USC’s NCAA sanctions story: The Reggie Bush ‘scandal’ timeline

Five years after the NCAA handed down harsh punishments on USC due to running back Reggie Bush receiving impermissible benefits, a court has ruled that the NCAA reached a “predetermined conclusion” and “disregarded the truth” in punishing former USC coach Todd McNair. McNair is suing the NCAA for ruining his reputation unfairly and using him as a scapegoat to punish the program.

Bush’s violations are not in dispute. What is in dispute is whether McNair knew about the allegations. The NCAA justified punishing USC with a bowl ban and scholarship losses because its administration knew. However, the court disagreed with the NCAA:

A number of the documents involved with the lawsuit between the NCAA and former USC assistant Todd McNair have been unsealed. McNair is suing the NCAA for defamation after the organization’s investigation into former Trojan running back Reggie Bush left McNair disgraced and out of football.

You’ll be shocked to learn the NCAA doesn’t look great here, but there’s a reason the governing body tried to keep portions of these docs sealed.

USC’s hiring of Lane Kiffin in 2010 drew ire from the NCAA infractions committee. It may have played a role in the Trojans receiving sanctions relating to improper benefits received by running back Reggie Bush about half a decade prior.

Multiple members of the committee mentioned the Kiffin hire as they attempted to settle on a penalty, according to a report from the Los Angeles Times on previously sealed documents released by the NCAA. The NCAA had tried to keep these documents sealed, to no avail.

A California appellate court ruled on Friday that the NCAA cannot seal hundreds of documents and emails in the defamation lawsuit filed by former USC running backs coach Todd McNair. The released emails will likely further the NCAA’s reputation of being a power-hungry entity with little concern for justice or consistency.

In a 16-page opinion, the California 2nd District Court of Appeal said that it was not sold on the NCAA’s argument that unsealing the documents would jeopardize future investigations done by the organization.

Despite reducing sanctions for Penn State earlier this week, the NCAA on Friday denied USC’s request for the same action. In a statement released by collegiate sports’ governing body, it said that the two cases aren’t comparable.

On Tuesday, the NCAA announced that Penn State will begin having its scholarship levels restored to the normal 85-player limit. The Nittany Lions will have 20 incoming scholarships and 75 total in 2014-15, and they’ll be up to the full 85 in 2016-17, which is two years earlier than was to be allowed when the sanctions were handed down. The punishment was a result of the institutional cover-up of Jerry Sandusky’s crimes while in Happy Valley.

Earlier this week, the NCAA announced that it would begin restoring scholarships to Penn State, after the school “consistently demonstrated a strong commitment to fulfilling the requirements of the athletics integrity commitment.” USC, under scholarship reductions of its own following the Reggie Bush improper benefits scandal, reportedly met with the NCAA to seek similar leniency.

Here’s USC Athletic Director Pat Haden’s statement on the meeting and what they discussed:

It would be nice to just blame the person in charge, because that would make the NCAA something effective, merely a noble franchise misdirected by inept, buttery hands fumbling the controls of a potentially fine machine.

That would be nice. It would be nice to imagine Mark Emmert--the man who earns $1.6 million a year to slap the controls of the NCAA around like an ape frantically smashing the buttons of a nuclear missile silo--as someone competent. It would also be inaccurate, since the NCAA is a cash-spitting brain fluke infecting anyone who touches it, and like most parasitic organisms has more willing hosts than you can count.

Bush broke the news on “The Dan Patrick Show,” and the trophy’s return was later confirmed by ESPN Los Angeles, which quoted a Heisman Trust spokesman as saying Bush “returned the trophy ‘some time’ ago.” The location of Bush’s Heisman had been a matter of some speculation since his title was stripped, and Bush had remained mum on the matter. He spilled the beans during Wednesday’s interview with Patrick, letting the world know that he no longer has it in his possession.

The return was an interesting move by Bush because the trust never asked for it back, nor were they actively trying to reclaim it. USC returned its copy of the trophy after the NCAA levied its sanctions in June 2010 and asked the university to disassociate itself from Bush.

Three months after the NCAA denies the USC Trojans’ appeal of their penalties for the Reggie Bush affair and basketball misdeeds, school officials are crying uncle. USC president Max Nikias said Wednesday that the school was giving up any further efforts to fight the penalties.

It’s not entirely clear what other “options” USC had, given that the NCAA (again) had already denied their appeal. Of course, there’s the question of how the NCAA is going to make all this appear fair in the eyes of even non-USC football fans when they punish Miami, short of shooting the Shalalabird out of the sky.

The centuries-long NCAA investigation into extra football and basketball benefits at USC will shortly commence gathering dust in the archives. The appeal is denied; sanctions are begun. The drunken brontosaurus that drives the Committee on Infractions’ wheel of industry is churning dutifully away at Ohio State, and North Carolina, and Tennessee, and who knows where else. If any parties remain unconvinced “cheating” runs rampant in college athletics, to the point that “cheating” isn’t even the right word for what’s going on, they are beyond your help or mine.

At this point, we feel like we’ve heard it all. And yet: Lonnie White’s tale of pay-for-play as a Trojan nearly thirty years ago is a compelling read. This one’s a page turner in large part because, after the investigations are sealed and coaches clam up, at-large fans of the game aren’t privy to the mechanics of how, exactly, the money changes hands. It’s not as complicated as you might think:

All this time and Reggie Bush never actually had his Heisman Trophy. Instead, the Bush family handed it off to a San Diego museum, and it’s been sitting in storage despite assurances it would be returned to the Heisman Trust. Bush was stripped of the award after he was found to be ineligible following an NCAA investigation into allegations of improper benefits.

Even though Bush agreed to return the trophy last September, his family handed it off to the San Diego Hall of Champions in March, where it’s been sitting in a back room since.

