The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
RICK PITINO PUT ON UNPAID LEAVE
Pitino’s exit is first sign that bad situation will get much worse.
The rst sentence of Rick Pitino’s Wikipedia pag and hi is bio tha has undergone man revisions go rewrite Wednesday. He’s no longe the coach wh wa fastes and rst to gras the powe of the 3-point shot He’s no longer the man wh lifted Kentucky from purgatory He’s no longe the onl gu to have wo national championships at sep arat schools.
Yes, he’ technicall still all of the above but tha won’ be the rst thing we think about when we think about Rick Pitino He will come to be known as the rst giant to fall in an investigation tha could well turn college basketball inside out. We see already the speed hich thi raveling: Within 24 hours of sober ing news conference in Man
hattan, Pitino Hall of Fame coach at one of the nation’s half-dozen biggest basketball schools ha been placed on unpaid leave, dismissal soon to come.
Louisville kept Pitino after the seam Se in Restaurant case. It stuck with him after the even mor sordid Strippers in the Dorm air But after see ing its name actuall code name, “University-6” in the feds’ nding the school tha would put up with anything gave Slick Rick the gate
Louisville, see, is terr ed. d. Thi isn’ the toothless/clue less NCAA doing the sleuthing Thi is the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’ ce. These folks have subpoena power. These folks ca put people in jail. These folks have the where-
withal to fund electronic surveillance and confidential informants and undercover operatives, all of which were used to make this case.
The feds could pick Louisville clean and leave the buzzard NCAA to pile on — and Louisville already is on probation, which means one of the sport’s tent poles could be eligible for the death penalty.
But it’s not just Louisville that’s shaking in its, er, sneakers. It’s all of college basketball. We’ve known for years that apparel companies, via the tax-exempt AAU, hold inordinate sway over recruits. The feds just illustrated how this actually works. It alleges that the family of Brian Bowen, a recruit from Michigan, was paid $100,000 by Adidas to direct him to Louisville, an Adidas school, and then to cast his lot with the company as a professional.
Shoe companies fund AAU teams, same as they outfit college programs. A couple of years ago, Pitino spoke — prescient, he was — of how ridiculous it was to be told he couldn’t recruit a player on “the Nike circuit” because Louisville was contracted to Adidas. And it does sound silly. But it’s the way of the basketball world.
As ESPN’s erudite Bob Ley said on “Outside The Lines,” the shoe companies are investing in “a futures market.” They’re all looking for the Next Michael, the original having made Nike a global colossus, or the New Steph, whose switch from Nike to Under Armour turned an earnest striver into a major player.
Four college assistant coaches — Auburn’s Chuck Person among them — were arrested Tuesday on charges of fraud and corruption. (The other three work at Oklahoma State, USC and Arizona.) The feds allege that these coaches took money from agents, investment companies and shoe companies to steer players their way. Three men associated with Adidas, the head of global marketing included, also were arrested. The worst the NCAA can do is hit you with a show-cause sanction; the feds can lock you up.
The feds can go — heck, have already been — where the NCAA could not. The feds can nail you for wire fraud. The feds can make you sorry you were born, and if you’re sorry enough, you might be inclined to turn state’s evidence, which takes us deeper into the mire. This will sound like hyperbole, but it probably isn’t: When the feds get done, college basketball as we know it might cease to exist, which mightn’t be a bad thing.
Louisville just signed a 10-year extension with Adidas — for $160 million. The Courier-Journal reports that Athletic Director Tom Jurich’s daughter recently took a job as an Adidas brand manager. In other news, Jurich was placed on paid leave Wednesday pending certain dismissal. He’s the man who brought Pitino to Louisville, and he goes out having reaped the rewards but ultimately the whirlwind.
As we speak, every president is asking every AD to ask every basketball coach, “Could we be in trouble with this?” Because every school has a shoe contract, and every coach wants the best players, and every good player has an AAU (and therefore a shoe company) connection.
The stewards of Georgia Tech are surely wondering about the wisdom of signing with Adidas. There’s not a major university with a gym that isn’t treading lightly today.
Sometimes we hear of an NCAA investigation and proclaim doom for a program — think Miami in the Nevin Shapiro case — but doomsday never comes.
We say again: This isn’t the NCAA. These are the feds. It takes Mark Emmert a week to form a coherent thought. It took less than a day after acting U.S. Attorney Joon H. Kim stepped to the microphone for a Hall of Fame coach to be toppled. (Who knew the feds work faster than FedEx?)
I’d like to tell you I know where all this will lead, but there’s really no knowing. I suspect it will be nowhere pleasant. I’m reasonably certain Pitino and Jurich won’t be the last casualties.
If even half of what has been whispered about college basketball is brought to light, the NCAA Tournament committee won’t have to worry about choosing a field of 68. There mightn’t be more than a dozen teams still eligible.