Tim Abromaitis Commits NCAA Violation

[zls44]

I can't remember a staff (a) not understanding how a year of eligibility works and (b) the NCAA saying "it's cool, just sit out 4 games".

http://www.und.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/101111aaa.html

 

[61cygni]

Can we retroactively claim misunderstanding rules?

 

[HuskyBballFan]

I think this is a reasonable resolution. The alternative would be to tell the kid that his eligibility is exhausted and he can't play at all this year just because he played in the exhibition games 2 years ago.

 

[ctchamps]

I can't remember a staff (a) not understanding how a year of eligibility works and (b) the NCAA saying "it's cool, just sit out 4 games".

http://www.und.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/101111aaa.html

ND made an honest mistake. I'm glad the NCAA didn't punish Abromaitis more than they did. He didn't deserve a greater punishment. There are a lot of things going on in college sports than this oversight that can be addressed.

 

[DogMania]

Maybe UConn can claim similar ignorance with Wolf, saying we didn't realize that playing freshmen from Germany for a couple games in the 2nd semester uses up a year of eligibility. We thought it only applied to non-Germans.

 

[Mr. Wonderful]

The punishment fits the crime. It's such a minor offense why bother with anything other than token punishment?

 

[upstater]

The punishment does not fit the crime because there was no crime. What exactly was Tim supposed to have done differently? "Coach, I don't think I should go in for the last ~8 minutes of these scrimmages that don't count because you might come to me in a week and ask me to redshirt."

Players get 4 years to play. It goes by way too fast. For the NCAA to steal 4 games from him is a sin. What harm did he cause anyone, and how does the punishment fit the NCAA's mission of keeping the "experience of the stuident-athlete paramount"?

Here is the real sin - Jim Calhoun gets a 3 game suspension for "failing to create an atmosphere of compliance" and he can coach until he is 100 (and very likely may). Tim gets about 120-130 chances to suit up, and he loses 4 of them because of a technicality. Way to go NCAA - always looking out for the kids.

Eh, Calhoun got donged for phone calls. Phone calls aren't even illegal anymore. Why defend your guy in such a fashion by bringing up bogus stuff?

 

[Uconnrick]

I can't remember a staff (a) not understanding how a year of eligibility works and (b) the NCAA saying "it's cool, just sit out 4 games".

http://www.und.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/101111aaa.html

I agree that the kid shouldn't be punished, but........, certainly "NCAA" and "accomodating" are 2 words that JC probably would not expect to see in the same sentence.

If we were in the same situation, I doubt the outcome would be the same.

 

[UConnSportsGuy]

Define bogus stuff for me please.

Calhoun has had a series of players steal laptops, get kicked out of school, failing to achieve some pretty low academic requirements, and has overseen a series of recruiting violations that were followed by cover-ups. Phone calls are not what he got punished for at all. Having an agent deliver a player to you and then having your Assistant Coaches cover it up is a little bit worse than playing in garbage time in scrimmages.

The point that I was making was the Tim committed no crime and even if you want to defend Jim Calhoun, he is the CEO, and crimes were committed under his watch. Compare the two and it is impossible to decide that Tim should lose about 3% of his playing career and Jim Calhoun should lose 0.2% of his coaching career.

Your move.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ GETS HIS NEWS FROM TMZ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

[pepband99]

You would get more traction if you didn't lace your argument with that much BS. I agree that Tim Abro did nothing wrong, in this case.

ND had a player steal a credit card number, use it, get kicked out of school, and transfer to a crappy B12 school. Now, he works at ESPN. What's your point?

 

[upstater]

Define bogus stuff for me please.

Calhoun has had a series of players steal laptops, get kicked out of school, failing to achieve some pretty low academic requirements, and has overseen a series of recruiting violations that were followed by cover-ups. Phone calls are not what he got punished for at all. Having an agent deliver a player to you and then having your Assistant Coaches cover it up is a little bit worse than playing in garbage time in scrimmages.

The point that I was making was the Tim committed no crime and even if you want to defend Jim Calhoun, he is the CEO, and crimes were committed under his watch. Compare the two and it is impossible to decide that Tim should lose about 3% of his playing career and Jim Calhoun should lose 0.2% of his coaching career.

Your move.

