Football's Dirtiest Programs: #8, Auburn

Using its own calculus, FanHouse ranks the 10 Dirtiest Programs of the last 20 years.

Mike Freeman, the columnist whose article served as the inspiration for this series, amazed on-lookers when he did what few realized was possible: simultaneously pissing off both Alabama and Auburn fans. For its part, the Loveliest Villiage on the Plains had its hackles raised by a number two ranking in Freeman's poll. It turns out that while they're no angels, the Auburn Tigers are not quite #2 material.

It is unusual that infractions in diverse sports can be blamed on the head football coach, but in this case the NCAA is very clear in its 1993 report that those violations and the ones covered by the 1991 report (which included only the men's basketball and tennis programs and, therefore, are not being scored here) fell on the shoulders of Pat Dye who served as both head coach and Athletics Director from 1981 to 1992.Sorry, No Photos

As major infractions go, and aside from the Committee on Infractions' admonitions regarding allowing one person to serve as head football coach and Athletics Director, this was a pretty boring case. It primarily centered around money flowing to players which should not have been flowing to players.

One player received over $4,000 from a booster, much of it in cash, during his time in Auburn. The booster also bought new tires for the player's car, made car payments on his behalf, and setup a "bonus system" for his final season which netted him $700 in cash for big hits, interceptions, and the like. This description from the report of one of the incidents between this player and this booster is somewhat amusing:

In the spring of 1991, following the completion of the young man's eligibility, the representative visited the student-athlete's trailer home and placed at least $250 in cash inside a trailer apartment sign. Thereafter, the representative telephoned the student-athlete and instructed the young man to look behind the trailer sign for the cash.

This wasn't an isolated relationship, though. There are reports of assistant coaches serving as go-betweens for boosters and players. An administrative assistant was found to have provided "financial assistance" to a player in the form of hundreds of dollars a month to help him with his car payments and rent. Dye himself even got into the act, having a talk with a branch manager at a bank and urging him to reconsider turning down one of his players for a loan. That branch manager made loans to five other athletes over a span of six years.

In fact, the impermissible loans were Dye's solution to the tricky problem of players being unable to sign with agents. He referred at least three student athletes to that branch manager for unsecured loans that were granted upon the basis of the athletes future professional earnings. Again, we're not here to quibble about whether or not this sort of thing should be against the rules, but it was, Dye knew that it was, and he recommended it anyway.

Two appearances before the Committee on Infractions in as many years would normally cause for great concern, but the NCAA purportedly went easy on Auburn because most of these violations occurred before the sanctions were handed down in the 1991 case. The Tigers wound up with two years of probation and post-season ban. A year's worth of TV ban, and some scholarships. In addition, the university self-imposed a separation of duties with respect to the Athletic Director and the head football coach.

Scoreboard:

Unethical Conduct (5 points)
Lack of Institutional Control (10 points)
Probation: 2 years (4 points)
Post-season ban: 2 years (6 points)
Television ban: 1 year (3 points)
Initial scholarships: 33 (16.5 points)
Scholarship cap reduction: 6 (1.5 points)
TOTAL: 46.00 points

As a single violation, this is the second third worst of the last two decades. (Updated: Oops. Third, not second)
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

7-24-2007 @ 9:55AM

Matthew.Noll said...

What about Ronnie Brown and other football players getting A's in that independent study class which amounted to them reading one book and meeting with a professor once or twice.

7-24-2007 @ 11:01AM

ciniellowc said...

Let's see if the players will get smart enough not to accept the "gift$" and thus not risk their eligibility and the schools credibility.

How about an athlete taking a morals test before they enter school. One that would weed out those who don't have a clue and possibly eliminate future Mike Vicks.

Better yet, try a first year class for all freshmen athletes in morals and ethics which is mandatory and if you fail you lose your scholarship.

7-24-2007 @ 12:05PM

rowefork said...

If they did that, ciniellowc, Miami wouldn't be able to field a team year in and year out. HAHAHA!

7-24-2007 @ 12:51PM

Todd'92 said...

Pete, believe it or not I actually agree mostly with your assessment of the program. You should really note though that the player in question "Eric Ramsey" in the last infraction was the instigator of the illegal payments both from Coach Blakeney and Corky Frost were phone calls made to Blakeney begging for money to feed his babies and pay his bills. Not one amount of evidence was ever introduced otherwise concerning Ramsey other than Ramsey's testimony and the tapes of Ramsey begging for money that Ramsey himself made as he called from a telephone booth at a pudunk convenience store in the middle of nowhere Lee County. The only other note concerning your point system is the deduction for a television ban. You should not use this as a criteria due to the fact that the AU probation was the last to include such as the NCAA no longer hands out television bans, the reasoning here is it is supposedly penalizing the conference as well as the school. If you need the proof look at Bamas infractions with both Jelks and the latest debaucled bid for high school talent. Other wise, AU has had major problems with boosters intermittently throughout the history of the schools football program. It is laughable however at the reason we were on probation in '57. In the mid seventies it was a power struggle and grudge match between boosters with them turning each other in that nailed us and we all know the matter with Eric "please coach I need money to pay my bills and feed my kids" Ramsey. All that being said the program needed cleansing of certain staff and boosters. It will be interesting to see where Bama fits into your list.

