If past discussions on Cam are any indication, some of you have a very difficult time differentiating "rules" from "loopholes". Don't worry, even the venerable Dr. Saturday has trouble with the concept, but to help you out, let me first show an example of something that's not a loophole:

It is legal to drive 54MPH and be in the process of accelerating in a 55MPH zone.

That's not a loophole. So what does a loophole look like? It looks like this:

Traffic citations show that Ohio State quarterback Terrelle Pryor has been stopped three times in three years while driving cars owned by a Columbus used-car lot or an employee there, though an OSU compliance official said the school was aware of two of those instances and determined that nothing improper had occurred. . . . Pryor and the employee, Aaron Kniffin, both told the Columbus Dispatch that Kniffin had allowed Pryor (then a true freshman) to drive Kniffin's 2004 GMC Denali to his home in Pennsylvania with the prospect of buying it.

NCAA Bylaws forbid providing benefits to student athletes that are not available to similarly situated non-athletes. That is to say that the benefits they receive must not be made on the basis of the their athletic ability. The Bryant Scholarship is a good example of this principle: It's allowed, and not counted against our limits until the player actually plays, because the eligibility for the scholarship is not athletically based, but based on heritage and lineage.  

We certainly don't have any evidence one way or the other, but what are the odds that Kniffin is going to let some random student who isn't a famous athlete test drive a 4-year-old Denali? I realize this isn't an unheard of practice, especially for used cars, but how many previous examples of that are there of someone who is in Pryor's financial situation, but not an NCAA star, got to borrow a car for a weekend? Pryor was supposedly test driving and considering purchasing it.

Did he provide some sort of collateral to borrow the car, or was it assumed he wouldn't run off with it because he's a famous athlete?

I have a guess that if I wandered down to the local Porsche dealer, they're not going to let me take a sports car on a weekend trip, used or not, and I make considerably more than Pryor supposedly did. Why? Because I probably can't afford to actually buy it. Could pryor have afforded to buy the car? (Relevant data point: he was one of the guys supposedly selling merchandise for needed spending money)

Now, this isn't an NCAA decision -- it's just OSU Compliance's determination -- but this is the situation where "loophole" potential exists. The rule is that players shouldn't get extra benefits just for being athletes -- lacking a standard for how to determine if this is a common practice for the dealership for non-athletes invites far more abuse than saying a player's dad can solicit money that he will never receive from a school at which his son will never play without ever telling his son. 

If I had a way to turn comments criticizing our play-calling into nickels, I'd never have to work again. 

My glib comment that folks who believe that should send in their resumes is a soundbite version of this:

Insomuch as those comments are just venting frustration, fine, but I'm starting to think that some of you actually believe you've discovered the secret to our problems this year, and it's that the coaches just aren't calling the right plays. If you're in that camp, take a moment to consider how patently stupid that is. 

First: Understand that even with a perfectly called game, and every player executing to the best of their ability, we will not (and cannot) win every game. "No shit," you're saying, "of course we can't, every idiot knows that." Good -- we're on the same page. The natural result of this axiom is that losing does not mean something is wrong with execution or coaching. Sometimes we're just not the better team.

Second: The coaches are human. They make mistakes. So do the players. That's going to happen. Odds are that our coaches realize when they've made a mistake. That doesn't mean that every play that has a negative outcome is a mistake. Outcome bias plays in here prominently. For example, if it's 3rd and 8, and a team runs a draw for a first down, we certainly could have stopped that by putting eight in the box and throwing run blitzes at them... and if the quarterback doesn't see what's going on, it might even work. That doesn't mean that's the best decision. In situations like this, outcome bias goes hand-in-hand with hindsight bias -- you KNEW they were going to run up the middle on us, right? Wrong. Odds are you had no idea what they were going to do, and you assumed they'd run some sort of pass.

Third: The game is infinitely more complicated than "lol runs up the middle don't work, we should run outside." Our coordinators have to consider a huge number of factors. Confidence in each of our players. The per-player match-ups that a prospective play would produce. The down and distance, the time left in the game, the timeout situation, and the score. How running the play will impact the meta-game that the coaches play against each other. How well have we setup the play we're thinking about -- is it going to be completely transparent when we run it? Have the other team's players been out of position? Do we think we see a hole or gap somewhere?

