Hello, everyone. If you'll excuse some meta-commentary on the media, there's something bothering me.
There's an art to the offseason. Some people use the time to get better at writing, like we try to do here. Some people write silly stories, write in-depth histories, tinker with X's and O's, and generally try to break out of their comfort zone. These people improve sports discourse by making readers a little smarter than they were before they read the story. These people earn their oxygen.
Unfortunately, this doesn't encompass everyone in sports media. Some people rehash a listicle they wrote seven years prior with banal praise for top ten coaches and nonsensical criteria for the worst coaches to attract more readers. Some people parlay objectifying women and shameless conference boosterism into a job as an analyst/talking head on Fox Sports One. And some people care so little about accuracy that in the last paragraph of a lousy piece about why Urban Meyer is obligated to take blame for failing to turn recruits into choirboys and return his championship rings, they screw up Ohio State's 2012 football record.
Even when one of these people, a known plagiarist, decides to praise Meyer, their past indiscretions prevent readers from enjoying their change of heart.
Not naming the above people is a conscious decision. None of them will get more name recognition from me, because shameless media personalities deserve all the anonymity and apathy readers can deliver. The news involving them is linked solely because taking a story from elsewhere without attribution violates ethical standards.
This isn't a lament on the state of media, which I think is stronger than ever thanks to the wide array of perspectives covered online. But readers deserve better than the above stories, which are clickbait and can simply be classified as lazy writing. Even when it gets slow in the summer, you deserve quality insight; when authors don't provide that, please navigate elsewhere.
O'BANNON PLAINTIFFS WARY OF RETRIBUTION. Which player is going to blow the NCAA up? Michael Hausfeld, the lead lawyer for the O'Bannon lawsuit against the NCAA, has requested a written promise that the NCAA will not retaliate against any player who joins the suit following judge Claudia Wilken granting the plaintiffs the right to add a current player to the complaint.
In a battle of snippy press releases, Hausfeld asked the organization to agree that "participation in this litigation by a current student athlete does not violate any NCAA rule (spanning the constitution, operating bylaws, and administrative bylaws) contained in the 2012-13 NCAA Division I manual or otherwise compromise a student athlete's eligibility". The NCAA's chief legal officer affirmed the request while making snide comments about the request being given to the press before the NCAA and the NCAA never seeking to retaliate against student-athletes, never mind Dez Bryant or Jeremy Bloom or the dozens of innocent athletes it punishes every time it hands down a Committee of Infractions ruling.
With this promise obtained, the plaintiffs now have until July 19 to amend the complaint and add a current player, which Wilken made clear would be necessary for the class action suit classification request to proceed. Which again raises the question: who will be the athlete to risk alienation and join the suit? Famous or anonymous, his name will be remembered with Curt Flood and Jean-Marc Bosman.
Can C.J. Barnett live up to Bednarik hype? PRESEASON AWARD HYPE. Here's the thing about preseason watch lists: they shouldn't mean anything. Without seeing how players develop over the summer, all of these lists are at best educated guesses based on how players did the previous season. These lists do mean something because name recognition is a big factor in award contention and people want to validate their held convictions, like the players on the preseason watch lists being good.
With that said, five Buckeyes are on the Maxwell Award and Bednarik Award preseason watch lists. They are:
- C.J. Barnett (Bednarik)
- Carlos Hyde (Maxwell)
- Braxton Miller (Maxwell)
- Bradley Roby (Bednarik)
- Ryan Shazier (Bednarik)
C.J. Barnett's inclusion is a little surprising since he was only honorable mention in the Big Ten last year. A bias towards seniors could be aiding his hype. Meanwhile, no Michigan player made the Bednarik watch list, which seems silly since the Michigan defense has been solid for the last two years and likely will continue to be under defensive coordinator Greg Mattison. For now, though, it's three to zip for Bednarik candidates. Take that, Imaginary Straw Michigan Fan.
