The UNC Tar Heels Committed Criminal Fraud And Got Away With It; Roy Williams Laughs At The NCAA

We told you last March, and we told you again this March. You were warned that this was going to happen, and we laid bare exactly what the double standard is.

To the surprise of absolutely nobody that follows college athletics, the North Carolina Tar Heels academic fraud investigation wrapped up, and the NCAA declined to punish them:

Are you surprised? You shouldn’t be. Did you think we were simply too cynical when we said that because the investigation involved North Carolina, it didn’t matter that their academic fraud was so wide in scope as to involve thousands of students and ran so deep that it led to a review of their accreditation? Well, now the NCAA has spelled it out for you. If you’re in the club, go nuts. If you’re not in the club, watch your ass with those impermissible benefits.

Things that are permissible according to the NCAA:

• Setting up fake majors and curriculum, or otherwise having academic advisors complete your papers, as long as you do it at a blue blood school. The UNC violations were so rampant that they were put on probation and almost lost their academic accredidation, but the NCAA thinks that’s ok!
• Procuring hookers, again as long as you’re at a blue blood school and claim you had no idea! Probation, who cares right?
• Hookers AND blow, once again, so long as you have a history of appearing in the biggest TV events, and hey, they’re just respecting local culture right?
• Covering up felonies that reflect poorly on your program so long as that program has a championship pedigree.

Things that are not permissible according to the NCAA:

• Running your own YouTube channel with your own highlights on it because that ad money is definitely a benefit you shouldn’t receive. SUSPENDED INDEFINITELY
• Taking a kid out to lunch when they aren’t on an official visit BECAUSE THAT $10 MEANS THEY CAN’T PLAY FOREVER NOW.
• Giving kids a ride in a golf cart (late 80s), because that deserves the TV death penalty for a year.
• Practicing too long over the summer because if you do that you definitely need to reduce your practice time in the future and reduce your scholarships to make up for it.
• Compliance Department error the player had nothing to do with? Suspend them for a year.

The NCAA is a sham and should just be shut down as we know it. They claim to stand up for the student athlete, ensuring that athletes are students first and they care more about that aspect than anything else. Today is the latest blow in that stature as the NCAA is openly turning their heads to multiple, rampant violations at UNC that almost resulted in the school losing its ability to issue degrees. Yes, you heard that correctly: In the era where places like Phoenix University Online exist and can hand out college degrees, UNC almost lost the ability to do that due to their violations concerning athletes at the school. The NCAA apparently doesn’t care as long as you’re a blue blood and raking in the cash. I don’t even know where to begin. This should open eyes to authorities that allow this organization to exist and “police” athletes at Universities across the nation because it needs to be completely reformed or dissolved. It has reached the point of no return in effecting change at any institution where athletics reign supreme.

Look, we all understand that the model of the amateur student athlete is kind of a sham that funnels the profits generated by the labor of unpaid college students towards executives and administrators. But this kind of shit is making it worse by assuring those who stand to gain those profits that the NCAA won’t punish the cash cows. This is an incentive for pushing the envelope of the current system and making sure it never changes. Why should it change if the traditional nobility has carte blanche to do whatever they want?

When it comes to the college athletics machine, and especially the capricious hand of the NCAA, no amount of cynicism is too much.