NORMAN — College sports have sure changed. Once upon a time, it was the boosters you had to worry about. Not so much anymore.
Now, it’s the agents.
Agent contact has Alabama looking into one of its players. Agent contact has Florida looking into one of its players.
Agent contact, however indirect, may be in the middle of the continuing investigation concerning Oklahoma men’s basketball, former player Tiny Gallon and the seeming forced resignation of an assistant coach.
It makes sense we find ourselves here.
There is no greater difference in college sports now against college sports then than the professionalism with which big time athletic programs are run, right down to compliance, imperfect though it may be.
Rhett Bomar and J.D. Quinn may slip through the cracks, but it’s not for a lack of trying to close the cracks and it’s sure not from the wink of a blind eye.
Once upon a time, if something wasn’t kosher, athletic departments hid in silence. These days, unless the result of rare incompetence, athletic departments run to the NCAA, racing to fall on their sword.
It is the definition of culture change and you could have seen it coming.
Because if you were an SMU booster back in the ’80s, you think you might have realized you were working against yourself, handing out improper benefits, the moment the death penalty was handed down?
Or if you were a partisan of one of the 27 schools Hart Lee Dykes put on probation, don’t you think, after the fact, given the opportunity to get dirty, you might keep your hands clean instead?
It’s hard to root your favorite team to victory if the talent to win has been taken away in penalized scholarships.
Agents, though, have no reason to worry about the future consequences of their actions. If they land the player, they’re good. So it had become the latest off-the-field topic in college sports.
Alabama coach Nick Saban lashed out at agents and their ilk at SEC media days earlier this week. Certainly, Big 12 coaches will follow suit, at least in part, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday when everybody gets together in Dallas.
What to do is the question.
It’s true, it never made a ton of sense to punish the players still at an institution for the acts performed by boosters for players who had already left the institution. On the other hand, it hit the boosters where it hurt: on the field, where their favorite team had a hard time winning.
So agents need to get hit where it hurts. That means the pocketbook.
Like church and state, there’s always been a wall between college and pro. Mostly because no good can come from one becoming too involved with the other. But that was before agents sent runners to campus like a crooked worker’s comp attorney sends runners to a factory before it closes.
Now, the sides need to get together.
Proving the connection between agent and agent’s rep will likely be the hard part, but doing something about it afterward won’t be. As soon as an agent loses his ability to negotiate in any of the leagues he or she’s been working in, the message will be sent.
If NFL commissioner Roger Goodell can take players down for making a fool of themselves, he can certainly take the agents of those players down for their bad behavior. And if David Stern can’t do the same thing in the NBA, he’s not near the godfather everybody thinks he is.
They still have to want to do it.
The NCAA should be in their ear.
Clay Horning 366-3526 cfhorning@normantranscript.com
