure to Monitor,” it’s hard to say what is – again, assuming that everything in the report holds up to be true.
Speaking of which, there is an interesting final caveat to the Miami case that is so ironic, it should’ve been contrived in a Shakespearean play.
When the Trojans were hit with sanctions last summer, the chairman on the NCAA Committee on Infractions was a man named Paul Dee. That’d be the same Paul Dee who was also the University of Miami’s athletics director from 1993 until 2008. Following the NCAA investigation of USC, Dee even famously said, “High profile players demand high profile compliance.” Well these were some of the most high-profile players, at one of the most high-profile programs in the country. Now what? Is there any way that Miami proves they provided high-profile compliance? Given how ingrained Shapiro was in the program, it seems impossible.
A couple quick, additional thoughts from here:
- For the past 18 months or so, USC fans have claimed that the NCAA (and Dee in specific) tried to make an example out of them, during the NCAA investigation into the program. To a degree, I think they’re right. The USC case was the NCAA’s big chance to hammer a big-time program, for big-time violations, and set the tone to other schools across the country: If you don’t have your house in order, you better get it in order. We don’t care who you are, or how relevant your program is. We WILL come after you. And for the most part, I think that schools have at least tried to improve their compliance departments because of exactly that. Ultimately, it’s what’s going to save Ohio State.
The problem for the NCAA is that in setting that precedent, they never took into account that something bigger, badder, and more in-depth could ever possibly hit. Remember, USC basically got in trouble because one football player and one basketball player got paid, and there were two coaches (one on each side), who knew about it. Again, at USC, this wasn’t a top to bottom epidemic; it was in essence, a pair of isolated incidents, made easier because the compliance department was too overworked to piece it all together.
So with that said, what happens at Miami in comparison? In this case, we’re talking about more money, for significantly more players with more coaches in the know, coming from a booster and not a street agent. If USC lost 30 scholarships over three seasons and was suspended from postseason play for two years, what should Miami get? Forty scholarships lost? Fifty? Bowl game suspension for three years? Four?
And that goes back to my point on the NCAA setting a precedent with USC. It’s all well and good that the NCAA tried to set the tone with USC. Seriously, I’m happy for them. But how can they possibly up the ante with Miami? How can they- given the guidelines they’ve provided- adequately punish a program and department that by any tangible measurement was significantly worse than USC’s? And at what point is just getting the Death Penalty actually a better option?
- The guy I feel worst for in all this is Al Golden. From all written reports, and all written statements, he had no idea that this situation was brewing, even though the NCAA started this investigation five months ago.
Really, the situation reminds me of a line from the great ESPN documentary on SMU. It occurred when the architect of the program (Ray Meyer) left, and Bobby Collins replaced him. During the documentary someone said something to the effect of “When Collins showed up, he probably thought the train was moving at 100 miles an hour, when in actuality it was probably closer to 500.” Considering that Miami didn’t make Golden aware of any of this when he was hired, did he know the Miami train was moving at all? Same with new basketball coach Jim Larranaga. Think he would’ve left George Mason if he knew that he’d likely be dealing with NCAA violations at Miami?
To the lawyers who read my site (and I know there are some of you out there), let me ask you, is there any way to tell if Miami has breached a contract here? Are they obligated to inform coaches of stuff like this?
I’ll be curious for your response.
- As for the on the field stuff, what’ll be most interesting to see, is how Golden handles the players on his current roster who were implicated with Shapiro.
Just quickly browsing the list, it seems like just about every key player on both sides of the ball had some kind of interaction with him. Quarterback Jacory Harris and wide receivers Travis Benjamin and Aldarius Johnson on offense, and Sean Spence, Vaughn Telemaque, Marcus Forston and Olivier Vernon are all said to have received improper benefits from Shapiro. Will Golden choose to play them come Week 1 if nothing comes from the NCAA investigation? Or will take a similar stance to what UNC did last year, and sit every accused player until they’re cleared? As of right now they're practicing. But as we all know, that can change quick.
If he sits them, expect a long drawn out process, that could likely result in a lot of losses for the Canes this year.
For those of you tired of the Jacory Harris era, good news. Considering what we know, it might be over.
- Speaking of which, for any poor soul who already bought tickets to the Ohio State-Miami game on September 17, all I can say is, I’m sorry.
I’m guessing you won’t be getting a refund, and you most likely will only be seeing a shell of the two teams you were expecting.
- Changing gears to a completely different subject, does anyone else find it ironic that just about the only time that Miami ran an even somewhat clean program was when Butch Davis was coaching them? You know, the same Butch Davis that just got fired at UNC?
Think about it, Davis took over at Miami in 1994, right after the Pell Grant scandal put “The U,” on probation in the first place. He left in the winter of 2000 to take the Cleveland Browns head coaching job, and about a year later was when all this non-sense with Shapiro started.
Strange, huh?
- Finally, I’ll wrap up by talking about Shapiro himself.
I already went in-depth on feelings on the guy at Crystal Ball Run, and they haven’t changed a day later: He’s the lowest scum of the Earth. A disenchanted snitch who went down in flames, and now is trying to drag down everyone with him.
And really, that bothers me above all else.
Look, the Miami players broke NCAA rules, I’m not excusing their behavior here. But at the same time, what about Shapiro? Why was he handing out money in the first place? Because he cared the players, cared about putting food in their stomachs or shirts on their backs? Of course not, it was so that in his own sick, twisted way, he could own a piece of them. When they refused to reciprocate and return cash that few had asked for in the first place, he threw them under the bus.
And you know what the worst part is? What Shapiro did to the Miami football program is only a fraction, a tiny percentage, of the damage he did to the hundreds of people all over the Miami metropolitan area with his Ponzi scheme. Go ahead and read this article on the guy. It’s long, but brings home the point that Shapiro is nothing short of a terrible, awful human being.
In the end, what we’re talking about with Miami is just football. Eventually all the players will move on, and so too will the program. As crazy as it is to think about now, they’ll play in bowl games again, and maybe sometime in the very distant future play for championships.
But those people whose lives he ruined? They may never be able to recover from that.
Forget football. This story is so much bigger than that.
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