Head in the sand
On Sept. 3, Georgia will host Boise State in football, the most anticipated game in Boise State history. Starting for Boise will be sophomore guard Tad Miller.
Tad's father, Dan, is a retired police lieutenant who currently works in Iraq training Iraqi police officers. Dan is planning to fly halfway around the world, at the cost of $2,700, to make the big game.
All of this was detailed in an Atlanta Journal-Constitution article last week and when Georgia fan Sam Hendrix read it online, he had an idea.
"It hit me that he shouldn't have to bear the cost of the flight," says Hendrix, a 57-year-old marketing consultant from Signal Mountain, Tenn. "I was struck by the fact that not only was he serving the country, but as a parent this might be the best athletic moment of his son's career."
So Hendrix posted on the message board on his favorite website, ugasports.com.
"I said, 'You know guys, let's all kick in $100, get 25-30 of us and pay this guy's way to Sanford Stadium in recognition of what he is doing for the country.'"
The response was overwhelming. Within minutes the money was pledged, not all $100 bids. Some Georgia undergrads offered $20 each. A few people only had $50 to spare. It was a community effort. A great idea. Everyone agreed.
Until someone posted a joke, "what if this is against NCAA rules?"
Someone checked with the compliance officers at both schools. Guess what?
"We were in violation of two NCAA rules," Hendrix says. Athletes are prohibited from having friends or family receive free travel. In theory, the rule makes sense; you can't have boosters flying a player's mom and dad in for games. Allowing such would provide an unfair advantage to the big schools that can afford it.
"I understand the intent of the rule," Hendrix says.
He just can't understand the NCAA. The rule is designed to stop boosters for helping out players for their team, not the other team. Tad Miller doesn't play for Georgia. He plays for Georgia's opponent.
Yet somehow, someway, by chipping in to this cause, all of those rabid Georgia fans who want nothing more than to beat Boise State somehow would have become official Boise State boosters.
And by showing respect and goodwill in paying Dan Miller's airfare, they would have put Boise State at risk of NCAA probation.
"If I had known it was that easy to get a team in trouble, I would have done this to Tennessee a long time ago," Hendrix jokes.
The NCAA has no official word on this as it only comments on actual rule violations, not speculative ones. The NCAA never ruled in this case because there was no case: The Georgia fans gave up so Boise wouldn't get sanctioned. It turns out Miller's airfare will be paid for by his company, which provides two trips home a year.
But Hendrix remains dismayed. The NCAA often gets things wrong it arrogantly thinks it is getting right. Hendrix would have violated the letter of a NCAA law, but certainly not its spirit. And as a serious college football fan, he knows many schools excel by doing the opposite: obeying the letter of the law but trampling fair play.
"It's pretty ludicrous," he says. "And this was in the week with the politically correct ruling banning Indian mascots. We've lost touch with reality. This is not what the NCAA should be involved in."
No it shouldn't. But it is. It always is. Almost two years after NCAA president Myles Brand vowed the culture would change, little has.
The NCAA is too busy making money and imposing its view of a politically correct society to make common-sense rulings in favor of Dan and Tad Miller.
It is spending time extending the football season to 12 games so players can pay for bloated campus salaries instead of accommodating an act of goodwill that benefits one of those players and his far-off father.
Simply put, it is so busy trying to do things it shouldn't do that it has no time left over for things it should.
"Of all the things," Hendrix says, "you wouldn't think helping out someone serving America in Iraq would be considered abnormal."
No, you wouldn't. But Myles Brand's NCAA would.
