Tag Archives: nfl

Should NCAA sanctions against Jim Tressel affect his ability to work in the NFL?

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FOX Sports reports:

The NCAA hit Ohio State with a one-year bowl ban and additional penalties Tuesday for violations that started with eight players taking a total of $14,000 in cash and tattoos in exchange for jerseys, rings and other Buckeyes memorabilia.

Tressel was tipped to the violations in April 2010 but didn’t tell anyone — even after the athletes got caught last December but were allowed to play in the Sugar Bowl against Arkansas if they served suspensions to start the 2011 season. Among those in the group: starting quarterback Terrelle Pryor and leading rusher Daniel ”Boom” Herron.
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Tressel, who guided Ohio State to its first national championship in 34 years after the 2002 season, was pressured to resign after 10 years with the Buckeyes. The NCAA hit him with a five-year ”show-cause” order which all but prevents him from being a college coach during that time.

”Of great concern to the committee was the fact that the former head coach became aware of these violations and decided not to report the violations,” the NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions wrote in its report.
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Under a show-cause order, any school that hired Tressel would have to present its case for why it needed to employ him, and would risk severe penalties if he were to commit any further infractions after that.

The NCAA also issued a public reprimand and censure, put the Buckeyes on probation through Dec. 19, 2014, and reduced football scholarships from 85 to 82 through the 2014-15 academic year.

The full article is here.

This fall, Tressel, recently hired as the Indianapolis Colts’ in-game video replay consultant, delayed his first day on the job, apparently to comport with the suspensions Ohio State players were facing.

A five-year show-cause sanction is a different animal, though, and Tressel’s multi-week, self-imposed suspension of sorts is not as apt a comparison as NFL commissioner Roger Goodell’s suspension of Terrelle Pryor. Back in August, I wrote about the Goodell Doctrine and the Pryor Precedent (and the potential Benson Exception), which apparently reflect NFL policy in the context of the relationship between the NFL and the NCAA and situations in which those facing NCAA sanctions seek to avoid them by fleeing to the NFL.

At this point, I haven’t formed any opinion on how Tressel’s five-year show-cause sanction compares with Bruce Pearl’s three-year show-cause sanction except that there’s a two-year difference between the two and the men coach different sports. Right now, my only question in the Tressel matter is for Goodell: Will the NFL impose a five-year requirement on the Colts and all other teams that they must meet the show-cause burden before hiring Tressel for any job starting in the 2012-2013 season?

Mixed up Monday

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Big weekend of reckoning in the NFL after things had become a little unhinged in recent weeks. It took the Redskins to remind everyone that the Giants are not that good, the Colts decided that now was a good time to change strategies and beat the Titans for their first win of the year, the mighty Chiefs ruined the Packers’ undefeated season, and the Denver Tebows proved no match for the Patriots, suffering their first loss since the Lions took it to them. Speaking of, out in Oakland, the Lions got back to their winning ways, coming from behind to keep their playoff hopes alive.

In the Nation’s Capital, Root Glen put on a highly enjoyable two-plus hours of floor-stomping music, which meant I barely caught Ohio U beating Utah State in the Idaho Potato Bowl.

A case study in comparative NFL politics

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Before the season started, I “interviewed” the NFL commissioner, Roger Goodell, and asked him about some of his disciplinary decisions. I couldn’t get him on the horn on short notice, but because I know he reads the site, I want to present the following data points for his review.

Case #1: Thanksgiving Day; Ndamukong Suh

Suspension for the above depicted act (which posed no meaningful threat of injury to any player): two games.

Case #2: December 8, 2011; James Harrison

Suspension for the above depicted act (which caused immediate and ongoing serious injury to the player involved): one game.

That Suh is a “repeat offender” cannot explain the distinction, as Harrison’s history of “devastating” hits is even more well known, and one of Harrison’s hits last season was the catalyst for the league’s crackdown on the very type of hit he put on McCoy last week. The only possible rationale for Suh’s heavier sanction is that his action came on Thanksgiving, a day of massive viewership, while Harrison’s hit was on a Thursday night game with many fewer viewers. Still, an indefensible basis for the disparity.

