Victory Bell Stays in Chapel Hill

Great to see Carolina stick it to Duke for the 20th time in the last 21 games, including 8 straight wins.  At 7 and 5 Carolina is bowl eligible, no small feat considering the turmoil off the off season and the firing of Butch Davis.  Kudos to Everett Withers and seniors such as Dwight Jones for leading this year's squad.

Next year is already tantalizing, with Bryn Renner and Gio Bernard poised to lead the Heels to the promised land - 9 wins, including one over N.C. State!

I'd also bring coach Withers back next year. 
 

Finally, while were talking leadership one of my favorites is T.J. Yates, who led Carolina to 8 wins last year despite numerous suspensions and disruptions.  Today Yates played in his first NFL game and helped lead his Houston Texans to a 20-13 win. Yates took over for injured second-string quarterback Matt Leinert at the end of the first half, and completed 8 of 15 passes for 70 yards.  Leinert may be out for the season so Yates is likely the de facto starter for the AFC South leading Texans.

Going 0-4 against Wolfpack under Davis, Tar Heels restore emphasis - College - NewsObserver.com

For any defenders of Butch Davis I remind them that he went 0-4 against our biggest football rival, NC State: Going 0-4 against Wolfpack under Davis, Tar Heels restore emphasis - College - NewsObserver.com

How low can you go?

Shoes keep dropping in the college football foyer - that's where I drop MY shoes, and I got Butch Davis fired! YAY

Like some others, I agree it's time for the NCAA, which only nominally controls college football anyway, to start dropping some hammers on schools like the U and even UConn.

One argument is that Miami deserves the death penalty for recent revelations that Nevin Shapiro - if that's his REAL name - provided improper benefits to dozens of Hurricanes football players.  The argument is 'It's time to make an example of Miami, similar to SMU in the 80s with their death penalty.' 

While that may feel good, did ANYONE or any school really learn from the SMU example?  It doesn't seem that the 'death penalty' of a school like SMU changed much, if anything.

Then again, giving a traditional power like Miami the death penalty would get people's attention.  Actually, Miami is still thought of as a renegade not a blue-blood; giving THE Ohio State University the death penalty WOULD do the trick.

However, I do agree with the proposed rule to tie graduation rates to bowl or tournament participation (a move that by the way would have disqualified UConn from this year's NCAA basketball tournament).  That seems obvious.

But in addition to that common sense move, college athletics needs to take it down a notch, not be so big time and try to take some of the money out of it.  That's the only way to fix a system that does not need reform so much as it's fundamentally corrupt.

Of course, proposing de-emphasizing money sounds crazy.  But remember, these are supposed to be institutions of higher learning that in the case of state schools are theoretically non-profits.

Anyway, to fix college sports the NCAA should do the following in addition to linking participation to graduation rates.

1. Make freshman ineligible to play any sport, revenue or non-revenue;
2. Use baseball's draft rules for all sports; you can get drafted out of high school but if you DON'T go pro you can't be re-drafted until you finish your junior year (and you have to make progress towards graduation while in school for those 3 years);
3. Limit conference sizes to 8 maximum; that would mean fewer games and practices for all sports, and shorter seasons, and therefore more time in the classroom, being a regular student, etc.;
4. Allow players to receive a percentage of money from sales of merchandise that use their likeness; seems only fair that the players should benefit from sales of THEIR jerseys, etc.;
5. Have a play-off system for all levels of football; get the bowls and their corporate shysterism out of college football;

Those are just a few.  I hope the NCAA makes some serious changes, but I'm afraid that until university presidents get the nerve to de-emphasize college sports a bit there will continue to be more Butch Davis-Jim Tressel-Nevin Shapiro-style headlines.  And more shoes all over the foyer.

Moron Butch Davis

Like the (subconscious?) dig at Butch Davis in this headline in The Old Reliable: "UNC supporters want more on Butch Davis' firing."

The timing of the firing has many alums and donors up in arms, but no matter how bad the timing it was time to Fire Butch Davis. 

I, too, am curious as to why the University and Chancellor Thorp stuck with Davis for so long but still surprised to see alumni organizing and even pressing for phone records, etc.  I think Davis' record speaks for itself, and was obviously bad enough and embarrassing enough to warrant getting fired. 

GO HEELS!

Well THAT Was Fast

In an eerie coincidence, less than 2 weeks after the debut of this blog Carolina announced that they were indeed firing coach Butch Davis.  

The headline at www.tarheelblue.com was a little more understated - Carolina Football Makes Coaching Change - but the bottom line is Carolina fired Butch Davis.  In doing so, Carolina came to it's senses and fired the coach who tarnished the standard set by Dean Smith and heaped more embarrassment on the University than any other coach in the last 50 years.

Chancellor Holden Thorp got it right when he said today "What started as a purely athletic issue has begun to chip away at this University's reputation ... I have lost confidence in our ability to come through this without harming the way people think of this institution. Our academic integrity is paramount and we must work diligently to protect it. The only way to move forward and put this behind us is to make a change."

I've said this before, but will restate that I don't think Butch Davis ever understood what Carolina means.  He did not work for the athletic department, he worked for THE university.  


Finally, his 'clueless defense' may have been the last straw for Thorp and Athletic Director Dick Baddour.  

You could probably get away with that defense if it was one player or one instance.  But there were multiple and repeated problems associated with Davis' football program:

• FOURTEEN players were suspended for academic fraud - or six more players than wins - fraud that was uncovered while the University investigated illegal contacts between players and agents;
• One summer after at least 3 players take an illegal, agent-funded trip to attend a party thrown by an ex-player, the same thing happens again for the second summer in a row;
• In the wake of an academic scandal that resulted in players getting suspended, you follow that up with one of your players getting caught by NC State fans plagiarizing a term paper;
• In the wake of the academic and player-agent scandals, you follow THAT up with players racking up tens of thousands of parking ticket.  On top of that, a tutor is charged with paying some of the parking tickets.
  

