UL Recruit Gets $2100 in extra benefits but only 3 game susp

[tornado]

University of Louisville recruit Derrick Caracter took $2146 from
an "unnamed friend" to visit the University of Louisville campus and pay travel expenses.
The team has chosen to suspend Caracter for 3 games (two are exhibitions.)

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/ncaa/article/0,2777,DRMN_23932_5066399,00.html

[beamer1]

Was the guy a Louisville booster?

[tornado]

It is never disclosed, but how does that matter?
First, the kid is bound by the same rules as all recruits, in that he can't tkae freebies from anyone, least of all someone trying to guide his basketball skills as the article says, the "friend" paid Caracter over $2000 to go to camps and make a visit to Louisville.
I suppose we'd all agree the "friend" sure wasn't a Kentucky booster if he's paying to send Derrick to UL!

But this is almost exactly what happened with Will Franklin.
Will had not yet attened BU, it was the summer before he enrolled, and the overpayments did not come from a known Bradley booster.
But Will got a six game suspension mostly because the dollar amounts were under $600, or had it been over $2000 Will would have been suspended eight game.
And that's eight GAMES not exhibitions.

It will be interesting to see if the NCAA acts as swiftly and punitively on Derrick Caracter as they did when they swooped down on Will and Patrick.
Has anyone ever seen the NCAA act so fast?
In fact, I am curious why we have never heard anything to this date about DePaul's Jerry Wainwright and his impermissable visit to Manual Cass MORE THAN A YEAR AGO!!
Has anyone ever even seen a response by the NCAA on that one?

[MickeyT]

I am not sure it is the same. The money apparently wasn't from anyone connected to Louisville, and the kid was not a student, yet. So, although it sounds sleazy, I doubt the NCAA will get involved.

By the way, does anyone doubt that some of the top talent like OJ Mayo, Eric Gordon, and Derrick Rose don't get money funnelled to them from companies like Reebok and Nike?

[flipper]

I am not sure it is the same. The money apparently wasn't from anyone connected to Louisville, and the kid was not a student, yet. So, although it sounds sleazy, I doubt the NCAA will get involved.

By the way, does anyone doubt that some of the top talent like OJ Mayo, Eric Gordon, and Derrick Rose don't get money funnelled to them from companies like Reebok and Nike?

good points. i really don't see the ncaa getting involved with this. it is not the same as having a known booster who employs many student/athletes and there is a trend of improper payments.

[tornado]

flip-- the NCAA IS already involved.....way more involved that you might think....read on..

First, I ask why is this not the same as Will or Reggie Bush, or the illegal payments that caused Charlie Villanueva to be suspended for the first six games of his freshman college career at UConn?
Some guy funnels cash to the kid and helps him get to Louisville, and you say there's no suspicion?

The reports state the person who gave Caracter the $2000 "loan" was a family friend (of course they all say that) but it was a guy who has since gone to work at a sports agency. A guy who has been in BIG trouble with the NCAA before and who has caused other collegians to be ineligible for illegal payments made to them!!

So nobody sees the suspicious nature here?
Give the kid cash, gain favor with the kid, then go to work at a sports agency and end up representing the kid down the road.
How is this different from Reggie Bush?

How many of your family friends end up getting jobs as a sports agent?
Just a coincidence?

One report says the "family friend" is a wealthy guy named Eddie Lau, who was said to be "Caracter's former adviser" and who ended up then getting a job with a guy named Dan Fergen, an NBA agent who operates a sports agency and who represents Gilbert Arenas, Jason Richardson and Erick Dampier.

Just in case you wanna know what kind of person this Eddie Lau is, you have to read this. Lau apparently threatened CBS writer Gregg Doyel when he wrote an article about Derrick Caracter.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/sportsline/main8783576.shtml

In this very article that Lau was furious about, Gregg Doyel predicts EXACTLY WHAT ENDED UP HAPPENING by saying the connection between Lau, lots of NBA money, AAU money, and Caracter was a situation that was very, very suspicious, and that
"That connection ought to curdle the Louisville compliance department's milk -- and pique the interest of the NCAA, which has investigated Fegan before. Two years ago, Fegan's relationship with Charlie Villanueva cost Villanueva the first six games of Connecticut's 2003-04 season. Villanueva's AAU team? The Long Island Panthers. Villanueva's connection to Fegan? Eddie Lau, according to multiple sources in New York City."

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/sportsline/main8783576.shtml

If you can read that Gregg Doyel story and still say you think this situation doesn't STINK, then you are wayyyy more naive than I am. This is as sleazy as it gets, and they got caught.
I suspect there's a whole lot more fire where this smoke is coming from, and the NCAA simply went soft on them since it is Rick Pitino.

[chitownBUB]

Sounds like this stuff is commonplace at the upper crust AAU level. So, follow the money.

[brainiac]

Some may not recall, but four years ago between his 8th grade and freshman years, Derrick Caracter had such a great AAU summer, that many ratings services had him rated as #1 in the nation in the Class of 2006, even ahead of Greg Oden and Kevin Durant.
That's when the AAU-types with cash reserves got in on him and his family.
So I guess that constitutes having a prior relationship. the fact that they've been funnelling cash and living in the kid's house for years.

