Someone doesnt want TCU un title game. Other players have been suspended for less.


INDIANAPOLIS -- Auburn quarterback Cam Newton is eligible to play in the SEC title game this weekend, even though the NCAA says his father broke rules by shopping his son to another school.

The NCAA released its finding in a statement Wednesday. The college sports governing body had concluded on Monday that a violation of Newton's amateur status had occurred. Auburn declared Newton ineligible on Tuesday and requested his eligibility be reinstated.

Newton has been cleared to compete without conditions.

Auburn (No. 1 BCS, No. 2 AP) plays South Carolina (No. 19 BCS, No. 18 AP) in the Southeastern Conference championship game Saturday. With a victory, the Tigers will earn a spot in the BCS National Championship Game.

"Based on the information available to the reinstatement staff at this time, we do not have sufficient evidence that Cam Newton or anyone from Auburn was aware of this activity, which led to his reinstatement," said Kevin Lennon, NCAA vice president for academic and membership affairs. "From a student-athlete reinstatement perspective, Auburn University met its obligation . . . Under this threshold, the student-athlete has not participated while ineligible."

Said Auburn athletic director Jay Jacobs: "We are pleased that the NCAA has agreed with our position that Cam Newton has been and continues to be eligible to play football at Auburn University. We appreciate the diligence and professionalism of the NCAA and its handling of this matter."

The NCAA won't say its case is closed on the Newton recruitment even though it clears Newton himself. Its statement notes that reinstatement likely occurs "prior to the close of an investigation."

The NCAA said in a statement that Auburn has limited the access Newton's father has to the Tigers' program, and Mississippi State has disassociated an unidentified individual involved in the case. The NCAA said its policy is not to comment on current, pending or potential investigations.

ESPN.com reported on Nov. 4 that a man, identified as former Mississippi State football player Kenny Rogers, had called former teammate John Bond and said he was represented the Newtons. Bond said Rogers solicited a six-figure payment to secure the quarterback's signature on a national letter of intent.

On Nov. 9, two sources who recruit for Mississippi State told ESPN of a pay-for-play scheme to gain Newton's services. The sources told ESPN that prior to Newton's commitment to Auburn, Cecil Newton told a recruiter it would take "more than a scholarship" to bring his son to Mississippi State, a request the source said the school would not meet.

After Newton committed to Auburn, another source said an emotional Cam Newton phoned another recruiter to express regret that he wouldn't be going to Mississippi State, stating that his father, Cecil, had chosen Auburn for him because "the money was too much."

Rogers initially denied talking to Bond, but told ESPN 103.3 radio in Dallas on Nov. 11 that Cecil Newton told him it would take "anywhere between $100,000 and $180,000" for his son to play at Mississippi State.

Rogers, who has worked with sports agent Ian Greengross and has a company called Elite Football Preparation, said Newton's father, Cecil, asked two Mississippi State coaches for money at a hotel in Starkville, Miss., in Nov. 2009 to secure his son's commitment to the Bulldogs. Rogers says the coaches declined the request, and Mississippi State said all of its employees acted properly.

Former Mississippi State football player Bill Bell, in an interview with ESPN.com on Nov. 17, said he told the NCAA he received a text message from Rogers claiming to represent Cecil Newton's father that outlined a payment plan designed to bring the quarterback to the Bulldogs. Bell said Cecil Newton never specifically asked him for money, but that Cecil Newton was present during three-way calls in which Rogers discussed a pay-for-play scheme.

Mississippi State notified the Southeastern Conference of the reported offer in January 2010. It followed up with more information in July.

"The conduct of Cam Newton's father and the involved individual is unacceptable and has no place in the SEC or in intercollegiate athletics," Mike Slive, the SEC commissioner, said Wednesday. "The actions taken by Auburn University and Mississippi State University make it clear this behavior will not be tolerated in the SEC."