Your info is totally wrong. Yeah, players stole laptops. And what did Calhoun do wrong? Nothing. You're mad because UConn kicked players out for misbehavior? Uh. Your list of wrongdoing is only about envy.
Phone calls ARE what he got punished for. Read the NCAA's judgement. UConn was dinged for MINOR rule violations. It's funny that you write that an agent delivered a player to UConn when that agent was introduced to the player by a member of the coaching staff AFTER the player had committed to UConn. The extent of the support that agent offered was dinners and a car ride. No one covered it up either. After the initial allegations that Asst. Coach Pat Sellers lied to the NCAA, he was exonerated in the subsequent investigation when he proved he didn't lie.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/tournament/2011/columns/story?columnist=oneil_dana&id=6272554

"I was like the guy in 'My Cousin Vinny.' I shot the clerk? I shot the clerk?" Sellers said. "I didn't do it."
So why resign if he wasn't guilty?
"Because, well, it's kind of difficult to answer that one," Sellers said. "There was no other choice, really. I had to go and prove to the school that I wasn't guilty of what I was accused of doing."
Though Connecticut's sanctions remain place, in February the NCAA agreed with Sellers.
He was cleared.

The logic you use in that final stat is just laughable. People should be punished according to the length of their careers? HEH!!!!!

 

[upstater]

Gottlieb was not under Brey's watch and he was punished appropriately. Where exactly in my argument is the BS? Does it hurt that badly to admit to wrongdoing? Look, my father played for UConn, I rooted harder than anybody for UConn growing up, and still do when it doesn't impact ND. But I can admit that the program has done wrong, and when compared to what Tim didn't do wrong, the punishments are not only inconsistent, they are absurd.

So, excuse making for Brey, but mouthfrothing for Calhoun. Got it.

 

[ctchamps]

Define bogus stuff for me please.

Calhoun has had a series of players steal laptops, get kicked out of school, failing to achieve some pretty low academic requirements, and has overseen a series of recruiting violations that were followed by cover-ups. Phone calls are not what he got punished for at all. Having an agent deliver a player to you and then having your Assistant Coaches cover it up is a little bit worse than playing in garbage time in scrimmages.

The point that I was making was the Tim committed no crime and even if you want to defend Jim Calhoun, he is the CEO, and crimes were committed under his watch. Compare the two and it is impossible to decide that Tim should lose about 3% of his playing career and Jim Calhoun should lose 0.2% of his coaching career.

Your move.

The agent wasn't being contacted to deliver the player. The agent was being contacted to stay away from the player. You would have no way of knowing what a lot of us UConn fans know about events surrounding Nochimson. He was handling things for Rip Hamilton prior to his involvement with Miles. And Rip found out Nochimson mishandled huge sums of his monies. He contacted JC about this well before Miles came into the picture. Rip and JC have had a mentoring relationship even after his graduation from UConn. JC actually attended Rip's wedding sometime in the middle of all these events. There is no way JC would be involved with an agent who stole money from one of his favorite players.

But the NCAA had records of texts and phone contacts and not what was said in those conversations, so the program was unable to defend itself. This was as much a technicality as the situation with Tim, which I have gone on record before your post as stating Tim did not deserve to be punished.

 

[intlzncster]

Define bogus stuff for me please.

Calhoun has had a series of players steal laptops, get kicked out of school, failing to achieve some pretty low academic requirements, and has overseen a series of recruiting violations that were followed by cover-ups. Phone calls are not what he got punished for at all. Having an agent deliver a player to you and then having your Assistant Coaches cover it up is a little bit worse than playing in garbage time in scrimmages.

The point that I was making was the Tim committed no crime and even if you want to defend Jim Calhoun, he is the CEO, and crimes were committed under his watch. Compare the two and it is impossible to decide that Tim should lose about 3% of his playing career and Jim Calhoun should lose 0.2% of his coaching career.

Your move.

Lol Tin foil hat man. That's not even close to what happened. It's ok that you haven't bothered to learn the details of the situation. Most people let their dislike for Calhoun color their perceptions. Read the NCAA report or simply ignore the facts. We are talking about a 2+ years NCAA investigation that turned up nothing as egregious as what you say. The "having an agent deliver a player" is comical by the way.

 

[ctchamps]

Your info is totally wrong. Yeah, players stole laptops. And what did Calhoun do wrong? Nothing. You're mad because UConn kicked players out for misbehavior? Uh. Your list of wrongdoing is only about envy.
Phone calls ARE what he got punished for. Read the NCAA's judgement. UConn was dinged for MINOR rule violations. It's funny that you write that an agent delivered a player to UConn when that agent was introduced to the player by a member of the coaching staff AFTER the player had committed to UConn. The extent of the support that agent offered was dinners and a car ride. No one covered it up either. After the initial allegations that Asst. Coach Pat Sellers lied to the NCAA, he was exonerated in the subsequent investigation when he proved he didn't lie.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/tournament/2011/columns/story?columnist=oneil_dana&id=6272554

The logic you use in that final stat is just laughable. People should be punished according to the length of their careers? HEH!!!!!

