Petering out. Over the weekend, nothing much happened. We were already starting to get articles that contain no new NCAA-relevant information and don't stand up to even a cursory fact-check—see Friday's post on claims that TCU's brilliant scheme duped Michigan—and now, uh:

Multiple sources from one Big Ten school told SI that a coach at a different school called them before playing Michigan to warn them about Wolverines ball boys on their sideline listening to play calls and communicating information to the Michigan sideline—holding the football up in one hand to indicate an expected pass, and in the other hand to indicate a run, for instance. (Sources at the school that was warned said they experienced nothing in the game to implicate the Michigan ball boys.)

We're now at the stage where people will say crazy shit to anyone, and that person will just publish it. Sometimes it's without bothering to check the plausibility of such a thing (Dellenger), and sometimes you'll even get a denial and still say "let's do it and be legends," as above. As far as Dellenger goes, his latest is about OSU asking the CFP whether they can scout the other game and getting a "yes," which doesn't do anything but indicate where this is coming from.

Meanwhile, the ball boy claims are part of a Pat Forde article in which he exhorts people to do things they're not allowed to do by NCAA rule…

Harbaugh is almost certain to try to no-comment his way through the press conference Monday, citing the NCAA’s confidentiality dictates during an ongoing investigation. That’s fine. But it seems appropriate for athletic director Warde Manuel—or even president Santa Ono—to step to the lectern Monday and address this.

…and proposes that Michigan self-administer a punishment as a "rogue" program with a smarmy "Any interest in leading here, Michigan?" Yes, I have interest in leading this column into the garbage. The future is now, old man.

[After THE JUMP: the Harbaugh show cause threat]

The non-event. The one thing that tried to happen over the weekend was a Wall Street Journal article claiming that Jim Harbaugh's contract offer had been "rescinded," which is language that should immediately perk your ears up. It is true that Michigan had a contract offer on the table for Harbaugh, and almost certainly true that Jim Harbaugh cannot sign that contract at this instant. Characterizing that as "rescinded" is the way you might put it if you were a bitter old man with an axe to grind and some access to insider information. Plenty of those around  these days; some of them are even on the infractions committee.

If you were more even-handed you might characterize such an event as an "obviously mandatory delay," or some such. Webb/Bacon:

Already alluded to this in my tweet last night. But let me co-sign Bacs here by sharing what I reported on TMI last night -- I heard any suggestion that a deal was "rescinded" is categorically false. https://t.co/5wvYVfCie0

— Sam Webb (@SamWebb77) October 30, 2023

FWIW, this leak was characterized to us as "absolute bullshit."

Speaking of… not often you can put "dunked on by a regent" on the ol' poaster resume, so kudos to this guy:

Hi Buckeye Friend! Hard to do fake emergency meetings during my kids bath time! Can't wait to see you in a few weeks! https://t.co/ethu6FNYhX

— Jordan Acker (@JordanAckerMI) October 29, 2023

The strong impression we have gotten is that there is a 0% chance the University of Michigan self-imposes anything before the end of the 2023 season—they have not even gotten a notice of allegations or their 90-day window to respond—and would immediately head to the courts if any other entity attempted such a stunt.

Provenance. There's no question where this comes from: OSU insider Bill Greene was making dark allusions to it a month before it ever came out. Exactly how things came about and who was involved is an interesting question, because if there's one thing hiring a private investigator invites it's more private investigators. It is a reported fact that there's a firm running this; the main remaining question is how personally involved folks in the OSU program were.

Sam put up a post yesterday that collected the circumstantial evidence against OSU and then provided another couple potential connections before getting into the fact that Christopher Day is a PI in New Hampshire, where Ryan is from. This immediately started a game of paywall telephone that I tried to defuse:

Sam's post is losing contain quickly so let me just point out that he says that it's "unlikely that [Christopher Day] or his firm would’ve conducted this investigation," and everyone seems to think it says "Christopher Day conducted the investigation." https://t.co/sYOVcUBt3U

— mgoblog (@mgoblog) October 29, 2023

Unfortunately, OSU is much better at this than Michigan and is unlikely to have written Ryan Day's brother a big check with "Sign stealing! Go berks!" in the memo. There is not going to be the big reveal here; it'll remain speculation without proof. And even if there was a big reveal, the die is cast in re: NCAA.

It doesn't really matter who, except insofar as it proves Day is shook.

