The Blue Board

The argument that any school is "signing more kids" is intellectually dishonest unless you can show that said school is punting guys off scholarship for no reason at a high rate.

That's my particular point with all of this. If there are so many guys getting das boot- show them to me!

My guess is, though, that non-qualifiers, transfers and normal attrition make up the bulk of the open roster spaces.

Someone who really wants to get after schools for oversigning needs to prove it.

So you think Georgia Tech head coach Paul Johnson, Georgia head coach Mark Richt,
and U. of Florida President Bernard Machen are being "intellectually dishonest"
when they speak out against over-signing. Wow, interesting.

From the website Oversigning.com
============================
GaTech head coach Paul Johnson said, "I don’t see how you can do that to kids, weed out guys for whatever reasons. No matter what anybody says, if you’re oversigning, some of that has to happen on occasion.”

That last sentence is pretty damning coming from a coach.
When asked whether or not teams who practice oversigning gain a competitive advantage, Johnson replied:

"Sure they do,” he told the newspaper. “It’s just like you take 25 kids every year and then cut the ones you don’t want. “You do the math. You have 85 scholarships. If you’re signing 28 every year for four years, instead of 85, you have 112. It doesn’t add up. So something is happening to those guys along the way. It just doesn’t add up. You’re losing them left or right academically or for whatever reasons.”
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Georgia coach Mark Richt addressing the over-signing issue

“I think that’s an awful thing to do, I think that’s the wrong thing to do. And it’s nothing that we’ve done since I’ve been at Georgia.“ “These other coaches have been over-signing, trying to grayshirt, trying to make sure they never come up short of that 85 (scholarship limit) number. But in doing so, have they done it in an ethical way, which is what you’re asking. And I’d say not. That’s why the NCAA is trying to change its rules."
=========================================================================

From Sports Illustrated.Com-
Authored by Florida President Bernard Machen

The universities, with full knowledge of what they are doing, extend more athletic scholarships than they have. These schools play roulette with the lives of talented young people. If they run out of scholarships, too bad. The letter-of-intent signed by the university the previous February is voided. Technically, it's legal to do this. Morally, it is reprehensible.

Associated with "grayshirting" -- and equally disgusting -- is the nefarious practice of prematurely ending student-athletes' scholarships. Some are just not renewed even though the student-athlete is doing what is asked of him.
Some students are mysteriously given a "medical exemption" which ends their athletic careers -- and makes another scholarship available for the football coach to hand out.
==================================================

Doesn't sound like a Red Herring to me. Sounds like proof of a deceitful practice implemented by most SEC and Big 12 coaches to gain an advantage through a loophole at the expense of these recruits who could have signed with other schools without risking having heir 'ship not renewed, or being forced to transfer or to take a medical hardship.

I'll use the numbers from oversigning.com from 2002-2010 ( 9 years)
Schools that followed the intention of the rules and brought in an average that put them
right around the scholarship limit of 85 total every 4 year cycle were USC, Stanford, Texas,
Notre Dame, Ohio State, Ga Tech, Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, etc. had a 9 year total of
around 190 recruits signed. = 21.1 signed per year.

85 total ships divided by 4 yrs = 21.25 per year.
So using USC as the example, since they signed exactly 190 players during those 9 years,
that means that SC signed the maximum amount (190) without going over.

These schools below all oversigned by an avg of at least 3.3 to 7.0 recruits per year.
From the highest -Auburn's 28.1 per year to 24.5 per year
(so 4 year cycles would equal 98-112 total recruits).

Recruits signed (2002-2010)
Auburn 253.......+63 oversigned above 190
Miss State 247..+57
Iowa State 243
South Car 242..+52
Arkansas 239
Kansas St 238
Ole Miss 237
Alabama 235...+45
W.Virginia 235
Oregon St 235
Oklahoma St 232
Louisville 231.....+40
Kentucky 226
N. Carolina 225..+35
LSU 224
Arizona 224
S. Florida 223
Tex Tech 222
Baylor 221........+31
=================
Examples of teams who didn't oversign

Texas 192
Vanderbilt 191
USC 190
Notre Dame 180
Ohio State 180
Ga Tech 177
Stanford 170

So for 9 consecutive years Auburn brought in 7 more recruits on avg every year and
Alabama 5 on avg every year more than the teams above that adhered to the scholarship limits,
which equals an extra "recruiting class" of about 20-28 recruits every 4 year cycle.