Coaches do make mistakes, but in the final calculus, we just don't have enough information to say with any degree of certainty whether a play call was a good one or not. If you really understand how complex the game is, your first reaction is probably going to be "I wonder why they ran that play?" not "What effing idiots, we should have run a different play!" 

"But Pete," I'm sure some of you are starting to think, "this isn't about one play, it's about the crappy play-calling all season!"

To which I respond: that's even less likely than one play being bad. 

Consider this: we pay Coach Saban more than four million dollars a year because he's a damn football genius. He chose coordinators that won us a national championship and are, in their own right, football geniuses. You think it's obvious that we should be doing more of one thing and less of another? And your suggestion is that this group of geniuses is missing something that obvious? Do you really think that's more likely than you, Joe Schmoe Internet Quarterback, missing something? No, of course not. In fact, when it comes to things you don't have much experience with, the more simple and obvious you think the thing is that the pros are missing, the more likely it is that you're just out of your depth. It's an obvious instance of the Dunning-Kruger effect, as a lay-person you interpret it to be more simple than it really is.

So, if you're in this camp -- that the play-calling is so obviously broken and easy to fix -- well . . . you know the type of environut who says things like "Obviously all we need to do is just stop using oil and use solar power instead! Simple!" You know the type?

Yeah... you're that guy. Congrats.

I'm sure many of you had discussions with folks after last week's games, who believed that Boise's close win over Virginia Tech was indicative of one really good team beating another really good team. What it was, in fact, was a Boise team of unknown quality beating a team that would go on to lose to James Madison University (A FCS school). 

Like last week, Alabama's schedule makes Boise's look like a walk in the park, but it's funny to see the matchups, so here's the current list.

1. Florida (#4) -- Fresno State (#24)
2. LSU (#5) -- Oregon State (#26)
3. South Carolina (#7) -- Nevada (#37)
4. Auburn (#33) -- Virginia Tech (#38)
5. Arkansas (#34) -- Idaho (#71)
6. Penn State (#35) -- Hawaii (#81)
7. Mississippi State (#36) -- Utah State (#85)
8. Tennessee (#53) -- Wyoming (#105)
9. Duke (#75) -- Louisiana Tech (#114)
10. Ole Miss (#78) -- San Jose State (#115)
11. San Jose State (#115) -- Toledo (#130)
12. Georgia State (#244) -- New Mexico State (#166)

As you can see, our opponent ranking order is starting to look a bit more realistic, and will continue to do so for the remainder of the season. Penn State took a big dive after the loss, as you might have expected, as did Tennessee. 

Here are the stats:

• Average Opponent: 59.92 (Bama) -- 82.67 (BS)
• Median / Tr. Mean: 35.5 (Bama) -- 83 (BS)

Our average opponent moved up a few spots while we lost a spot in the median. Boise's average opponent slipped a few spots, but lost more than 20 points in the median. Essentially that means that Boise's top couple of teams is keeping their average up, but Sagarin's estimation of the middle of the pack for Boise's opponents is pretty dismal.

That's obvious, too, if you just look at the precipitous drop from Virginia Tech to Idaho. Also note that Virginia Tech hasn't felt the brunt of the hit to their Sagarin rating yet, as JMU is actually 2-0 and, in this week's Sagarin ranked 58th on the basis of two wins, with one of them over Virginia Tech. Once the initial rankings stop playing in, I'd expect Virginia Tech to drop even farther, unless they can get some quality wins in the mean time, or JMU doesn't lose.

Just to re-state the point: we all knew the difference would be laughable -- the post is here just so we can all actually get a good laugh out of it.

What we can do, however, is thank JMU. They just made Boise's task of jumping a one-loss team in the computer rankings really, really difficult.

I spent some time yesterday chatting with some UGA fans on various sites about Marcell Dareus and A.J. Green. Like many college football fans who have had something taken from them that they felt entitled to, they were bewildered and extremely critical of the NCAA's decision and many of them were outspoken about how they just couldn't figure out how Dareus only got two games while Green got four. I thought I'd provide a helpful summary of the key differences between the two.