7-24-2007 @ 1:05PM

Pete Holiday said...

Todd -- I definitely considered exempting TV bans but I left them in because if the NCAA hadn't been able to use TV bans, they would've increased the punishments in other areas (more scholarships, more years of probation, something) and not including those penalties would give a leg up to the teams who got them.

I included the penalties to give some sense of how egregious the NCAA thought the violation was, not because the penalties make a team dirty.

7-24-2007 @ 1:50PM

PS: Washington was put on TV restriction in 1994.

7-24-2007 @ 2:41PM

D.S. Williamson said...

What a great post! I love the comment regarding Ronnie Brown. Yeah, the Tigers aren't that clean, but who really is? Wait until Erickson gets done with the Sun Devils. They'll probably leap ahead of everyone!

www.sportsgameinfo.com

7-24-2007 @ 3:13PM

joe mooney said...

Who was number 9?

7-24-2007 @ 3:09PM

THE TRUTH said...

MORALS?This whole country is immoral!From the President on down to the average citizen back up to the REAL CONTROLLERS of this country.The hypocrisy is a stench in the nostril of God.

7-24-2007 @ 3:17PM

aunick said...

who cares war eagle every one dose it

7-26-2007 @ 1:21PM

grant whitcomb said...

RowFork

Maybe you should check the NCAA football graduation stats. I bet UM will rank higher than you favorite school. If not I am sure you will be supprise by what you find! probably even impressed!

7-24-2007 @ 6:48PM

The U Is Dead said...

An SEC school cheating.......No way

7-24-2007 @ 8:30PM

grc said...

I would have to say that under Tuberville, this program has really turned the corner. There is far more problems up the road

7-24-2007 @ 8:39PM

I would have to say that under Tuberville the program has really turned the corner. I believe there has always been more trouble "up the road."
Anyway, UGA had a class set up for its basketball players and they never attended the class. I believe it led to the resignation of the head coach

7-25-2007 @ 8:59AM

notabammer said...

I'm not sure how any of this qualifies as real journalism. Yes I am an Auburn homer, but to bring up something that happened 10 years ago and extrapolate a story from it seems to be the lazy way out. Why not talk about the last decade at least? Why not talk about APRs? Why not at least mention graduation rates?

People in the state of Alabama eat and breath football. Recruiting isn't just a war, it's nuclear. Typically at both Bammer and AU it has been a overzealous booster that causes the problem but coaches have been willing accomplices at times.

I think to have any credibility, anyone who cares about this story line should spend a few minutes investegating what kind of man who runs the AU program now and how proud we are of him and the University. Personally I would take the balance of our graduation rate/ High, high APR, low number of athlete legal problems, and huge winning percentage over any program in the country.

7-24-2007 @ 9:19PM

isabarner: yeah, everyone looks nice and clean when you only count the times they weren't cheating... but that makes for some pretty boring stories.

Sounds like you'd rather read some puff-piece about how much everyone adores Tubby. That's good, actually. You know what you want. That said, you won't find it here.

7-26-2007 @ 8:45AM

silly, trailer dwelling, cousin doing, mullet person... Dont let the facts get in the way of your desire to fanatically support a college at which you almost certainly never attended a class...oh by the way... fear the middle finger! the thumb is so yesterday

7-24-2007 @ 10:51PM

rwfwdw said...

yeah not a bammer. who cares about 10-20 years ago.
"PICK A FINGER"... 6 IN 07!!
Till you live it, you can't know it.

7-25-2007 @ 5:23AM

Hey Granty, despite whatever stats you can create from UM, the whole country looks at you boyz as thugs pure and simple. Graduation rate? Obviously, Coker spent more time on that than winning. What does that tell you? He tried to clean up the felons and lost all his recruits to FSU and UF. Let's look at Davis, Erikson, Johnson and dare I say Schnelleberger? The U has consistenly taken great talent with a rap sheet.

7-25-2007 @ 7:27AM

claytor said...

These blogs are great stuff. That being said i think someone would have to be a total dumbass to think that any, i repeat, ANY college in america has never had booster issues, or taken in players with questionable ethics, or worked one backalley deal or another in order to achieve some quality ranking or success. High and mighty Ohio State, which produced Maurice Clarett, who imo singlehandedly is worse than the entire lot of Miami players ive watched over the years, has now started to show cracks in their bullshit once pristine armor. Jimbo T. is a fraud, and any idiot who wishes to sit there and preach about ethics all day long should take a good hard look at the their glass university of choice before slinging rocks.
They dont do television bans, not because the conference suffers too, but because the NCAA ITSELF suffers revenue loss. Why the hell do you think the bcs will never go playoff structure? Because the conferences make money from 314807245834579 bowl revenues? Or the NCAA?
Personally, the reason i love the U so much is because unlike the holier than thou variety, we KNOW were a mixture of scholar athlete/rebellious youth.
The whole fight fiasco didnt start last year until one of the Florida Int kids got it in his skull that it would be a godd idea to kick the fucking punter in the HEAD after another one had tackled him for no reason and held him in place.
Like noone elses team wouldnt freak out over it.