Many are rushing to brand Suh, previously largely a media darling, as a dirty, immature player, and I’ve tried to flesh out my own thoughts on 2011 Suh, but if you think Suh is making the Lions into a violent team, 1) you’re doing a disservice to Calvin Johnson and Matthew Stafford, and 2) you haven’t heard 90s Lions star Lomas Brown dish on teammate Bennie Blades (fast forward to 3:24).

Upset Monday

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As hoped for here on this site, Robert Griffin III became Baylor University’s first Heisman Trophy winner on Saturday night. Griffin was the clear choice for the award, in my mind, and the voters agreed.

No sooner had the Kentucky Wildcats become the top team in the basketball land then they went into Bloomington and fell to the unranked Hoosiers on a last-second three pointer. Unranked Michigan State went out west and beat a ranked Gonzaga team at their place, and unranked Murray State took down #20 Memphis on the road to go to 10-0 on the road.

In the NFL, the Indianapolis Colts, Green Bay Packers, and Denver Tebows held serve this weekend, doing what they’ve been doing the way they’ve been doing it all year. Despite a defense stripped by injuries and a suspension, the Lions held on to go to 2-0 on the year against division foe  Minnesota, a game Detroit had to have.

In the nascent NBA, the nixed Chris Paul trade still is on hold despite early reports that the Hornets, Lakers, and Rockets had reworked the deal. As I write this, the latest from ESPN’s “sources” is that the Los Angeles Clippers have moved onto Paul’s shortlist of acceptable destinations behind the Lakers and New York Knickerbockers.

The emerging offseason baseball story is NL MVP Ryan Braun’s positive PED test, but fans should be aware that Manny Ramirez, who I assumed was totally dunzo, may be back in baseball in the upcoming season.

The sum total of these and other stories lead me to believe that December is mere prelude to 2012’s sportspocalypse.

Programming note: ALDLAND’s live coverage of the biggest events in sports will continue in the coming weeks with NHL hockey and college football bowl games. Related, a recap of Michigan’s win over Ohio State in Ann Arbor will not run because I only got one good picture and it was a couple weeks ago and everybody knows what happened, and my only real insights on the experience were that there were more Nebraska fans in the Big House the week before than OSU fans that day and that people still have and are drinking Four Loko. Here’s the picture:

Buy a share of the Green Bay Packers, sit down, and shut your mouth (and your wallet)

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The Green Bay Packers are America’s only publicly owned professional sports franchise, and that is really cool. Just in time for Christmas, the Pack recently launched a new stock offering, issuing a minimum of a quarter-million shares of common stock. In this case, common stock is not the sort of investment opportunity people are used to, although it does carry voting rights, however mathematically miniscule. For many of the more interesting elements of this offering, see Deadspin’s typically jaundiced-eye treatment of the details.

I found one aspect to be particularly noteworthy. Page five of the official stock offering document contains the following reminder of what it means to be a part-owner of an NFL team:

The NFL Rules prohibit conduct by shareholders of NFL member clubs that is detrimental to the NFL, including, among other things . . . publicly criticizing any NFL member club or its management, employees or coaches or any football official employed by the NFL . . . . If the Commissioner of the NFL (the “Commissioner”) decides that a shareholder of an NFL member club has been guilty of conduct detrimental to the welfare of the NFL then, among other things, the Commissioner has the authority to fine such shareholder in an amount not in excess of $500,000 and/or require such shareholder to sell his or her stock. In addition, if the Commissioner determines that a shareholder has bet on the outcome or score of any game played in the NFL, among other things, then the Commissioner may fine such shareholder in an amount not in excess of $5,000 and/or require such shareholder to sell his or her stock.

It seems to me that the sort of person who would want to buy common stock in the Packers is likely to be someone who does one or both of two things: 1) criticize football-related people, and 2) gamble on football. While enforcement seems unlikely, Deadspin notes that the threat was enough to spook at least one would-be purchaser.