You simply can not overlook a list that long.  It was more than cluelessness, it was incompetence.  Davis was in charge and therefore responsible.  Maybe he thought he was back at Miami, or at Ohio State or USC or Auburn or South Carolina or wherever. 

But you can not be that sloppy and irresponsible at Dean Smith's school.  Carolina has higher and better standards than that.  Davis never understood that responsibility, and he was finally fired today.  

The football program was an embarrassment for the last 14 months (but not the players like T.J. Yates who persevered) but today is a great day to be a Tar Heel.  We got it right today.

Swofford calls for reforms in college athletics

Speaking at the ACC football kick off event, former UNC football player and athletic director and current ACC commissioner John Swofford said college athletics was at a 'tipping point,' and said recent scandals have caused an erosion of public trust.

He laid out a few good ideas, such as having scholarships cover all costs - travel, pizza and beer money, etc. - in addition to tuition, room and board. 

Swofford also said he "favors strict, consistent penalties." When asked about the troubles at his alma mater, the former Tar Heels quarterback said "that's not who we are as a league.* When you have those kinds of problems, you don't step back from what your cornerstones are and what you're all about. You try to fix it and move forward."

* Kind of a funny statement when you consider the league includes Free Shoes University, Butch Davis, the 2009 champion Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets that had to forfeit that title and are on probation, etc. etc.

I have one very simple way to fix college sports, an old idea that would fix recruiting and change the mentality of college coaches and athletic directors everywhere.  An idea, by the way, endorsed by none other than Dean Smith - eliminate freshman eligibility.

Making freshmen ineligible would force coaches to take the long view, end the get-rich-quick mentality of big time college recruiting - where many, many abuses occur - and almost more importantly, give college athletes a year to act like normalish college students. 

You could compliment a ban on freshman participation by adopting baseball's draft rules for all sports.  In baseball, high school seniors and college juniors (and seniors) are eligible for the draft.  But once a student-athlete commits to college he or she has to complete three years of school before being eligible to be drafted a second time. 

Fairly simple rules that would change college sports completely.   

But in the meantime, Carolina should fire Butch Davis!

Clueless Defense

Old - from May of this year - but still on-the-money blog post by ESPN's Heather Dinich about Butch Davis' and the reliable 'clueless defense' argument.  It's a nice change of pace since it's about Quentin Coples not McAdoo, etc.

Check it out at http://espn.go.com/blog/ncfnation/post/_/id/42477/butch-davis-in-the-dark-again

Pittman replaces Blake

Carolina announced yesterday that Sam Pittman has replaced John Blake as associate head coach.  Blake resigned last year at the start of the NCAA's investigation of UNC football.

The NCAA determined that Blake was a runner for a well known player agent. Carolina has NOT revealed which agent Pittman is 'working' for, nor can we figure out why Butch Davis is still the head coach in Chapel Hill.

I know Davis is a lock to win eight games every year.  However, the win total pales in comparison to the number of players suspended by the University or the NCAA in the last 14 months.   

Fire Butch Davis!

Davis to release phone records

Presumably as part of the NCAA investigation of the Carolina football program, coach Butch Davis will release phone records for his cell phone to the news media.  The University did the same thing last year for calls from the football team offices when the NCAA first started to investigate Davis' stewardship of the football program. But there apparently were very few calls, so few that reporters questioned if the records were accurate.  So to augment those phone records Davis' CELL phone records will be made available to the press.

I don't think any UNC coach or program - or professor for that matter - has ever had to turn over phone records.  To this alumnus, turning over phone records is another embarrassment for the University. 

The worst may still be on the horizon.  Carolina has to respond to the NCAA investigation - as if it were a tawdry school like USC, Ohio State, Kentucky, etc. - by September, and is to appear before the NCAA infractions committee a month later.

When's the last time that happened?  In the early 60s and Frank Maguire?  But Carolina going before the NCAA infractions committee?  Carolina!?  Thanks Butch. 

Chancellor Thorp - It's time to Fire Butch Davis!

DTH not exactly sugar-coating Davis headlines

I was at the Daily Tar Heel website checking in on the Leslie McDonald story, and of course was struck by the Butch Davis headlines, headlines perfect for the Fire Butch Davis blog.

If you go, you'll see:  

• McAdoo case raises issues of plagiarism and academic standards;
• Paper in McAdoo lawsuit shows evidence of plagiarism;
• NCAA sends UNC football notice of allegations

Of course, the first two items are McAdoo items, but the last story is all about Butch, and talks about the latest NCAA letter sent to Carolina inquiring about the program's academic work.  According to the DTH the letter includes a list of “potential major” violations and "include improper academic assistance from a tutor, impermissible benefits to players and failures of institutional oversight."

 

In addition to including a list of potential violations, the 26-page letter sounds like a list of why Carolina needs to Fire Butch Davis!

 

McAdoo

Yet another example of Coach Butch Davis not understanding what Carolina is all about is the unfolding McAdoo academic embarrassment.  Does Davis understand that he has the same title as Dean Smith - a head coach at the University of North Carolina?  

In case he needs reminding, that title means you have HIGHER standards than the NCAA requires.  And that pertains to the class room and off the field, not just the on the field stuff Butch.

How long are we are Tar Heels going to put up with this guy embarrassing the University?  

It's time to Fire Butch Davis.