↵But Oklahoma will not claim the championship as its own. (What do you mean, no one was offering it?)

When it was revealed last year that Reggie Bush would be stripped of his 2005 Heisman Trophy, the running back revealed in a statement that he would be returning the trophy. According to an unnamed source on the Dan Patrick show, the Downtown Athletic Club in New York has never received it. So, then, where is the trophy?

It used to be on display at a place called the San Diego Hall of Champions, but that is no longer the case. Whether or not that means the institution is not in possession of the trophy is still disputed. That same Dan Patrick Show had a report on Tuesday that the trophy was at the hall until last year, when Bush’s father removed it. A spokesman from the San Diego Hall of Champions denies that. Ay dios mio.

First of all: you can vacate losses? A pseudonymous Mike Locksley has just faxed a whistle-blowing letter to NCAA officials.

More importantly, this means you never saw any of this happen:

Farewell to a certain crystal football in Heritage Hall: Following the denial of USC’s appeal of the NCAA ruling in the SC football program’s illegal benefits case, the BCS has taken an unprecedented strike against a sanctioned team and moved to formally strip the Trojans of their 2004 college football national championship title. The game itself, a 55-19 shellacking of Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl, was vacated last June. BCS executive director Bill Hancock’s statement is excerpted below:

Apart from the asterisk in the history books, not much else will change: The Pac-10 keeps its title run money; the players keep their rings, and before you get too excited, Auburn and Oklahoma, know that a new ‘04 champion will not be crowned. That’s really all for the best; I imagine Sooner and Tiger fans can find more recent BCS-related events to hang their prideful hats on.

In the last week of May, we wearily celebrated the end of the five-year USC illegal benefits case; as it turns out, that flash of joy may have come a touch too soon: Todd McNair, ex-running backs coach and special-teams helmer who was ousted in the course of the investigation, will not be taking that high road so prized by the new USC administration. McNair has filed suit against the NCAA, seeking “unspecified damages for libel, slander, tortious interference with prospective economic advantage, tortious interference with contractual relations, breach of contract, negligence and declaratory relief.” The Association slapped him with a show-cause penalty last June, and denied his appeal of the ruling in April.

Our USC blog, Conquest Chronicles, has helpfully pointed out the public availability of the court documents, filed in L.A. County superior court. If you’re a fan of institutionalized slap-fighting, we invite you to hang around this story for just a little while longer.

USC’s pointedly taking what they’re apparently insisting on calling the “high road” when it comes to possible legal action against the NCAA, but do the actions of the Committee on Infractions where the Trojans are concerned open a window for future schools to traverse less lofty paths? At least one lawyer thinks so.

↵

Larry Scott has some feelings about the NCAA’s recent dismissive dismissal of USC’s appeal to the Committee on Infractions. We have excerpted the part that is interesting:

↵I respect USC’s decision to take the high ground and not pursue any further recourse to the NCAA ruling.↵If you didn’t respect Scott’s game at the close of the Pac-12 media rights deal, respect it now, because “basing the entire appeal on accusing the NCAA of abuses of power, like that’s going to get them to reverse course, then graciously ‘agreeing’ not to sue them over it” is the best doublestep definition of “high road” we can imagine in this scenario.

SB Nation’s USC blog, Conquest Chronicles, has some understandable grousing to do following the NCAA’s denial of the university’s COI appeal, but may want to hold off before comparing themselves unfavorably to Ohio State just yet: If this is what’s to become of USC for one ineligible player, what’s going to happen to the Buckeyes for fielding a handful of them for an entire season?

As reported last night, the NCAA has ruled earlier than expected on USC’s appeal to the Committee on Infractions’ ruling against the university, denying the Trojans on all points of plea. The levied penalties against the Trojans football program, including four years of probation, two years of postseason play exclusion, vacated wins, scholarship reductions, and fines, will all stand. The Trojans have already served one year of their bowl ban; scholarship sanctions will begin in the 2012-2013 academic year. The NCAA’s official release has a complete explanation of all penalties upheld, and also contains a stiff rebuttal to the university’s earlier charges of abuses of power on the part of the COI:

In its appeal, the university requested the penalties be reduced, asserting they were not supported by the facts and were excessive to an extent that they constituted an abuse of discretion. It also contended that the findings of violations should be set aside as contrary to the evidence. [...] The appeals committee also upheld all penalties in the case, noting there was no basis to conclude the Committee on Infractions departed from prior decisions.CBS’ Bryan Fischer has a copy of USC’s statement in response to the appeal, which comes with all expected vitriol:

Everything from scholarship limits to bowl bans to free transfers for current USC players would remain in effect if the current sanctions remain in place. Players affected by the 2010 season’s bowl ban would be allowed to transfer to another school without having to sit out a year, as is custom.

There’s nothing more USC can do once the results of this appeal are made known. Well, there’s nothing more they can do either way, as this appeal was their last shot at avoiding severe punishments and was filed months ago.

Todd McNair, former USC running backs coach and central figure in the NCAA’s investigation of illegal benefits in the Trojan football program, has largely been forgotten in the months that have elapsed since the university declined to renew his contract. With all the storied programs that have fallen under the Committee on Infractions’ scrutiny since, it’s understandable to have forgotten the USC investigation entirely, but pieces are still moving, albeit small ones: Recall that the investigation formally wrapped in January; the COI’s report was released and sanctions levied in June, and that the appeals process got underway just days later.

Apart from the restrictions placed upon the football program, McNair himself was slapped with the dreaded show-cause order, and according to a news release from the NCAA this morning, his appeal has been denied. And if you have been following this case with a modicum of interest, it will not at all shock you to learn that McNair’s attorney is adopting the hallowed HATERZ defense, first popularized in this case by former Trojans AD Mike Garrett.