Rogers, Bell and Bond were all interviewed by the NCAA during its investigation, as was Newton, his father and his mother.

George Lawson, an attorney who said he was representing the Newton family, told WSB-TV of Atlanta on Nov. 18 that he was "1 million percent" certain Cam Newton did not take any money. Lawson says if Cecil Newton discussed money, his son "knew nothing" about it.

"No money has been offered to Cam Newton," Lawson told WSB-TV. "Cam Newton [hasn't] asked for any money."

Rogers is scheduled to meet with officials from the Mississippi Secretary of State's office Dec. 9 to discuss the recruitment of Newton.

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Conns7901, that was kinda of my theory, they don't want to take any chances of TCU in the title game, so Cam can play, and also it may be that people are saying that if Auburn did lose, that they may still get in the title game.

The NCAA doesn't care who plays in the championship game. They get nothing out of it. They get no television revenues from it, unlike the basketball tournament. Of all the sports, the NCAA has the least interest in football because they get the least out of it.

The SEC has an interest in him playing, but then, the SEC was the group that stepped in and said he was ineligible. The NCAA has just said that, given what is known right now, he is not ineligible.

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Fire Phil Emery

Irish Boy are you right that the NCAA doesn't get anything out of the tv deal, that's a little suprising, if I were the NCAA I would rethink some things, when you say the NCAA has the least intrest in football and that's the big moneymaker, maybe that's why there was some comments before the season that college football could leave the NCAA.

It wasn't random chance that Newton's dad admitted to everything. They knew that he could deflect the issue until next year by doing it and ensure he plays the rest of the year.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

What happens if he admits to taking his son's SAT for him?

They don't get anything out of it by order of the Supreme Court (antitrust stuff, kind of interesting but I can't get into it here). The individual schools control almost everything, and they usually cede a lot of that control to their conferences. The BCS is just the collection of the major conferences, so the power goes from school ---> conference ---> BCS. The NCAA is almost helpless, except insofar as they control things like amateurism and academic requirements.

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Fire Phil Emery

Dan Wetzel strikes me as either really clever, or really clueless, and I'm not sure which. He has his own agendas, and he pushes them in such a way that his arguments seem plausible. He does that in his Death to the BCS book, but I'm not concerned about that right now. Let's stick to the Newton situation. This is an example of what I'm talking about:

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/news?slug=dw-newtonturn120110

The NCAA is obviously concerned with a team making a monetary offer to a player. That is the ultimate recruiting violation. He says that making player knowledge necessary is some sort of impossible hurdle to climb, but that's OK, because the players should get money anyway.

First, proving knowledge isn't that difficult. All it takes is one shred of evidence suggesting that the player had an idea what was going on. This is a little bit tougher for the NCAA than for, say, a police department, since the NCAA can't get subpoenas or threaten criminal sanctions. But it's not that tough, and knowledge can easily be inferred.

But second, and this is where I really can't believe that Wetzel is as dense as he seems: in the prototypical case, the player's knowledge will not be very important, because the team itself will know what is going on. That is much easier to discover, since the NCAA can force teams to reveal information in all sorts of ways.

That is not this case. Cam Newton went to play for Auburn. The NCAA has zero evidence connecting Auburn money to anyone in Newton's family. They have no evidence that anyone associated with Auburn made any offer. They are looking for that evidence, but they don't have it. They do know that Newton's father (as of right now, without his knowledge) discussed a pay-for-play scheme with Mississippi State, but there is (once again, as of right now) no link between Cam Newton and the offer, and no link between Auburn and the offer.

Because he conflates the two cases, he tosses head-scratchers like this:


No! No, no, no! If the player's team was doing the buying, the player and the team are both toast. Not just sorta toast, either. Serious, lack-of-institutional-control, bowl ban, you're screwed toast. The player's knowledge only matters here because you have nothing on the school either.

I don't accuse him of mere ignorance because then he tosses out stuff like this:

That's quite a caveat! "We don't have any evidence that anything relevant to this case happened." OK.

