Thankfully this sites motto is ‘A Sports Blog from Lazy Sports Fan’ – because I’m pretty sure this article was due on Friday.
It’s College Football Bowl Season, where every sponsor from Chik-Fil-A to San Diego County Credit Union has slapped their logo on a field and declared that a football game must be played there. Make no mistake, while the experience I imagine is great for the kids – an opportunity to get away with your team-mates, spend a few nights out in another town and play some quality football.
The Bowl Season is really ultimately about one thing. Money. This won’t be one of those think-pieces about why college athletes aren’t getting paid. You can argue that scholarships are some form of salary. This is about something a tad bit more sinister. This is regarding the loss of ethics in College Football and the severe lack of accountability.
The year is 1987. It’s a grim, rainy day in Dallas, Texas. The entire sports world has just been shaken to its’ core. Southern Methodist University has just been sentenced to death. The gravity of this decision not lost anyone – the man who passed the sentence, David Berst, fainted just after delivering the verdict. There would be no college football in Dallas for the remainder of the year, along with a bevy of other penalties and other fines. The school was not allowed to play Home Games until 1989, banned from Bowl Games and television until 1989 and forfeited 55 scholarships over the course of 4 years.
You may be familiar with the story. SMU was providing its players with benefits “under the table” to bring in recruits that typically were reserved for the big dogs of the Southeast. No one knows why Eric Dickerson switched his commitment from Texas A &M to SMU. One thing is certain though, Eric Dickerson was seen driving a brand-new Gold Trans AM his senior year of high-school. When he announced his decision to de-commit from A&M to SMU. His Trans AM was MIA. This went on for a few years at SMU and the school relished in great success, going undefeated in 1982. But eventually the cracks began to show. Multiple players came out and acknowledged receiving improper benefits. The Mustangs program was hit with imposed sanctions and placed on probation as a result.
This is where “The Death Penalty” comes into play. The Death Penalty is not an official name for the rule, the rule is actually known as the “Repeat Violators” rule. Essentially, when SMU was busted again for providing improper benefits while still on probation – the executioner axe fell. Many consider The Death Penalty to be a nuclear bomb – and the fall out off this particular one are far-reaching and the impact felt to this day. Arkansas left the SWC Conference to join the SEC. “The Big Eight” conference absorbed members of SMU’s remaining SWC Conference members – taking in Texas, Texas-Tech, Baylor and Texas A &M. They’re now known as The Big 12 Conference.
SMU would go on to one winning season over the next 20 years, suffering embarrassing losses during that stretch. A 95-21 loss to Houston, a 59-7 to Notre Dame highlighting the ineptitude of the program in fielding a competitive product due to the sanctions. They made their first Bowl Game in 2009 and are finally, 30 years later, starting to look like a consistently competitive product.
They say it’s important to understand history, so you’re not doomed to make the same mistakes of the people who have come before – and that brings me to the point of this article. There has not been another nuclear detonation used in war since the end of WWII. There will not be another Death Penalty passed down on a D1 Program in College Athletics. While the decision to not use WMD’s is one that comes from having a high ethical code- it’s my opinion that the reason there won’t be one used against an NCAA program is an un-ethical one. There’s simply too much money at stake.
Can you imagine the fall-out if Alabama or Penn State were to receive the penalties that SMU incurred? The entire infrastructure of Tuscaloosa and State College would come crashing down. These are areas that live and bleed their football programs. The revenue brought into these cities based on their football programs existence is a major source of income. In 2018, Alabama self-reported 13 NCAA violations. In 2019? 16. I would prefer not to get into the disgusting ethics that plagued the Penn State Football program during Joe Paterno’s tenure – but it’s this writers’ opinion that if those actions aren’t Death Penalty worthy, nothing is.
Perhaps it’s easier to make an example of a smaller school. SMU currently has about 11,000 enrolled students, at the time that number was around 6,000. Compare that to, say, Ohio State. That currently has 46,000 enrolled students, a perennially great football program, and a checkered history to say the least. Ohio State has the same self-reported infractions that Alabama has, but has quite a few well-publicized snafus. The tattoo parlors, the new cars, the domestic abuse scandal stand out. But Ohio State has nary lost a beat in spite of these.
The main proponents of paying collegiate athletes cite the large amount of revenue brought in by these athletes. But that revenue doesn’t exist without the fans and boosters that pour their money into their prospective programs.
A recent Forbes article cites that Alabama, Ohio State and Penn State rank 4th, 5th and 13th respectively in revenue. These are massive programs, that help line the pockets of many people in the NCAA. SMU’s boosters’ oil money can’t compare to the thousands upon thousands of alumni. That’s why it was easier at the time to make a scapegoat of the smaller school. But 30 years later, as SMU prepares for their bowl game. Keep in mind, it took them 30 years to get back to this point. That’s why you’ll never see these sanctions levied again.
Written By:
Ray Lang
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