Written by Drew Sharp at DetroitFreePress.com
The NCAA needs to slap down Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh.
Not because he has broken any rules, but rather because he’s breaking protocol. Whether it’s staging outlandish celebrity productions under the guise of signing day or orchestrating Florida work retreats during what should be student downtime, Harbaugh’s forcing the NCAA to take a more serious look at its own hypocrisies.
And the NCAA can’t have that, can they?
The Southeastern Conference supposedly isn’t pleased that Harbaugh is infiltrating its recruiting terrain, holding a week of spring practices at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla. Harbaugh, in turn, tweaks the SEC’s nose on social media, taking another Twitter dig Monday suggesting the SEC are “masters of deception.”
But what’s truly laughable regarding the childish back and forth between Harbaugh and the SEC is the suggestion that this is a strictly a territorial feud, as if somehow the SEC’s inherent recruiting advantage and national championship dominance will burn into cinders should more programs take their spring practice show on the road.
The SEC’s real fight isn’t with Harbaugh. It’s with the NCAA and its delusional definitions. The conscience-free football conference would love taking a flamethrower to the NCAA rule book. It’s using Harbaugh’s aggressiveness as a means for calling out the NCAA’s various duplicities.
If football athletes are truly students first, then the NCAA can’t condone the usage of a spring academic break for all students as a sanctioned football work retreat. If the NCAA continually seeks legal protection as a nonprofit entity, it can’t tolerate its massive revenue-producing monoliths transforming spring practices into high-cost, high-profile business trips.
Harbaugh’s actions have strengthened the argument that college football players indeed are employees rather than average students. The further he pushes the envelope, the further he exposes the myth upon which the NCAA has erected a multibillion dollar enterprise.
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