He also has some nonsense about amateurism and non-tax status which doesn't make a ton of sense but it's a hobbyhorse of his so whatever. Sometimes I think he throws out legal-sounding stuff--501c3! Antitrust!--because it makes him sound in-the-know. Talk to someone first about this stuff, Dan.

A few more, non-Wetzel related points on this before I pass out

1.) "Why isn't this the Reggie Bush situation? Huh, smart guy?" Because Reggie Bush himself took money. Next question.

2.) "The NCAA used to nail kids and programs for far less than this in the 1980s and 90s. They're not following precedent." Maybe, maybe not. Every case is different. But the NCAA used to demand very little of itself in its investigations. They even got taken to the Supreme Court on it, and while the Court said that the NCAA doesn't have to provide members with any due process, it suffered a major black eye. They want to have, you know, actual evidence of wrongdoing now. That's laudable.

3.) "So they're just going to let everyone off?" I guess it depends how you define it. If Cam knew, Auburn is in trouble. If Auburn knew, there's going to be a smoking crater in East Alabama where Jordan-Hare Stadium used to be. As for Cam Newton, it could be that he is totally guilty, yet he's going to end up in the NFL while Auburn gets hammered. Yeah, that happens sometime. I'd rather have a system where the player gets through and the program gets hammered than one where we slam kids without evidence because it makes fans and preening columnists feel good about themselves.

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Fire Phil Emery

By Gene Wojciechowski
ESPN.com

Huh? Did the NCAA do what I think it did? Did it basically rule that a father and a third party can actively, brazenly and with impunity shop a player around for hundreds of thousands of dollars -- and the worst thing that happens is the father has to lie low and the third party has to disassociate himself from the programs in question?

Did it just get embarrassed by a rules loophole the size of Jordan-Hare Stadium, the gist of it being: Your old man and another guy can put you on the open market, but as long as you don't know about it, you're good to strap it up for the next big game?

The answers: yes and yes.

"In determining how a violation impacts a student-athlete's eligibility, we must consider the young person's responsibility," said Kevin Lennon, NCAA vice president for academic and membership affairs, in announcing the ruling Wednesday that Auburn quarterback Cameron Newton is eligible. "Based on the information available to the reinstatement staff at this time, we do not have sufficient evidence that Cam Newton or anyone from Auburn was aware of this activity, which led to his reinstatement."

Amazing. The NCAA just made it possible for anyone with a blue-chip prospect to shop that player without fear of real punishment. Football player … hoops player -- doesn't matter. All you have to do is say the kid didn't have a clue about the sales price and it's like nothing happened. Plausible deniability.

The Rev. Cecil Newton should thank the heavens that the NCAA carries guns loaded with blanks. Newton's penalty for peddling his son: His access to Auburn athletics is "limited." That's it -- "limited," whatever that means.

This isn't a slap on the wrist; it's a wet kiss on the ring finger. Someone who tried to sell his own son as if he were a football commodity essentially beat the rap.

You think the reverend cares whether he has limited access? Please. In all likelihood, his son has two games left in his Auburn career. And then Cam is off to the NFL, where the auction is sanctioned and done publicly. Amen, to that.

As expected, everyone involved issued the appropriate statements. The NCAA made its molar-less ruling. Auburn said it was pleased with that ruling. And SEC commissioner Mike Slive said, "The conduct of Cam Newton's father and the involved individual is unacceptable and has no place in the SEC or in intercollegiate athletics."

Duh. Of course, it's unacceptable. But nothing the NCAA or the SEC did Wednesday is going to make this go away in the future. If anything, Cecil Newton provided a detailed road map for those parents or others looking to make a buck (or nearly $200,000) off their sons. Now everyone with their hands out knows the NCAA is powerless to do anything -- just as long as the kid has that plausible deniability.