The big question. The NCAA changed their rules this offseason to make it harder for head coaches to dodge responsibility when their underlings break rules. The text of the change:

“NCAA Bylaw 11.1.1, “Head Coach Responsibility,” imposes a presumption of head coach accountability for impermissible acts committed by assistant coaches and administrators within their program.

Saying "I didn't know" is no longer good enough, and the punishment is now mitigatable but draconian:

If there is a Level I or II violation(s) in a sport program, the enforcement staff will charge a head coach responsibility violation at the same level as the underlying violation(s).

Connor Stalions is getting a billion-year show cause and without mitigation the NCAA can just slap that same penalty on Harbaugh. How do you mitigate?

…head coaches must rely upon a three-prong strategy: A demonstration that the coach adequately monitored the activities of employees under their supervision, actively engaged in rules education activities with employees under their supervision, and actively communicated compliance concerns and reported information that could constitute a NCAA compliance issue.

There are a bunch of individual bullet points that can be taken in a coach's favor ("Actively soliciting feedback to determine if compliance systems are functioning properly," etc.) that both links in this section list. The NCAA released a guideline about how they're going to enforce this rule:

First, enforcement will consider factors related to the coaches’ education, monitoring, and communication efforts in deciding whether an 11.1.1 violation exists, and the severity of the violation.

Second, the head coach will have the opportunity to present information to the Committee on Infractions panel demonstrating that the coach satisfied these three areas of obligations.

Finally, the Committee on Infractions Hearing Panel will consider NCAA enforcement’s allegation and the coach’s rebuttal in making its determination as to whether Bylaw 11.1.1 was violated and what the appropriate classification of the penalty should be.

Takeaway: Head coaches will need to commit significant time to not only engaging in the three areas of presumption rebuttal, but also documenting and filing those efforts. It is strongly encouraged that all Division I Head Coaches begin to coordinate the creation of a filing system documenting their efforts, if they have not already.

The bold is mine. That does not sound like an area of strength for an athletic department that's announcing Shemy Shembechler's hire before anyone did a cursory search for racist social media likes. Nor does it sound like something Jim Harbaugh is proactively going to do himself. It's the NCAA, where the rules are made up and don't matter, but in past cases that has leaned towards letting Kansas and Tennessee off. Whatever personal vendettas Jim Harbaugh has racked up in the last decade could be coming due, especially since he's coming off a three-game suspension for what looks like blowing off an NCAA investigation into some secondary violations.

This is new ground for the NCAA; Harbaugh will be the first head coach subject to this rule for a newsworthy scandal-type substance. I would not be surprised if they bomb him, personally, and leave the rest of the program more or less intact. That would take at least a year or two to process, but if Harbaugh gets any NFL offer with that hanging over his head he's going to take it.

About that. I'm not buying this:

The NFL is unlikely to make itself a safe harbor for Harbaugh to escape what could be substantial NCAA discipline, league sources say, raising the strong possibility Harbaugh would need to serve some or all of any possible suspension he could face in college if he returns to the pros.

There isn't a bylaw governing the matter. But sources pointed to former Ohio State head coach Jim Tressel as precedent for how the NFL and its teams could handle a college suspension of Harbaugh.

Jim Tressel didn't take a moribund 49ers team to three straight NFC championships. I have heard that all this has made him less attractive to the NFL because it's a reminder of all the Harbaugh Shit you have to put up with when you hire Harbaugh, but the Bears loom as the kind of franchise that's desperate enough to ignore all that.

On campus. There were various confused reports about the NCAA being on campus and meeting with unknown persons. FWIW, we believe they were on campus and met with Santa Ono primarily. (This section is speculative, no insider info present.)

How egregious can it be? Brian Kelly on the whole thing:

"…this isn't the first time we've heard of sign stealing," he said, "whether there is proposed sign stealing or people were buying tickets to other games. This is all part of why this should not even be part of the equation."

Kelly said the tangible effect of stealing signals is debatable. In 32 years of coaching, he said, he has never believed they lost a game because of it.

"I've never come back to the office and go, they got us," he added.

If this is such a tremendous advantage why would the NCAA go thirty years without implementing a quick fix? Why would football coaches—the most paranoid group of professionals anywhere on this earth—not go to un-hackable wristbands? The claims that this is the WORST SCANDAL EVER simply do not align with the behavior of anyone in the sport for the last three decades.

Etc.: Timothy, you gotta chill out about this. "Harbaugh had to know what Stalions had seen in Oxford. The world had to know."