First, some assumptions. I am going to assume, for the sake of argument, that absent evidence to the contrary, in every situation Dareus and Green are upstanding and ideal student athletes. I am going to assume that Green had no idea that the guy he sold his jersey to was an agent. I'm going to assume that Dareus didn't know money was flowing from agents through Austin.

Basically I'm going to give both of them as big a benefit of the doubt as the facts will allow.

Also, recognize that both of them, by rule, started at four game suspensions before the NCAA considered mitigating factors. So the question isn't "should it be four games", as that part is decided by rule, the question is "is there any reason to reduce it from four games?"

Now, for the facts. 

Dollar Value and Repayment

The NCAA determined that the dollar value attached to Dareus's infraction was $1,700 and some change. Green sold his jersey somewhere in the immediate vicinity of $1,000. This might seem like it weighs in favor of Green, and to some small degree it does, but once the dollar amount gets over $500, it's all "big" to the NCAA. An absurdly large benefit might lead to increased sanctions (or, in the case of agent interactions, the complete loss of eligibility), but the difference between $1,000 and $1,700 is probably negligible in terms of penalty. They both fall into the > $500 category.

I've seen a number of folks cite Green's repayment as a mitigating factor. The simple fact is that both athletes repaid their benefits, but it's important to note that they were required to make that repayment inorder to gain eligibility back, that wasn't something either of them did to "do the right thing", it was required by the NCAA.

Intent and Knowedge

We've already stipulated that Green didn't know the buyer was an agent. However, he knew (or should have known) that the sale was impermissible without regard for the status of the buyer as an agent or booster. For us to assume that he was never told that this sort of thing is not allowed would be assume that UGA's compliance staff failed to inform one of the biggest stars on the roster about a rule that was enacted after (and likely because of) the 2002 situation where UGA players were selling their SEC Championship Game rings. Not telling your team about that, itself, would probably set off all sorts of alarm bells in Indianapolis, and would seem to me, as an outsider, as complete inexcusable, so I'm skeptical that Green wasn't filled in. More likely is the fact that this has been harped on every year, and probably reiterated before and after the bowl game if UGA Compliance is even marginally paranoid. No, Green didn't know he was selling to an agent, but he should have known that selling the jersey was against the rules, regardless.

From Dareus's perspective, he was getting a trip to a party in Miami from a long time friend of his to cheer him up because of his mother's long-term illness. That, alone, could be permissible under NCAA rules (depending on the context and circumstance). The problem was that the source of the money was an Agent. There's no reason to believe that Dareus knew that. As I also pointed out elsewhere, the circumstances probably also made Austin's sudden generosity much less unusual, and reduced the amount of skepticism  he'd have had. Hindsight being what it is, maybe he should've been more skeptical and asked more questions, but it appears he was as much a victim of Austin's wrong doing as he was a rule violator here.

Honesty and Cooperation

This is always mentioned when the NCAA issues a sanction, especially one with reduced penalties, but I really do question how much it matters in terms of penalty reduction. After all, honesty and cooperation are required by rule, and failure to be honest and cooperate is, itself, an infraction for which the penalties are not insignificant. I assume that the NCAA played up Dareus's honesty and cooperation because it provides a nice incentive for future student athletes to be honest -- they think they might get a lighter sentence as a result -- the proverbial carrot to the suspension stick. I do not assume that Dareus was more honest or forthcoming than Green in any way that really mattered to investigators. If that's not accurate, it appears (based on the reports I've seen) that they found Dareus to be more honest (an odd statement to me, you were either honest or not, right?), so whatever that weighs (and, to reiterate, I don't believe it to be much at all), would weigh in his favor.

All told, I don't see much in the way of reasons to mitigate Green's sentence. Though certainly biased, I see this as a situation where Green was doing something he knew was wrong while Dareus wasn't. There are a million arguments that what Green did shouldn't be against the rules, or shouldn't be punished as harshly, or something else, but when it comes to the NCAA following their own rules and making sense doing it, this seems like a reasonable resolution. That's not to say that it would've been unreasonable to give Dareus four games as well -- I think it probably would have -- but in the end, what they chose to do makes sense to me.