When even this "extra class" thing didn't work for the south and USC was kicking that SEC/BCS ass,
they tried it the other way and took away a class of 30 from USC over 3 years. So that's how the Nzaa
levels the playing field.

Good...good....

Those are the exact numbers. Feel free to view our signing classes from '10-'11, current roster, and google the names not on there. Mine is 100% correct.

Oversigning.com!!! seriously gtfo with that ish.

Something like 12 medical hardships since 2008, some of those guys said they pretty much had no choice but to accept the medical. 12 medicals? That's about the same amount of medicals as the entire rest of the conference.

Saban being unwilling to to tell people who his scholarship players are so that it is harder to track his cheating.

All very shady stuff especially when Saban says to reporters, "You guys don't need to know. The fans don't need to know about this stuff."

Its funny that your numbers are 100% when Saban has refused over the
years to give out any info and then he
says "you guys dont have all the facts and info to criticize how we manage our numbers".

That's doubletalk when you don't give out info on the numbers. Even if your numbers are right you still prove what I'm saying as Bama oversigned by about 20 players after signing 103 in 4 years.

I can understand why you are so upset about this stuff, the more people talk about this dirty little secret, the more it becomes evident that soon they will have to change the rule because of the negative media backlash.

Without his extra 25 players used to upgrade the roster, what will Slick Nick do, demand that Bama starts every game with a 10 pt lead?

Again where is the proof that those 12 players had no choice? Also, you are a USC fan. Jarvis Jones and the Armstead kid have a choice to play at USC?

See that's a medical issue.

Name the players, provide proof. I'm with you on the issue if there is, but you know what? I haven't seen any.

One more thing your entire argument became nothing more than silly fan butt hurt when you tried to claim "the man" was out to bring down USC because they were winning big.

The NCAA went overboard on you because your then-AD acted like a smug moron and it pissed the rent-a-cops off. You were only going to have to give the rip-off cologne or fake poo from Spencer back and apologize, but Mike Garrett laughed at the mall cop so your banned from the Galleria for a year and spent two nights in jail!

That's one way to look at it too. The issue with just having that as a policy is that coaches could cut guys that are doing fine and replacing them with roster upgrades like the pros. It violates the spirit of amateurism in college football.

First, thanks JC for the responses, I appreciate the dialogue on this topic, especially since I wasn't sure
if you would want to talk about this issue or even be allowed to talk about this issue in much detail.

One aspect of college football I hadn't taken a close look at until recently was the practice of
oversigning. I had heard of it, but just figured it was just a few here and there.
So I was blown away when I saw how much oversigning was really taking place, especially in the SEC
and the Big12. I should have known there was another big factor besides just the % of home games, the
unbalanced conference schedule, and the ability to control the components of the BCS standings
that were driving a lot of the SEC success.

I'm glad you pointed out "Looks like, and probably told" because I choose those words since I can't say
for sure if some or all of these players were forced to transfer or take a medical hardship, but that's
not the core issue here. The core issue is that when a coach decides to bring in recruits that will put his team
over the limit of 85, that coached just forced a certain number of players off his roster and off scholarship.

You wrote -
[None of those folks you just mentioned can provide any specific names of student athletes that
have been run off]

*That info was provided to show that this is an issue that other southern schools are talking about.
It's a growing conflict within the SEC. Several coaches from big time programs including the ones at Georgia and Georgia Tech, plus the President from the U. of Florida are all on record speaking out against the unethical situations that oversigning creates and the competitive advantages that it yields.