[tornado]

That is right.
Here is a link from 2002 that rates Derrick Caracter #1 in his class (scroll to the Class of 2006 near the bottom)

http://members.tripod.com/primeprospects3/id104.htm

Oden was #8 and a bunch of kids who have since faded severely are listed in the top 10.

scout/insider also had Caracter ranked #1 just 3 years ago.

http://schoolsports.scout.com/2/252815.html

[collegehoopjunkie]

Re: UL Recruit Gets $2100 in extra benefits but only 3 game

University of Louisville recruit Derrick Caracter took $2146 from
an "unnamed friend" to visit the University of Louisville campus and pay travel expenses.
The team has chosen to suspend Caracter for 3 games (two are exhibitions.)
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drm...066399,00.html

Anyone see the Louisville game against Arizona Tuesday in the Jimmy V Classic?
This was Derrick Caracter's first game back after serving his 3 game suspension.
I am puzzled why if he accepted over $2000 of improper gifts, then was he suspended only for 3 games?
I thought anything over $800 was 8 games, it was for POB?

[romar]

Re: UL Recruit Gets $2100 in extra benefits but only 3 game

University of Louisville recruit Derrick Caracter took $2146 from
an "unnamed friend" to visit the University of Louisville campus and pay travel expenses.
The team has chosen to suspend Caracter for 3 games (two are exhibitions.)
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drm...066399,00.html

Anyone see the Louisville game against Arizona Tuesday in the Jimmy V Classic?
This was Derrick Caracter's first game back after serving his 3 game suspension.
I am puzzled why if he accepted over $2000 of improper gifts, then was he suspended only for 3 games?
I thought anything over $800 was 8 games, it was for POB?

I would venture to guess that it's because he was a recruit at the time of the infraction and not a player on the team. At least that's the excuse the NCAA would use. But honestly it probably has to do more with that fact that it's Louisville.

[tornado]

But romar, as was noted earlier, same with Will Franklin.
He was still officially a recruit, as it was the summer before he enrolled at Bradley, and he was not yet either a BU student nor a player on the roster when he had his job at Star.
Never the less, they penalized him anyway.

Here is a challenge I will issue....

If anyone can find a single example of the NCAA actually stepping into a situation like Star Transport/BU at any other school that's BCS school...then sticking to the penalties as they were outlines in the BU case....please let me know.

Please don't cite the football players at Oklahoma or the Reggie Bush case, since the NCAA hasn't yet even made a phone call.
And don't mention the cases like at UK in the 1980's when cash actually fell out of a package going to a recruit, and try to stay within the past 2 decades, or the only other one you're going to find might be the improper benefits that Anthjony Webster supposedly got during the Versace era.

All the other cases you'll find nail some mid-major or smaller school, and every other case such as the Darnell Jackson case at Kansas or the Jiri Hubalek case at Iowa State either involves WAY, WAY more money, more benefits, more of a clear smoking gun to big booster payments right to the kid or his family, and more violations of other rules or much softer penalties given out.

For example, the Jiri Hubilek case at Iowa State the kid got nearly $2000 of benefits and got a free car, yet he only got suspended 6 games (not 8 like Patrick).
The case noted at NIU with a womens player receiving thousands of dollars in freebies, clothes, free living arrangements in some uppity top level professor's home, plus CASH, CASH, CASH, netted the girl ABSOLUTELY no penalty and the school got....guess what....no penalty beyond a year of probation. I know it's NIU and a midmajor--so I am puzzled why they actually got only probation, but a year of probation is MORE than the school got at Iowa State in the Hubalek case.

Review all the prior discussions on these other cases, and see if only the mid-majors ever get hit with real penalties to parallel the violations.
I am still waiting for anyone to show me that the BCS schools get investigtaed and penalized as hard as mid-majors.

http://www.bradleyfans.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=3683

http://www.bradleyfans.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=3706

[McBeam]

I am curious what any of this matters. Can anything good come of it for BU fans?

[Biff]

It seems to some Bradley fans that the NCAA has been very inconsistent in enforcing rules violations. I think they do look the other way when one of their favored schools gets caught with their hands in the cookie jar. But if some midmajor school is found to have even minor violations, it's one step away from the death penalty.

I am still waiting to hear what the NCAA ruling is on the DePaul recruiting violations with Manual Cass.

[tornado]

I am curious what any of this matters. Can anything good come of it for BU fans?

It's a message board, McBeam, you've been here before.
you know that if it interests anyone who wants to post and discuss then it does matter.

I issued a challenge, and generally I even give away a prize, and would be willing here, too!

Find one example of the NCAA going after a BCS school the way they have after the littler schools. Just one, and it has to be a minimal extra benefits violation that incurred the MAXIMUM stated penalties within the rules.

I have given numerous cases where they have softened the penalties and given less, but none that nail the numerous extra benefits violators who are BCS guys the way they went furiously after BU.

Come on....just one example....I am waiting.