Going After Tampering

It’s pretty ironic that the conference with the most blatant tampering HCs would be the conference to actually do something about the tampering. If other schools follow that would be great. As far as “competitive advantage” goes who knows. It would probably hurt some SEC programs more than others while the BIG/B12/ACC follows suit.

SEC is desperate to halt their slide.

EGIrish said:

It’s pretty ironic that the conference with the most blatant tampering HCs would be the conference to actually do something about the tampering.

IDK, Miami just put on a tampering clinic in stealing Duke's QB and best WR.

Go ahead, SEC. When players want to leave, they can just avoid your system anyway. You can't stop someone from unenrolling from School A and enrolling at School B. So if you think tampering is going to stop, you're fooling yourself. The SEC will do what it's always done — find better ways to tamper in secret and turn a blind eye to the programs that carry the water for the conference while penalizing the ones that don't. Also, BOO F***ING HOO. Times have finally caught up to you. A fourth year straight without a finalist in the championship is incoming. The only teams you beat in the playoffs consistently are your own.

twalsh said:

IDK, Miami just put on a tampering clinic in stealing Duke's QB and best WR.

I mean they were pretty desperate when it came to QB. I also doubt Miami is dumb enough to talk to Mensah directly. Which is the only actual tampering violation. As far as it’s been reported the WR didn’t get tampered with, he just followed his QB. Kiffin and Golding are the biggest offenders in CFB, Ole Miss will fall off the face of the planet if the SEC does anything.

Every team tampers, it sucks but that’s the landscape now. Sure, there are different levels of tampering, like what Miami did to Duke. But in the end, all do it to gain that advantage. I believe ND had Hartman, Leonard, Fields locked up before the season even ended. The SEC knows that it doesn’t have the wealth that the northern teams do (and Texas teams) so it’s trying to find ways to get back on top.

FightinMike87 said:

Go ahead, SEC. When players want to leave, they can just avoid your system anyway. You can't stop someone from unenrolling from School A and enrolling at School B. So if you think tampering is going to stop, you're fooling yourself. The SEC will do what it's always done — find better ways to tamper in secret and turn a blind eye to the programs that carry the water for the conference while penalizing the ones that don't. Also, BOO F***ING HOO. Times have finally caught up to you. A fourth year straight without a finalist in the championship is incoming. The only teams you beat in the playoffs consistently are your own.

That is so true. Now that the folks in SEC-land can't buy players under-the-table, they don't look so unbeatable do they? Part of me wonders about coaching not being quite what it was down there, even beyond the change in the quality of player depth. The better SEC teams just before NIL and the portal seemed among the most physical in the country, and the edge they played with was noticeable and they also seemed to commit fewer turnovers and penalties than we see from UGA and especially Alabama. My guess is the quality of the assistants they have now isn't what it was because those better assistants are now either head coaches somewhere or moved on to the NFL. At the same time, the quality of assistants "our" Fighting Irish have on staff is very high and is arguably improving slightly. As much respect as we can give Al Washington for his work with the defensive line, Charlie Partridge is likely an improvement as a position coach and it could be at worst a "push" if he proves a willing and capable recruiter. If Aaron Henry proves to be as good or better than he was at Illinois, that suggests another "push" that I'm not sure many of us saw coming when Mike Mickens took an NFL job. If the linebacker coaching hire follows this trend, the Fighting Irish will have changed the entire defensive coaching staff below Chris Ash and might have actually improved a bit in the process. This is what happens when your program has momentum, plenty of cash for salaries, and a head coach who is very highly respected within the national coaching community. The ND brand helps as well, and as the overall level of talent at most every position on the team keeps improving, it'll get even easier to hire great assistant coaches to work in that environment.

Forcing kids to sit a year is the only thing I can see to fix this. And there can't be exceptions if a coach leaves because that can decimate a school.

twalsh said:

There was an article in the AJC over the weekend indicating that the UGA President and AD are pushing the SEC to adopt pretty strict non-tampering rules, with enough teeth behind them to make a real difference. As to the obvious question, will doing that put the SEC schools at a competitive disadvantage, they believe that great majority of schools really want these rules in place and that the other conferences would follow their lead and adopt similar rules. Since each individual conference has no monopolistic power, you don't have the anti-trust implications that you have with the NCAA making similar rules. What would be interesting is seeing if any school would have the cajones to publicly oppose anti-tampering rules. That would be kind of telling. Yes Lane, I'm talking about you.

The coach from Miami is just as bad as Kffin.

twalsh said:

IDK, Miami just put on a tampering clinic in stealing Duke's QB and best WR.

aGREE

EGIrish said:

I also doubt Miami is dumb enough to talk to Mensah directly. Which is the only actual tampering violation.

It's 100% still tampering, even if a third party reaches out to the kid on your behalf. Just like it's a recruiting violation for a booster to offer impermissible benefits, whether the coaches know about it or not.

Wasn’t it reported Georgia offered Love $3M to transfer after his sophomore year at ND? Interesting.

twalsh said:

It's 100% still tampering, even if a third party reaches out to the kid on your behalf. Just like it's a recruiting violation for a booster to offer impermissible benefits, whether the coaches know about it or not.

It’s tampering. But not against the rules the way it was written. You can’t make direct contact with the kid, that’s it. If you contact a former Coach, agent, etc…it’s not a violation.

EGIrish said:

It’s tampering. But not against the rules the way it was written. You can’t make direct contact with the kid, that’s it. If you contact a former Coach, agent, etc…it’s not a violation.

Exactly. Here’s the deal, and I know this from first hand conversations: Every one of these kids has an agent, or a parent representing them. That agent is fielding contact directly from other schools. The agent then tells the player what other offers are on the table. You’re correct in saying that (for example) Miami can’t speak directly to Mensah. Cristobal can’t call him up and make him an offer. But Miami’s GM can absolutely call Young Money or whatever dumb name his agency is called and say “tell Darian we want him.” And that’s permitted under the current rules. So it almost doesn’t matter at all that schools can’t directly contact players. They just contact their agents or parents directly. It’s an obsolete rule now. It barely creates one degree of separation, and makes no difference

EGIrish said:

It’s tampering. But not against the rules the way it was written. You can’t make direct contact with the kid, that’s it. If you contact a former Coach, agent, etc…it’s not a violation.

Understood. The key thing will be to make it a violation in whatever rules are adopted.

MrND2 said:

Exactly. Here’s the deal, and I know this from first hand conversations: Every one of these kids has an agent, or a parent representing them. That agent is fielding contact directly from other schools. The agent then tells the player what other offers are on the table. You’re correct in saying that (for example) Miami can’t speak directly to Mensah. Cristobal can’t call him up and make him an offer. But Miami’s GM can absolutely call Young Money or whatever dumb name his agency is called and say “tell Darian we want him.” And that’s permitted under the current rules. So it almost doesn’t matter at all that schools can’t directly contact players. They just contact their agents or parents directly. It’s an obsolete rule now. It barely creates one degree of separation, and makes no difference

Yep. That’s what makes the ole Miss/clemson thing so wild. Golding basically said I give zero effs and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. Now people actually want to do something about it because it was so brazen.