To really make a case for Green, the key is not to compare the infractions of Green and Dareus, but to come up with reasons -- mitigating factors -- why Green's sentence should be reduced. "Because Dareus's was" isn't really a good one, though, as the two situations are vastly different in content and character.

As we prepare to spend the next 14 weeks listening to ESPN (et al.) talk about how brave Boise State is for scheduling two (TWO!!) BCS conference teams, I thought it'd be worth looking to see how their scheduling stacks up to, say, our schedule. I pulled the Sagarin predictive numbers for the season so far (doesn't include the VT/Boise game, I don't think), so we could do a little comparing.

If we just look at averages (which includes our game against 244th ranked Georgia State), the average Alabama opponent is around 62nd, while the average Boise State opponent is around 79th. Of course, averages are notorious for being able to be dragged away by outliers, and two of the ways to get rid of those are with trimmed means (only averaging the middle X%) and medians. In this case, rather remarkably, the 90% trimmed mean and the Median are actually identical for both teams: Alabama's is 34 while Boise's is 62. (Which goes to show you that the Georgia State game kinda kills our strength of schedule).

Of course, it's so early that those numbers are pretty worthless (for example: Mississippi State is ranked #18 while Penn State is only 23rd and Arkansas is 46th), so I thought a more fun way to measure would be strength on strength! I sorted the teams by their sagarin rating so we can see how they compare down the stretch. These are also somewhat skewed by the rankings, but as you'll soon see, it hardly matters:

1. South Carolina -- Virginia Tech
2. Florida -- Fresno State
3. LSU -- Oregon State
4. Mississippi State -- Idaho
5. Penn State -- Utah State
6. Tennessee -- Nevada
7. Auburn -- Hawaii
8. Arkansas -- Louisiana Tech
9. Duke -- Wyoming
10. Ole Miss -- San Jose State
11. Georgia State -- Toledo

So, if you take a look at that, you can see some places where the sagarin right now doesn't match reality, but outside of the Georgia State game, I'm not sure there's a single time the team on the left wouldn't be a tougher match up than the team on the right.

Virginia Tech might have the edge over South Carolina, although after tonight's game I doubt it.

I'll keep the list up to date from week to week since the numbers will get significantly more accurate as the season progresses, but, gosh, if you can't go undefeated with Boise's schedule, do you even deserve a crappy bowl game?

It all serves to illustrate one of the more frustrating points of schedule arguments: people looove to toss out the conference schedule as unimportant and focus on the 3-4 games a year that aren't written in stone, which is silly, because your conference slate comprises 75% of your games.

PS: Next time you hear someone say "It's not boise's fault they have a crappy conference" ask them this: if they can't be blamed for being a part of the WAC, how can they be given credit for "moving up" the MWC? Bottom line is that Boise was in the WAC by choice, so, yeah, you can blame them for playing a crappy schedule.

Old thread was closed due to age, so I'm opening up a new one!

Dynasty Rules

• The week will be advanced on Monday mornings (or afternoons if I forget), or as soon as each player is ready.
• 7 minute quarters, All-American difficulty
• Invariably, there will be some bugs found -- there always are -- do not exploit them.
• Lose gracefully. Don't restart your game. We're on the honor system here -- I don't want to penalize folks who have the game crash, the power go out, or anything like that, so just take your beatings like a man if you lose.
• For player-versus-player games, do your best to schedule these early -- I'd hate to have to simulate them, as they're half of the fun of the league.

Rankings Through Week 4:

On second thought: please step away from your respective ledges. There's a whole lot of banter in the main thread, but I wanted to put some of the big points in one place for easy reference.

First, a preface: if you're a fan of another team, please recognize one fact: we don't care. We don't care what you think about this, how you think it compares to your current troubles, or care to commiserate with you at all. Feel free to excuse yourself to fornicate with an angry badger.

Second: the party happened after the BCS Title game. You can tell your gloating Texas buddies two things: 1) 37-21 and 2) This is what happens to teams with NFL-grade talent -- they become agent targets and they win national championships, comfort them with the notion that they'll probably win another one . . . some day.