Mark-it Monday

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Last weekend featured championship games in all of the major college football conferences. Clemson rolled hard over Virginia Tech, Boise State smoked New Mexico, Southern Mississippi upset Houston, and Baylor doubled up Texas. Georgia played a decent first half against LSU but never made it out of the locker room for the second half, and in the late game, the inaugural Big Ten championship game, Michigan State totally blew it in their rematch with Wisconsin. After officials reversed a play ruled a catch on the field (the ultimate decision being the incorrect one in the eyes of the television announcers and Spartan fans at the bar where I was watching), MSU got a second chance to win the game, only to negate a punt return for a near touchdown on a melodramatic roughing the punter penalty.

If you’re wondering what would happen if two teams that lost championship games on the strength of serious second-half miscues faced off in a bowl game, wonder no more: Georgia will meet Michigan State in the Outback Bowl this year. In other bowl news, the BCS national championship game will be a rematch of the de facto national championship between LSU and Alabama, despite protests from Oklahoma State, which dismantled Oklahoma this weekend. Vanderbilt, as reported last month, will play in the Liberty Bowl, where they will meet the Cincinnati Bearcats. As for all of the rest of the bowl pairings, the big surprise seems to be Virginia Tech making it to the Sugar Bowl on a very weak record. They’ll face Michigan in New Orleans on January 3. And in case you were worried, Ohio University and Utah State will meet in the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl on December 17. It’s FAMOUS!

The injury-riddled NFL limps toward its own playoffs as well. The Packers survived the New York Giants to stay undefeated, and the Lions died a death of 1,000 self-inflicted cuts in the Sunday night game in New Orleans. Rather than wait until the end of the season to admit that my nuanced, second-level prediction back in August about the Philadelphia Eagles— basically, that if they were to dream team their way to a Super Bowl win, it would be under the direction of Vince Young and not Michael Vick– has been proven wrong through rigorous testing under the conditions of actual reality. Whoops.

In baseball news, Pedro Martinez wants everybody to know he’s going to retire sometime soon, in case you’d forgotten he never actually did that. Our bdoyk reacted here last night.

Finally, in sports writing news, The Classical launched somewhat inauspiciously on Friday evening amidst technical difficulties. More on that site down the road.

No fool’s gold: Frank Gore

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The San Francisco 49ers are 9-2, their best start since 2001. In trying to understand the team’s sudden success, many are pointing to some combination of new coach Jim Harbaugh and supposedly resurrected quarterback Alex Smith as the reason for the change.

The one person nobody seems to mention, though, is running back Frank Gore. While Smith and Harbaugh have bumped the Niners up to be the league’s 29th-best passing team, Gore has made them the seventh-best rushing team in the NFL. In a league in which RBs only last for three to five years, Gore is playing in his seventh season, and he played all of them for SF. Since he became a starter in his second year, Gore has rushed for fewer than 1,000 yards in only one season (2010, when he only played eleven games and still rushed for 853 yards), and he never averaged fewer than 4.2 yards per carry. Although his receiving numbers are severely down this year, that’s likely due to Harbaugh-induced schematic changes, and with 909 rushing yards through eleven games, Gore should have no problem finishing on the high side of 1,000 again this year.

While Gore hasn’t done anything out of his ordinary this year, observers’ ignorance of his role in the 49ers’ success requires explanation.

A boy named Suh

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“My name is Suh! How do you do (me like that)?”

This morning, the NFL suspended Detroit Lions defender Ndamukong Suh for two games without pay:

NFL Vice President of Football Operations Merton Hanks notified Ndamukong Suh today that he has been suspended without pay for the Lions’ next two games for his unsportsmanlike conduct in the Lions-Packers game on Thanksgiving Day. It was Suh’s fifth violation of on-field rules in the past two seasons that has resulted in league discipline. Suh may not practice or be at the team practice facility for any other activities during the two-game suspension. He will be reinstated on December 12. Under the CBA, the suspension may be appealed within three business days. If appealed, an expedited hearing and decision would take place this week in advance of this weekend’s games.