For you to continue to pretend like this is some kind of boogie man and its existence hasn't yet been
proven leads me to 1 of 2 conclusions; either the minister of defense from Baghdad has hacked
your account, or we both have a vastly different definitions of what oversigning is.

But let's not be ridiculous here and act like this hasn't been happening, not only the last decade, but for a very long time in SEC territory. It's history repeating itself, just instead of Ga Tech and Bobby Dodd leaving the SEC because they couldn't get Bear Bryant and others to join him in doing the right thing, it's Richt and Johnson taking an opposing stance to the way that Saban, Spurrier, and others have been manipulating scholarship numbers.

You wrote
[ The math supports that there is attrition on rosters and that players aren't completing their eligibility.
Where is the proof guys are getting cut? ]

*Of course there is attrition with grades, suspensions, leaving for the NFL early, and all that.
Yet when you know you have 66 scholarship players returning and you enroll 29 more, you created
the situation, and now 10 of those 95 scholarship players somehow have to leave the program.
(i.e. cut from the roster by transfer, medical, non-renewal, etc).

Your example about Georgia bringing in a bunch of players next year making the math support my
argument would only be true if I didn't know how to apply the math. But I know how to apply the math.
An average of about 21 per year puts you at 85. But Georgia could sign 32 next year and it wouldn't automatically mean they oversigned, it they have only 53 scholarship players returning then that high number is fine, they would just need to have some early enrollees. It's all relative to how many scholarship players are returning and how many you sign over a 4 year period. It can't be based off just 1 year.

There are many ways to trim your roster down after oversigning, some legit, some not so legit. You would have to have your head in the sand not to see that Saban has been improperly over using the medical hardship. When a conference has a total of 25 medical hardships, and Saban has 12 of them during that time, it's foolish to think
they are all legit.

I'm not sure why you bring up Jarvis Jones and Armstead at USC, and are trying to compare their medical situations to the guys Saban has steered into medical hardships in order to get under the 85 limit. I'm sure you have seen the WSJ article where a couple of Alabama players say they felt forced into taking the medical hardship and they knew it was because the coaches wanted to free up that scholarship for other players. Or are we gonna act like that didn't happen either.

What really is intellectually dishonest is if Saban doesn't tell his recruits this - ( I've signed an average 26-27 recruits per class, and over 4 years that makes around 106-108, but I can only have 85 scholarship players on the roster. That means there is about a 20% chance that you will lose you scholarship and not finish your career here. Do you really think he tells them that, when he won't even share which players on his team are on scholarship.

Unfortunately, that was a big swing and a miss on the Ncaa analogy. Saying Garrett's smugness was the reason
for being hit that hard is just as comical as when people say SC didn't coperate with the Ncaa. And I certainly wouldn't call the Ncaa the man, suit wearing ku klux klan is more appropriate for that disease of an association.

If you want a good look into the cesspool of corruption and selective enforcement that is the Ncaa, just read the report from the most recent South Carolina major infraction case. You talk about a school in bed with ncaa enforcement, the stuff that went on at South Carolina, just take any of USC's violations and triple it and you'll have the level of cheating and rule breaking that went unpunished.

They most comical part is that Spurrier had 10 Reggie Bush's on his team and they passed it off as
impermissible loans. Hilarious. They should of been banned from bowl games for 3 years for all the cheating going on South Carolina. .

Thanks for the insults and the name calling, you added absolutely nothing to the conversation except your constant obsession with mentioning being butthurt. But since you are so 100% accurate superstar, why don't you make yourself useful this time and list the 85 scholarship players on Alabama's roster this year and last year, since apparently you are the only one with this insider info.

Then you can spend the rest of your day doing what you love
which is wearing your clothes backwards while watching Kriss Kross videos
and telling yourself to jump.

All that talk about how you had all the 100% accurate info on Saban's numbers and when you get called on it you produce squat. Thought you had some juice hot shot. Typical fail. You gotta be the dumbest most fackin pathetic loser in your entire trailer park.

Pretty comical stuff coming from an SC fan. Isn't SC in the practice of gray shirting kids these days?

That's the one.