Third: All available evidence right now suggests that THIS IS NOT AN INSTITUTIONAL NCAA INFRACTION. It's not. This doesn't impact our probation, it doesn't give rise to repeat offender penalties. By itself, It's not something the NCAA can do a damn thing about, except...

Fourth: we could very easily have just lost Marcel Dareus. His career at Alabama could be over. Accept that and come to terms with it. Recognize that the "extra benefits" bylaws are not the same as the agent contact bylaws. They're both in play here, though. The extra benefits are what give rise to the things you're hearing about dollar amounts, payback, and suspension. If the NCAA determines that, because of those benefits or anything else, Dareus has made himself a professional athlete, he will never be reinstated. To wit (numbering messed up because SB Nation is stupid):

Bylaw 12 Guidelines.

1. Amateurism Cases involving Student-Athletes Initially Enrolling at an NCAA Institution for the 2006-07 Academic Year or After.
   1. Philosophy Statement. The NCAA, as an amateur organization, separates itself from the professional model of athletics. In this separation, participation in athletics for individuals competing for NCAA Division I institutions or who wish to compete for a Division I institution should be motivated primarily by education and by the physical, mental and social benefits derived from such participation. An individual who engages in activities that clearly professionalizes him or her will be deemed permanently ineligible for Division I athletics. (February 2006)
   2. Standard. The individual's actions shall be reviewed under a "reasonable-person" standard to determine if those actions warrant the individual's eligibility not being reinstated for intercollegiate athletics. Individuals who engage in the following activities have crossed the threshold of professionalism and, thus, their eligibility will not be reinstated:
      1. Sign an agreement or contract that states the team is professional or the individual is a professional;
      2. Sign an agreement or contract that provides the individual with money above expenses (even if the money is never paid);
      3. Individual receives money above his or her expenses/individual has profited from his or her sport (i.e., could be in the form of cash payments, prize money, stipend);
      4. Individual consistently represents himself or herself as a professional athlete;
      5. Individual enters into written or verbal contract with an agent; or
      6. Individual accepts significant monetary benefits from an agent.

That last part -- "individual accepts significant monetary benefits" is the money quote. Unless Dareus entered into a contract with an agent, he'd actually need to receive "monetary benefits". Now, I've not read up on what that phrase specifically means to the NCAA, and the NCAA could easily say that having trips and parties paid for is a "monetary benefit", but that might not be the case, and even if it is, in light of six-figure bonuses being tossed around, it seems that a strong case could be made that a trip and a party aren't really all that "significant." If he crosses that line, however, there's absolutely no coming back.

Still: until we hear otherwise, it would be prudent to assume that Dareus won't be suiting up with the defending champs this fall.

Fifth: honestly, if you didn't see this coming, it might be time to cut down your Kool-Aid intake. When a team like North Carolina is getting popped (do they have a single player that could start at Alabama?), you know this is going to be a bumpy ride for teams with actual talent. One of the benefits of having a team full of studs is that agents want a piece and, until only very recently, they and most of their targets been operating with virtual impunity. Times, they are a changin', and there are going to be a bunch of players caught up in dragnets like this one while the agents (and hopefully players) get smarter about how they handle their business.

Finally: Prepare yourselves for the possibility that more players could wind up in Dareus's shoes. Trust that Saban and our world-class compliance office will see us through this storm, and we'll come out the other side of it just fine. It would hurt to lose Dareus, there's no doubt about that, but it ain't the end of the world.

In summary: 'Bama fans, calm down. Everyone else, go away.

The season is now underway, so this post will be edited occasionally to keep things up do date.

Dynasty Rules

• The week will be advanced on Monday mornings, or as soon as each player is ready.
• New players joining may not take ranked schools or those with over-all ratings above 92.
• 7 minute quarters, All-American difficulty
• Invariably, there will be some bugs found -- there always are -- do not exploit them. 
• Lose gracefully. Don't restart your game. We're on the honor system here -- I don't want to penalize folks who have the game crash, the power go out, or anything like that, so just take your beatings like a man if you lose.
• For player-versus-player games, do your best to schedule these early -- I'd hate to have to simulate them, as they're half of the fun of the league.
• There will be a small prize for the player who finishes highest at the end of the season.