Speaking of meaningless preseason speculation, Braxton Miller is now a 6:1 bet to win the Heisman, an improvement from previous odds of 7:1 and 13:2. Nobody in this establishment condones gambling, but nailing a SEC vs. Everyone Else bet would feel pretty good.
D'ANGELO RUSSELL IMPRESSES AT LEBRON SKILLS ACADEMY. The LeBron James Skills Academy is now over, and coach John Lucas had kind words for D'Angelo Russell:
Jerry Eaves was the point guard for the 1980 Louisville Cardinals squad that won a national championship. I'm not sure if the comparison comes more from Russell's play or the fact that he hails from Louisville. Whatever the reason, comparisons to championship winning players are encouraging.
For his part, Russell seems excited to play for Thad Matta:
“It’s one thing to know that an assistant coach wants you, and then it’s another thing to know that the head coach wants you just as bad,” Russell said. “I built a relationship with (Matta), and he was telling me I would come in as a playmaker, that I have the tangibles Evan Turner had with being able to pass and being a big guard, being able to facilitate and get creative for his own shot.”
Russell takes the Goldilocks approach to Columbus, calling it "not too far from home and not too close (to) home." He also said he would recruit Jahlil Okafor and Craig Victor to the 2014 class. There's probably not room for both of them, especially if Okafor and his friend Tyus Jones are a package deal as they claim, but the sentiment is appropriate. If he wants to make a difference – and the same goes for Jalyn Holmes recruiting Virginian Derrick Nnadi in football – snazzy t-shirts are all the rage.
(I CAN'T GET NO) COMPENSATION. NCAA Football 14 has its release today. In spite of complaints that players are more generic, there is little question that players' likenesses are used in the game. Missouri defensive end Vincent Lucas wonders why he doesn't get a free copy of NCAA 14, considering that he's in it with no compensation:
Legaliy, players are required to sign over the rights to their likeness upon beginning their college careers and after that are not entitled to compensation. More practically, because the NCAA suppresses benefits that players would receive in a free market and its model of amateurism is generally unjust.
The peculiar thing is that Vincent Lucas's likeness is hardly valuable; though he's a defensive starter, he's by no means a player people buy the game to play as, unlike Johnny Manziel or Marcus Mariota. As one of thousands of players represented in the latest game and tens of thousands represented in previous games, a cut of revenue might have netted him a few dollars at most. But with the aforementioned O'Bannon case developing into a class-action lawsuit with a potential payout in the tens of millions of dollars should it end up like a prior NFL case, the punitive damages athletes would win from Electronic Arts or a settlement with the NCAA could net him and other players hundreds of dollars and/or free copies of the video game in which they appear.
If EA Sports does have to pay a large settlement, one might wonder if the end of EA's exclusive license for NCAA college football video games will lead to another company's series overtaking the NCAA Football series. Considering the series's stagnation, that change is welcome.
GETTING THE LAST WORD IN. Some old jokes can still cut to the bone. Scott E. Entsminger, a diehard Browns fan, died on July 4th. From his obituary:
A lifelong Cleveland Browns fan and season ticket holder, he also wrote a song each year and sent it to the Cleveland Browns as well as offering other advice on how to run the team. He respectfully requests six Cleveland Browns pall bearers so the Browns can let him down one last time.
There aren't enough frowning emoticons in the world for this. Were I a Browns fan, it would drive me to drink.
LINKS AHOY. Tom Rinaldi's Outside The Lines feature on two Cleveland athletes is powerful... This comment takes pro-oversigning fanaticism to a new level... In breaking news, Alabama is football-mad... An Ohioan tackles an escaped inmate, is very patriotic... Luxury apartments are somehow a hot market in Columbus... Run it out, Nick Swisher... Miguel Cabrera hits hard... Head transplants now start a slippery slope to the Borg Queen in stardate 54038.4... And Mexico is now the fattest country in the world. USA! USA! USA!