And maybe it's just me, but the NCAA's phrase, "Based on the information available to the reinstatement staff at this time …" caught my attention. Does that mean investigators are still digging? Or does it mean they've run out of shovels?

And if they are still digging, what happens if they find something after the Heisman vote? Or after the national championship game? Then what?

So Cam Newton is eligible -- for Saturday night's game against South Carolina, for the Heisman and for the BCS National Championship Game, should No. 1-ranked Auburn win the SEC title. But something still doesn't feel right.

The NCAA, for all of its countless, mind-boggling rules, is apparently useless when it comes to a father trying to sell his son. Think about that for a minute. It's like a bad fairy tale:

Once upon a time, in the land of the SEC, the quarterback's scheming father and the evil scouting service owner decided they were going to auction off the quarterback to the highest bidder. Best of all, the quarterback would never, ever know.

Then one day they were ratted out.

The handsome quarterback was ruled ineligible but then instantly reinstated by the NCAA, played for the SEC championship, remained the favorite to win the Heisman Trophy and everyone lived happily ever after.

Meanwhile, Cecil Newton is laughing all the way to his big, bad limited access. He got his happy ending. And, as it turns out, so did his son.

But here's the thing: This isn't the end; it's the beginning. Of loophole chaos.

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That deserves a good bricking.

No

No

My answers are more accurate.

Notice the "or" part of that second sentence.

You can't just say that the player didn't know. There has to be evidence that it's true. And the prospect's school can't make any offers. That's a pretty big difference.

Whatever the circumstances here, the father wasn't going to be punished. How would making Cam Newton ineligible punish Cecil Newton?

Do you think he cares whether Cam is made ineligible for two games?

I don't think people are getting this. The NCAA ruling here isn't final. This isn't the end of the investigation. They're just saying, given what we know right now, he is eligible. This is unsurprising.


Nope. Unsurprising.

And as long as the school they actually play for never makes any offers. Why am I the only person not missing this? Plus, the deniability has to be, you know, plausible.

Yes

Damned witty, Wilde. Deuce it all.

It'll be revoked.

I'll be vacated, and Auburn will be sanctioned back to the stone age. Cam Newton will still be making millions of dollars in the NFL, but guess what? The NCAA could have given Auburn the death penalty today, and Cam Newton would still be making millions of dollars in the NFL next year.

Right now, yes. At least you're catching on.

You're still not getting this. We don't know that the player was ever auctioned off, because there is no evidence whatsoever at this point that the "auction winner" actually made any type of bid. The school might be completely innocent, and the player might be completely innocent; at the very least right now, we have no evidence that they are not innocent.

Of the investigation, yes.

I understood the "loophole" pretty well within about 25 seconds. I think the NCAA will be able to handle it.

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Fire Phil Emery

Lets use some logic. Kid was set on going to Mississippi St. Dad wanted 200k, Miss St said no. Kid ends up at Auburn because dad says he has to go there. So because Miss St. wont pay he goes to Auburn for free??

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Do you or anyone else have any, you know, evidence? Because without that, that is all just mental masturbation on your part.

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Fire Phil Emery

Yeah your right. You can never look at something and know it is wrong.

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I guess I'm just old fashioned like that, wanting evidence before ruining a kid's season and crippling a program.

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Fire Phil Emery

So the WR from UGA sells his jersey for a couple hundred bucks, and he sits out several games.

Pastor Newton gets six figures and.........this is a crock.

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oh to create a dan wetzel mult...

A radio show today said that the FBI has a bunch of photos that are linked directly to ATM cards. When you do an ATM transaction it takes a picture of you and the FBI had the power to get that. The thing that will ultimately get Auburn is that there are a bunch of gift cards that were provided by boosters. If players start showing up on that things will be very bad for Auburn. Basically, they are going to gift wrap the whole investigation to the NCAA.

Enjoy your SEC title Auburn. You won't get another one for a long time.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

they probably also enjoyed all those macaroni grill meals.