re: ESPN Finally Questioning Accuracy of SI OSU Story

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We can look at the physical and documentary evidence the two reporters have both dug up. Now, it is a little unfair for ESPN, seeing as they've only has one day and SI had 10 months, but seeing as SI has ZERO documentary evidence to support their claims, maybe its not that unfair.

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Charles Robinson is clearly much better than Thayer Evans, and I don't think the SI story on OK State is really a big deal, but this isn't fair. The vast majority of sports scandals do not have huge paper trails because it is in everyone's incentive to have the paper trail as obscure/minimal as possible.

For me, the biggest thing about the OK State story is that none of the allegations are that shocking.

Here's what htey have so far:

1) Some players smoke weed, maybe half the team, maybe a little less. A much smaller number do coke or codeine-based cough syrup. One guy sells meth to non-football players.

2) One player receives about $20,000 from boosters, several get 5 to 10 grand, several dozen get between $500 and 5 grand. This includes envelopes of cash, a bounty from an assistant, and no-show jobs.

3) A bunch of guys with 2.5 gpas from shitty urban and rural high schools and 820 SAT scores can't do real college work. Their advisers stick them in classes that won't help them graduate or pick up real skills, but will help them maintain eligibility for 7 semesters with a 2.0 gpa. Some of the guys are too lazy and/or stupid for this to work, so there is a librarian and several tutors who do the work for them. Four or five guys are functionally illiterate. One can't spell the word house.

4) There is an inconsistent drug policy. Stars are able to use a loophole where they do some bullshite counseling, and as long as they are in the program, the tests don't really count. When injured players or back-ups fail tests, coaches follow protocol and suspend the guys and dismiss him from the team.

And these are the two final things, it seems like:

5) Some of the hostesses who recruit top players are jersey chasers and sleep with recruits and/or star players.

6) Many of the guys finish their 4 years at OK State with very few marketable skills or a degree and end up back in their shitty small towns or inner cities.

With the exception of the drug counseling program, which exploits the hell out of some loopholes, the coach running a small bounty system, and the guy who can't spell house, I would venture that all of those things happen at 85% of D-1 campuses, including every single major SEC campus.

The most shocking thing about the report is how unshocking it is. SI is trapped in 1994, and the stuff Thayer Evans wrote is not going to have the public up in arms. I do expect OK State to lose a few scholarships from this, but it won't be anything they can't handle.