Standings after Week #3:

Stats courtesy of CrimsonWraith: Scoring Offense

Total Offense

Rushing Offense

Passing Offense

Total Defense

Rushing Defense

Passing Defense

Turnover Differential

Restarts

The AP The Coaches Poll announced today that USC, on account of their sanctions, would not be eligible for the 2011 football poll. This isn't exactly news, as it is the AP's poll's policy to remove schools on post-season bans, but what is interesting about it is one particular blog's reaction to it. In linking to the announcement, Conquest Chronicles editor Paragon SC writes: "Like this poll was ever credible.... Whoop dee do!"

This is amusing, though, on account of USC's claim of a national championship for their 2003 season, despite not even being invited to play in the BCS Title game. They claim the title because they were ranked #1 in the AP at season's end. LSU fans were not amused.

So, when the AP doesn't want them, the poll isn't credible, but when it ranks them #1, it is the gospel.

Makes about as much sense as the arguments we've heard about those poor, mistreated Trojans.

(Edit: Never mind all that. Got the two polls swapped in my head somehow. This is not nearly as entertaining as I had thought it was earlier. Although it is still mildly amusing to watch USC partisans try to downplay the poll that is actually used by the BCS.)

In more recent news, when Dillon Baxter told his little white lie about Alabama, Florida, and a few other schools, Bruins Nation speculates that they might have broken yet another NCAA Bylaw. In the interests of balance, it is worth noting that the author of the estimable Bylaw Blog doesn't think that's particularly likely. The Bylaw Blog is usually spot on, but this is a Lane Kiffin squad -- it won't be the last time the NCAA hears about the USC of the West.

Countless times over the past four or five years fans of teams in BCS conferences have said something along the lines of: "Sure that mid-major team went undefeated, but they didn't play anybody," only to add, " if they played in a real conference, they'd have lost three games!"

I know it's just the Pac-10, but we're going to get a chance to see just how accurate that sentiment is when Utah officially makes their move.

The interesting thing about this is that, like it or not, it will be a referendum on mid-majors for future expansions. If, after a few years, Utah isn't in the mix for conference championships and major bowl games, the next time a major conference looks to expand, they're going to hesitate to pick up the latest, greatest, mid-major. Or, maybe, the latest, greatest mid-major will hesitate to join a major conference for fear of their success coming to a halt.

Maybe to a lesser extent, it could even impact future rankings. If Utah struggles against Pac-10 competition, pollsters may very well think twice before ranking a Boise State team with a weak Strength of Schedule in the top 10.

I'm not going to make any bold predictions, but I suspect the road to glory is going to get a little more difficult for the Utes in the coming seasons.

As 'Bama fans, we come to learn this song and dance frighteningly well over the last two decades: our team breaks the rules, we get caught, the NCAA issues its sanctions, and we (as fans) spend the next several months shouting at anyone who will listen how unfair they are.

Conquest Chronicles is, as you might expect, following that script to the letter.

I hate to rain on the parade, but there are a few points CC, and the Stewart Mandel article they linked for support, are missing.

Comparisons to the Albert Means case

Invariably, any Southern Cal apologist who brings up the Albert Means case does so to highlight the fact that the individuals handing out cash were actual Alabama boosters while those in USC's case were supposedly not. They conveniently leave out a host of other differences, however. Those include: 

• Alabama had a picture-perfect compliance department, while USC's was woefully under-manned and uninvolved.
• Despite Alabama's best efforts, it had no way of knowing that Means and his coach were on the take. Among other juicy details, the NCAA infractions report puts one of Bush's coaches at a party where Bush was receiving extra benefits. (USC fans also tend to ignore the second half of "knew or should have known")
• Alabama complied quickly and thoroughly with the NCAA investigation. The USC investigation was stalled by any number of parties and a USC coach lied to the NCAA.
• Mandel's opinion notwithstanding, Alabama did not commit either of the two cardinal sins: Failure to Monitor or Lack of Institutional Control. USC was found to have lacked institutional control.
• Means was not yet a player on campus, but Bush and Mayo were both being seen every day dozens of people who have the responsibility of promoting enforcement (fellow players, coaches, administrative staff).

In the balance, those differences weigh far more than whether or not someone is technically a booster.