↵Somewhere in a dark little office the one true believer on the NCAA infractions committee is choosing between two courses of action: Falling Down and just lying there until his consciousness expires. He’s rocking back and forth on the floor muttering terrible things to himself because USC athletic director Mike Garrett has sent the internet into a tizzy and Tennessee into festive riots by hiring Lane Kiffin. In doing so, Garrett has slowly moved his hand from his side to his face, placed his thumb upon his nose, wiggled his fingers, and declared one thing very clearly.
USC, Kiffin To NCAA: Nyah, Nyah, Nyah
That thing: Nyah. Nyah. Nyah.
A brief review for anyone who's lived under a rock or on the East Coast for the past few years: USC gets in department-wide trouble for malfeasances ranging from ignoring the agents and runners Reggie Bush has in the USC locker room to having a coach directly pay an O.J. Mayo's associate who had gotten USC in trouble with the NCAA a decade ago. The NCAA's long and winding investigation finally wraps up; the NCAA rejects ↵USC's request to self-flagellate. Carroll gets one look at the notice of allegations and packs up for Seattle. The hammer comes down in late February. There's considerable circumstantial evidence—including Kiffin's hiring itself—that it's going to be bad.
Meanwhile, Lane Kiffin gets the Tennessee job because his dad is famous and the administrators in Knoxville momentarily lose their minds. Over the course of one year—one year—the Kiffin administration racked up so many secondary violations that Outside the Lines did a piece investigating the shenanigans. Naturally, the piece resulted in another secondary violation. Tennessee is currently under investigation by the NCAA for using recruiting "hostesses" as travelling sex fairies from sea to shining sea.
Kiffin, of course, thinks this is all a good thing:
“I think when it comes to recruiting, we’re at the highest level, and I think that people really want to know what we’re doing,” Kiffin said after practice Saturday. “They want to know how are we able to get interest from so many great players, and sign so many great players, so I think you have a lot of people coming at us.”
Kiffin and company are either totally ignorant of NCAA rules or just don't care to follow them except when it's convenient. This fact is inescapable for anyone who's followed college football over the past year. Look at all the Kiffin posts at this blog alone I couldn't cram into the rest of this post.
The kicker goes in all caps: LANE KIFFIN WAS THE OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR AND RECRUTING COORDINATOR WHEN REGGIE BUSH WAS ON THE TAKE AND JOE MCKNIGHT COMMITTED TO USC. USC is hiring one of the guys—possibly the guy—who was most responsible for the NCAA coming down on the program.
This is like Memphis hiring Kelvin Sampson after Calipari left ... if Sampson was the guy who facilitated Derrick Rose’s fraudulent SAT. And had zero accomplishments and had convinced everyone he’d ever met that he was a “liar“ and ”snake.”
Here’s one vote for Falling Down, NCAA fetal position guy: the only appropriate reaction is the inappropriate one. Use the napalm.
This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.
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