First off congrats to Liz and Big Blue Nation for a great season. Nowhere in the US is basketball more loved than in the Bluegrass. They now have 8 National Championships and could have won it all in '10 and '11 with a pinch more luck. I have to remind myself that these kids are still teenagers and that today's athletes are way more seasoned than the stars of my era. Despite my feelings for Calipari I found myself in awe of Anthony Davis and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist. Those two are throwback players that come to play every night and if you're going to beat them you damn well better bring your A+ game. I'd rank them maybe the two best ever to don a Kentucky jersey.
The flip side of Kentucky winning was the awkwardness of the trophy presentation involving a coach who has vacated two Final Four appearances and seasons. Calipari carries more baggage than Madonna. Even more disturbing was seeing all the starters going into the stands and hugging William Wesley, aka World Wide Wes, a guy probably #1 on the NCAA's most wanted list. I came across an interesting post about the one and done of college basketball. I'll let you guys make your own assumptions regarding its validity.
From someone connected...
I am writing this due to the number of posts that accuse several major programs of cheating and the follow up posts that ask why doesn't the NCAA do anything about it. First let me say, that I have coached at some of the biggest HS basketball camps in the country and I have family and friends at every level of basketball from NBA GM's to college coaches, high school coaches, agents themselves and journalists at ESPN.
What I am writing is not a guess of what's going on in college recruiting it is a fact. Several years ago cheating as a college coach meant your school was paying HS or Junior College players to sign with them. The going rate for top 20 talent was around 50k cash. Some schools like Missouri got caught and many others did not.
Things started to change when the NBA first made the rule allowing kids to be drafted straight out of HS. This rule gave agents an incentive to start cultivating relationships with HS players and coaches and "handlers". Once those relationships were made, agents became the power brokers of college basketball. However, this didn't really impact the game until the NBA once again changed the rules and stated that a player must at least wait one year after his class graduates to be drafted.
This rule meant that the agents had to find college coaches that would take the player's they had great relationships with and not try and turn the player's toward a competing agent while that player played for that coach. This is where I know every top ten program play's the game if you will. You do not get several McDonald all american's without understanding how this works.
Now here is where Coach Cal up's the ante. While many coaches will do what I mentioned above most will still try and keep the player's in college as long as possible or at least until the player is definitely ready for the next step. Coach Cal does the opposite and the agents love it. Coach Cal's message is you have one year here and then I am kicking you out. The agents love it, because they get the player back earlier which helps in two ways, the obvious one being agents make money when players sign contracts and two the shorter period of time a player is in college the less chance another agent will be able to sway them to their agency. The player's love it because they know starting spots will definitely open up for them and Coach Cal is going to give them heavy minutes and do all he can to push them to the NBA.
Added on top of this is the fact that it is UK and Coach Cal is considered by those of us in the game to be a good coach and there you go, UK get's just about any player they want.
Don't get me wrong, there are other coaches who agents believe do a good job preparing player's for the NBA, only most of them have a conscience and won't push a player out of the program whether they are ready or not. If you notice this year's UK team has a couple of sophomores, the main reason for that is the NBA lockout. Jones is definitely gone last year if it was a normal year and maybe even Lamb although occasionally agents will let Cal keep a player there if the player has a chance to move up from a second rounder or free agent to a first rounder because first round draft picks get guaranteed cash and second rounders most often do not. Player doesn't make money neither do the agents.
It should be noted not all agents play this game, however several of the biggest one's do and Coach Cal is tied in tight with them.
Now the question is, is this cheating or not, in many cases player's or their families or handler's get a line of credit ( there are many times the player doesn't even know about it)
to me this is obviously cheating by the agents, but where do the colleges come in. I can tell you the college coaches have nothing to do with the cash and don't want to know if a player received any benefits or not from the agent. Yes, they all bury their head in the sand. But before you crucify them realize they don't have much of a choice, they do not know who get's paid and who doesn't usually. They don't break any current rules, all they do is say to player's when they are ready to leave " ok you like Andy Miller ( NBA agent ) go for it, sign with him" and really don't get in the way.
Now, is their other types of cheating going on, a little bit not anything huge. Example might be Coach Cal allowing D. Rose's brother to ride to games on the team plane and stuff like that.
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My understanding is that he's down to Texas, and Alabama. This would be a monster pickup for Anthony Grant. Please pick us Mr D.