Pulitzer Prize winner alleges OSU basketball recruiting violation
The allegation comes from George Dohrmann, currently of SI, who won a Pulitzer for breaking the Minnesota basketball academic scandal about 10 years ago. He says that Clark Kellog called a recruit and lobbied (unsuccessfully) on behalf of Ohio State.
I doubt anything comes of this, but it piqued my interest because he wonders if the local OSU media will make anything of the report.
Key portion:
Like UCLA, Ohio State also violated an NCAA rule pursuing Roberto: Former Ohio State player and CBS college basketball analyst Clark Kellogg called Bruce and lobbied on behalf of his alma mater. (As a former Ohio State player he was forbidden under NCAA guidelines from contacting recruits or their families.) “I heard that the missing piece to the puzzle was a kid in California,” Kellogg told Bruce.
http://georgedohrmann.com/blog/id/555/UCLA-and-Ohio-State-NCAA-Violations
October 7th, 2010 at 11:11 PM ^
I feel like Ohio State always admits they have recruiting violations (even football) like improperly reaching out to recruits... but nothing ever happens. Stretching however, they don't eff that up, so they're okay.
October 8th, 2010 at 8:32 AM ^
I have lived in Northern Ohio for the past 20+ years and I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt there is no way in HELL the Ohio media would go after OSU the way the Freep did Michigan. Say what you will about Ohio (and i do) they are loyal to their school and they do have the good sense God gave chickens to NOT attack something their readers hold dear. I cannot even begin to tell you how many times over the past year I've had people ask me why the Free Press went after Michigan. They are utterly baffled by it - not only because to their perspective it was much ado about nothing (remember - Tressell himself said every Big 10 school including Ohio State would be in violation of those same rules) but more importantly from a business perspective as well. Nobody here could figure out why a business (and newspapers are businesses after all) would want to deliberately antagonize 50% of their perspective customers.
So to answer your question....no...the local media here will not be picking up or doing anything with that story.
October 8th, 2010 at 8:41 AM ^
That was my exact thought process. Why alienate so many of your readers by attacking something as ridiculous as stretching.
Maybe they don't care if people read their paper...er...site?
October 7th, 2010 at 11:14 PM ^
Shouldn't he be down there right now uncovering these injustices?
October 8th, 2010 at 9:42 AM ^
It's inconceivable to me that this continues to make me giggle. But it does.
October 7th, 2010 at 11:45 PM ^
A KGB-Communist like feel when it comes to OSU athletics. Everything is taken care of internally and then magically disappears. It is always gray and colorless in Columbus, citizens running rampant, vodka-whiff, insult bearing drunkards acting as if you are under their martial law. Stadium is granite cold and if they wheeled Lenin's embalmbed body to dot the "i" then fans in front of you would give you a list (while shouting and using their fingers as if you cant follow along) of all the great things Lenin provided. So soon enough tOSU wil have their Afghanistan and Chernobyl and Mary Sue Coleman will then stand at her podium and pronounce Gordon Gee to "tear down this wall, and take off that damn bow-tie, you sissy".
October 7th, 2010 at 11:48 PM ^
I love this post more than I love taffy and I am a man who enjoys his taffy.
October 7th, 2010 at 11:54 PM ^
Yea, but they've apparently got a sweet pool:
Seriously, I've actually heard that they use this as a recruiting selling point...to football players, basketball players, runners, damn near everyone.
October 7th, 2010 at 11:57 PM ^
it is pretty sweet, plus a hot tub and two saunas right outside those doors.
October 8th, 2010 at 12:06 AM ^
About OSU, I wouldn't step foot in that hot tub for fear of contracting something. Things I'd rather do:
- Share a toothbrush with Paris Hilton.
- Dance up against any member form Jersey Shore.
- Drink from Ke$ha's whiskey bottle.
This has been another exciting edition of "What health inspector was high when he ok'ed a hot tub at OSU?".
October 8th, 2010 at 12:34 AM ^
If I could +1, I would
October 7th, 2010 at 11:53 PM ^
In the grand scheme of OSU recruiting dirt, that isn't so bad. Much worse is the paying, whether through intermediaries of directly, of recruits' representatives for access. It's common practice for top-20 level players to have friends or family members take small amounts of money for things like "taking a phone call", "reading a letter", "taking an in-home visit", etc.
My source on this is a member of a major D-I coaching staff that has had to deal with the $ requests and said "no" where schools like OSU say "sure". I don't have a second source, but I'm no journalist...so that's the best I've got. It's a shady business, as we all know.
October 8th, 2010 at 12:08 AM ^
If, as it appears, Clark Kellogg has admitted to engaging in conduct that constitutes a violation of NCAA rules, I wonder how CBS will respond. Can it continue to employ someone as a analyst when he has violated a rule governing the sport he analyzes?
I think this creates a difficult ethical dilemma for CBS. And probably a political one as well, considering that the NCAA is probably not too happy about having a rules violator participate in the showcasing of one of its products.
The worst thing about all of this would be if it resulted in the return of Billy Packer as a comentator. If so . . . god help us all.
October 8th, 2010 at 12:35 AM ^
that this sounds like a pretty tame accusation. I mean, does Clark effing Kellogg even have any cachet? Would a recruit care at all if Clark Kellogg called him?
But the real questions are seemingly never followed up on: Troy Smith takes money and his penalty is to miss a meaningless bowl game and that's it? TP shows up with a Corvette for his prom and no one even thinks something might be awry? Anything Clarett ever did? Why couldn't Rosenberg have gone to OSU?
October 8th, 2010 at 1:15 AM ^
That's what I like to hear.
October 8th, 2010 at 2:17 AM ^
Gus Johnson gets to call the Final 4. I know he's A play by play which is what nantz does. Hopefully CBS will consider improving their announcing quality.
October 8th, 2010 at 3:52 AM ^
This is exactly why the NCAA rules are completely F****d up....
“I heard that the missing piece to the puzzle was a kid in California,”
This is the type of thing that every former player, (from every school) might say to potential recruits.
The really stupid part to all of this is that I could see the NCAA slapping them on the wrist for it. They don't do anything about the Troy Smith stuff, TPryor stuff or Mo Clarette stuff but telling a kid he's the missing piece to the puzzle, that's crossing the line!
October 8th, 2010 at 7:09 AM ^
October 8th, 2010 at 5:53 AM ^
it will happen but maybe the NCAA will acctually look into this, and start digging around... people have assumed for years that thad is pretty shady when it comes to recruiting... for some reason i feel that OSU has an "Ed Martin" type person behind the scenes helping to sway players to OSU...
October 8th, 2010 at 7:45 AM ^
They had the balls to bring the uSC crap to light, why not tuos.
October 8th, 2010 at 8:12 AM ^
This should be a bigger deal but I figure it happens at most schools. Part of me thinks this needs to be addressed by the NCAA and really cracked down upon, but the other part remembers how many seemingly-shady actions do not constitute an NCAA violation that it seems useless to enforce a couple of minor ones over others. What does surprise me is that they used Clark Kellogg to talk to recruit, who I am fairly certain never knew Kellogg played for OSU considering they were born decades after his playing days. Maybe OSU figured that after everyone saw Oden's dong, recruits would be too intimidated to speak wth him. Isn't Scoonie Penn available?
October 8th, 2010 at 9:36 AM ^
Even OSU soccer players are punks...