Friday, August 21, 2009

Memphis Vacates Final Four

I'm sure everybody reading this is well aware that Memphis has had their 2007-08 season records revoked, including their Championship appearance. They've also been placed on probation for three seasons, and all of this is because Derrick Rose had an ineligible SAT score.

In general when these schools get in trouble there are two lines of thought that spread through the sports world: the coaches shouldn't be able to get away free, and the schools/teams shouldn't be punished for what another coach did in the past. In this case I'd say that's half true.

The fact is that Memphis couldn't have gotten away much lighter than they did. At all levels and in all sports, the rule is always that wins cannot count if you have an ineligible athlete. Even if Memphis was completely innocent in all of this and had no idea that Rose was ineligible, he was still ineligible. The wins can't count - there's no debate.

Memphis fans can argue that they shouldn't have gotten any probation because any wrongdoing was by people no longer at the school, but probation isn't a big punishment. And besides, I don't think Memphis is entirely innocent here. Memphis fans and the Memphis athletic department chose to be willfully ignorant. They knew John Calipari's reputation. They knew that they were bringing in kids with questionable academics and amateur status. They knew that they were bringing in kids with legal problems. It's hard to find another school that took the phrase "student-athlete" less seriously than Memphis did when John Calipari was there.

Memphis fans wanted to win, and Calipari brought them wins. As soon as he jumped ship, suddenly he was evil and a traitor. Suddenly Memphis fans convinced themselves that Calipari was actually holding them back - that they were going to be better with Calipari gone. They were suddenly shocked - shocked - to find out that shady things had been going on while Calipari was in town.

But Memphis is not unique. Just look at Kentucky's constant support and defense of their man. Calipari walks on water for them, because he will bring wins. And when Calipari takes Kentucky to the Final Four and then runs away to another school, Kentucky fans will sound just like Memphis fans do now.

Now one place that I do agree with the conventional thinking is with regards to coaches. I think it's a huge problem in the NCAA that coaches rarely ever are forced to take responsibility for their actions. They skip town and get away.

I'm not saying that I'm buying into the conspiracy theories about Worldwide Wes - and if those theories are proven true then Calipari will indeed get a real punishment and this will all be moot. But even if Calipari wasn't directly involved in the Derrick Rose academic fraud, the NCAA should still step in and punish him. Sometimes the NCAA forgets what college sports are supposed to be about. John Calipari is not what college sports are supposed to be about. The NCAA should step in and punish coaches for not living up to their responsibilities. If a coach does this or this, the NCAA should step in and take action for the good of the students, and the good of college sports. The same way that the Commissioner of Major League Baseball can invoke the "best interest of the game", so should the NCAA.

How many John Calipari Final Fours need to be revoked before the NCAA steps in and punishes him?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

If only the sportswriters and sportscasters would portary Calipari for what he really is. All I ever hear from them is how great a guy and coach he is.