The suspension will cost Suh $164,000 in lost pay, and the way the official announcement reads, the mere filing of an appeal will not allow him to play in Sunday night’s game against New Orleans, a game in which his teammates will miss him sorely; only a completely successful appeal could do that. In addition to the team and individual character costs of mounting sanctions, some have begun to speculate that Suh’s corporate endorsers may not like his image either, although none have signaled any changes. Keep reading…

Running past interference

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I like Grantland’s Vegas correspondent, Bill Barnwell, and it seems he had himself a pensive weekend, maybe because he lost all his money? Who knows, but he posted today his suggestions for reforming the NFL’s pass interference rule that are thoughtful and almost academic in their substance and presentation. Aside from the practical workability concerns he identifies, I think his solution– creation of minor, major, and flagrant pass interference penalties– is a good one. The details are available here.

I have long complained about pass interference calls in football too, but not for the same reasons as Barnwell. I’ve often said that 75% of pass interference calls shouldn’t be made, and while I’m no good at numbers, the point is that it’s called too much. Barnwell agrees for a derivative or secondary reason: the game-atlering nature of the sanction. I think so for a primary reason, however: the very act being punished isn’t worthy of punishment as often as it is punished, irrespective of what that punishment is.

I get that football doesn’t work if the DBs get to just tackle the receivers on every play, and I get that this is especially true today, when passing has come to dominate the pro game to the extent it now does (ESPN declared 2011 the Year of the Quarterback, so it must be true), but this is still a contact sport, and passes are still live balls, and getting a jersey tugged or an arm touched is part of the game. Watching every receiver who just missed a catch pop up and flail for a flag he more often than not gets shouldn’t have to be, though. I know we don’t really live in the world of tear-away uniforms anymore, but the jersey pull is the dumbest of all, right? “Yep…right there…grabbed the back of his jersey….”  Whether that and other similar physical interactions cost the defense five yards or fifteen yards isn’t my concern, and I don’t propose any formal rule change. Rather, the league should just tell the officials to back off on their pass interference calls. 

Barnwell, ever the Vegas man these days, writes a lot about risk and reward in his proposal for sanction modifications. Because the types of interactions the pass interference penalty punishes aren’t those that are large player safety threats, a similar analysis could apply to my proposal for treatment of the underlying act in that this is a low risk, high reward area for the league to permit back into the game some of the physicality it’s taking out in other areas.

Busy Monday

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It was a busy weekend, really, and mostly because it was twice as long as most ordinary weekends. Plenty of football, including another Lions Thanksgiving day defeat at the hands of the Packers, injuries, and Ndamukong Suh (more on him later), a dominant performance by LSU over then-number 3 Arkansas that left Razorbacks head coach Bobby Petrino less than happy with the Tigers’ Les Miles (Clay Travis (who else?) has the video here), Michigan State rolling over Northwestern in a classic trap game, Michigan beating Ohio State for the first time since 2003 (more on that exciting game later), and Vanderbilt destroying Wake Forest to finish the regular season with a bowl-eligible 6-6 record, tripling their win total from last year and besting their win total of the last two seasons combined. In an era when a new coach routinely gets three or four years to “get his guys in” before he has to show success, Vanderbilt’s James Franklin turned a 2-10 team into a 6-6 team in one year, playing in the toughest conference in America, and he’s mad because they were a couple plays away from being 9-3. The Commodores’ loss to UT still stings, but the Vols’ defeat at the hands of lifeless Kentucky will keep the Big Orange out of a bowl this year, and that definitely is a silver lining for Vandy fans.

In Sunday NFL action, I have to mention Tim Tebow, who continued his improbable winning ways, and the Indianapolis Colts, who continued their extremely probable losing ways.

Two pieces of basketball news sure to be disappointing to large segments of the population: first, throwback UNLV took down top-ranked UNC in decisive fashion at the Las Vegas Invitational on Saturday, and the NBA is back, games to start piously on Christmas Day (link to the entirety of Grantland.com pending) (UPDATE: here it is.). (More seriously, the situation in Syracuse seems to have entered a new phase.)

In hockey, the Red Wings took down the pesky Predators and the Capitals fired their coach 22 games into the season.

Oh, and despite their loss in Ann Arbor, Buckeye hearts are aflutter with news of the hiring of Urban Meyer as OSU’s next head football coach. (More on that later, too.)