Joel Hammond examines why the almighty dollar was more important than improper recruiting actions in the Colorado football program.
By Joel Hammond
210 west Writer [send email]
Three facets of big-time collegiate athletics became painfully evident throughout the entire four-month scandal at Colorado that supposedly would rock the college football world and bring about wholesale changes to the way the business is conducted.
Those facets, in no particular order:
1. Money always wins.
2. Football, as the prime money-maker for an institution like the University of Colorado, always wins.
3. Money always wins.
Have no fear, the UC board of regents and administration still vow that the recruiting of the Buffaloes football program will be entirely different the next time around, with monitored trips by numerous administrators, curfews, no alcohol, etc. You know, the whole she-bang. The proverbial whole kit-n-kaboodle.
If they only knew the half of it.
The changes that will have manifested themselves upon the Buffaloes’ football program will be painfully evident the next time reinstated coach Gary Barnett and his flunkies go on a recruiting trip to Joe Stud’s house.
You see, Joe Stud is a quiet kid, with quiet parents, from a quiet town, and just happens to be the best damn running back in all the land. Joe’s parents, Bobby and Kathy Stud, have heard all about this coach Barnett’s troubles, and are wondering why he wasted a trip to their quiet town and their quiet house.
Joe Stud’s off to Austin, or Lincoln, or Stillwater, or Norman. Any Big XII school not fully entrenched in the biggest scandal this side of BALCO.
Recruits win games. Winning games puts butts in the seats. Butts in the seats equal cash.
Say it with me now: Money always wins.
You see, when the recruiting practices that take place when mom and pop aren’t around aren’t known by the public, it’s easy to lie to the face of said mom and pop.
But now, they are very public, and painfully well-documented: At Colorado there were alleged rapes. There was alcohol. Sex was used as a selling point of the university.
For all anyone knows, this practice has gone on around the country at major and perhaps even mid-major programs for years. Hell, it may continue to go on at the institutions that weren’t caught.
But the widest-known fact about college football, basketball, hockey and even baseball is that money is running rampant, and with state-wide budget cuts for higher education happening not only in my old stomping grounds in Ohio but in Colorado as well, everyone is clamping down and trying to get a piece of the pie.
Colorado insiders are saying that the school could simply not afford to fire Barnett and pay him his contract, of which there is reportedly upwards of $4 million remaining with bonuses.
I say the school could not afford not to pay him his money and tell him to get the hell out.
Money always wins.
Colorado will be at the bottom of the Big XII and likely descending rapidly upon the bottom of the 117 teams that play Division I college football in no time.
Kids want to play football, parents want the best for their kids. When the violations and troubles are known, parents will not buy the load of garbage Mr. Barnett and coaches like him will attempt to sell them on their recruiting trips.
The best for Joe Stud, is not at a school where he will be embroiled in rape allegations by a coach who simply “was not aware” of what was going on.
Yikes. I have a feeling a lot of parents may feel the same about sending their Joe Stud somewhere were the coach is oblivious toward their son’s action.