BTW, that's a great article. I never read it nor did I know Sellers was cleared of wrongdoing. And I never knew his relationship was still positive with the Huskies. It's great to know and maybe someday he gets reconsidered for a coaching position at UConn. He deserves it.

I can thank this ND flamer for learning something significant that I had been unaware of.

 

[HuskyBballFan]

Gottlieb was not under Brey's watch and he was punished appropriately. Where exactly in my argument is the BS? Does it hurt that badly to admit to wrongdoing? Look, my father played for UConn, I rooted harder than anybody for UConn growing up, and still do when it doesn't impact ND. But I can admit that the program has done wrong, and when compared to what Tim didn't do wrong, the punishments are not only inconsistent, they are absurd.

You should be smart enough to realize that bringing up the Calhoun situation was not going to go over well here. It's been discussed ad nauseum for over 2 years and we Uconn fans are well versed in our rebuttles to the countless people who have their mind made up about what really happened and believe what they want to believe.

Fundamentally, I think most of us agree that Tim's situation is unfair and unfortunate. That's what this thread is supposed to be about.

 

[zls44]

Jason, posting on a message board about stuff involving your father and your brother is a really, REALLY stupid idea.

If you want to complain about the NCAA being unfair, you're preaching to the choir.

 

[visitor123]

Bring it back to the point in question:

Did Tim do something wrong? If you are to somehow decide that he did, does the punishment fit the crime?

The points about UConn issues are completely fair in demonstrating the inconsistency in punishments handed out by the NCAA. I could look at the punishment for the Ohio State players as well and say that they only got 1 more game suspension than Tim. For consistency with my own arguments, that is about 9% of their total career - so it is more severe. But those players sold property that was theirs (and believe me, I'm not a fan of Ohio State), meanwhile their coach covered it up and was initially given a shorter suspension than the players.

The NCAA does not dare anger the coaches who make millions and can sue. But players who have no recourse and no voice are subject to harsher penalties for lesser crimes. The system reeks of inequity for "student-athletes" and to deny that is impossible.

Did Tim do anything wrong? No. But he was ignorant of the rules. When Calhoun claimed that the NCAA rulebook was confusing he was crucified in the court of public opinion. "You're supposed to know the rules". Shouldn't Tim have known the rules regarding his eligibility? When I was in college if I missed a course drop date do you think I got my money back or grade history deleted because I was 'unaware' of the rule?

UConn got 'caught' on a technicality too. Agent had illegal relationship with recruit. Agent was in contact with UConn because he was a former manager. There was no proof that the contacts were directly related to each other. The ONLY reason UConn was in trouble was because the said agent was a UConn alum and therefore considered a 'representative' of the school and cannot have any contact with recruits. If Nochimson was just some agent who graduated from Kentucky there would no violation.

 

[intlzncster]

Your info is totally wrong. Yeah, players stole laptops. And what did Calhoun do wrong? Nothing. You're mad because UConn kicked players out for misbehavior? Uh. Your list of wrongdoing is only about envy.
Phone calls ARE what he got punished for. Read the NCAA's judgement. UConn was dinged for MINOR rule violations. It's funny that you write that an agent delivered a player to UConn when that agent was introduced to the player by a member of the coaching staff AFTER the player had committed to UConn. The extent of the support that agent offered was dinners and a car ride. No one covered it up either. After the initial allegations that Asst. Coach Pat Sellers lied to the NCAA, he was exonerated in the subsequent investigation when he proved he didn't lie.

Absolutely no offense intended, but this inaccuracy has been repeated over the years and sticks in my craw. NO UConn basketball players stole laptops. A non-basketball player stole some laptops. One player placed a call for this non-basketball player to try and sell those stolen laptops. The other player involved tried to cover for the player who placed the call. Both were punished to the same degree as any regular student would be in a similar situation.

 

[ctchamps]

Bring it back to the point in question:

Did Tim do something wrong? If you are to somehow decide that he did, does the punishment fit the crime?

The points about UConn issues are completely fair in demonstrating the inconsistency in punishments handed out by the NCAA. I could look at the punishment for the Ohio State players as well and say that they only got 1 more game suspension than Tim. For consistency with my own arguments, that is about 9% of their total career - so it is more severe. But those players sold property that was theirs (and believe me, I'm not a fan of Ohio State), meanwhile their coach covered it up and was initially given a shorter suspension than the players.

The NCAA does not dare anger the coaches who make millions and can sue. But players who have no recourse and no voice are subject to harsher penalties for lesser crimes. The system reeks of inequity for "student-athletes" and to deny that is impossible.

The problem I see with your rant and attack is that not many people in this thread want Tim to suffer punishment.

Most people in this thread supported Tim and Notre Dame. One or two people alluded that the NCAA treats JC harsher than other programs. But that was not a demonstration that the NCAA should punish Tim.

You came here and escalated things. You created an attack that wasn't even warranted if you read most of the posts in this thread. You went on the offensive against UConn and JC. People here were talking about the NCAA and its unfairness to JC and not that Notre Dame or Tim Abromaits deserved punishment.

And now you are trying to justify yourself and making this an issue about big time coaches and so forth. There is a lot of junk going on in college sports. The sweetheart deal ND has with NBC has raised red flags. This is a no win situation for any of us to get into a p*ssing contest about who is more morally superior to whom. There is enough dirt on all of us to keep things local instead of global. Tim did not deserve to be punished and I'm happy he will be playing for Notre Dame this season.

 

[ctchamps]

Absolutely no offense intended, but this inaccuracy has been repeated over the years and sticks in my craw. NO UConn basketball players stole laptops. A non-basketball player stole some laptops. One player placed a call for this non-basketball player to try and sell those stolen laptops. The other player involved tried to cover for the player who placed the call. Both were punished to the same degree as any regular student would be in a similar situation.

Would call this a technicality of a technicality.

 

[HuskyBballFan]

Did Tim do anything wrong? No. But he was ignorant of the rules. When Calhoun claimed that the NCAA rulebook was confusing he was crucified in the court of public opinion. "You're supposed to know the rules". Shouldn't Tim have known the rules regarding his eligibility? When I was in college if I missed a course drop date do you think I got my money back or grade history deleted because I was 'unaware' of the rule?

Just to clarify here before Jason does - Tim did not need to know the rules. Mike Brey needed to know the rules.

 

[ctchamps]

Do you really believe that was their only involvement in the crime, and does that make them any less guilty even if you do? It's difficult to have a reasonable conversation with unreasonable people.

How am I being unreasonable?

 

[upstater]

@HusbyBballFan You're absolutely right that the people on this forum would a) know more about the Calhoun situation than me and that b) they wouldn't be able to see the point that I was making. I'm pretty open minded about "infractions" because to me the group committing the biggest crimes is always the NCAA. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/10/the-shame-of-college-sports/8643/

As I said, I'm still a UConn fan, but if the NCAA were after the right things, having players get kicked out of school or not graduate would be a bigger crime than phone calls. But that still leaves Jim Calhoun guilty, and to be fair, with Gottlieb, ND should have been punished as well. But that was 16 years ago and under a different coach - so it's not defending Brey - it's saying that Brey wasn't even in the picture.

Why is kicking a player out of school a crime? You're saying schools should be rewarded for keeping players who commit malfeasance in school? And, if your standard is to punish schools that don't graduate players, why would anyone recruit a potential early NBA draft kid? Your criteria would benefit schools like ND that have fewer NBA players than UConn.

Yes, Calhoun is guilty of making phone calls. !!!!!!!!!! And it's not even illegal anymore to make too many phone calls!

 

[UConn Do It4]

Didn't bother reading anything in this thread once I saw Abro comment. Best FHS player ever. Yeahhh Farmington!

 

[upstater]

I'm not saying that they should be punished for kicking kids out but for not running a program whose players contribute to the academic environment of a university. That was really a good attempt to spin words though.

As to recruiting players that are early NBA entrants, that should not be a crime, you're right. I think that a better metric than simple graduation rate or even some of the newer "progress" rates needs to be found. But if you were to remove the early entrants to the NBA draft it doesn't affect many graduation rates significantly. The NCAA is historically bad at measuring the right things. I don't know if this is still the case, but players who died, and those who transferred and graduated elsewhere used to count against a school's graduation rate.

The point is that the NCAA is really worried about minutia of rules that don't matter rather than making good rules that actually motivate outcomes that would be consistent with their stated mission.

I agree with you on the bogusity of the APR.

But you're slandering Calhoun for recruiting kids not contributing to the academic environment of the university. One such kid, a laptop kid, in this case, was the product of a two parent family, both of whom were professionals with Ivy League degrees, he was raised in the suburbs, experienced a life-threatening illness while at Uconn, overcame it, got into trouble, served his one year suspension, and then subsequently graduated.

You're saying that Calhoun should not have recruited a kid like this? Really?

 

[intlzncster]

Do you really believe that was their only involvement in the crime, and does that make them any less guilty even if you do? It's difficult to have a reasonable conversation with unreasonable people.

Are you aware of something I'm not? Why read more into a situation than is actually there? The kids were never even in possession of the laptops. Why not claim that Calhoun handed 10 grand to Nate Miles? As long as we are reading whatever we want into things. As I said, they were guilty of what they did and were punished accordingly with respect to the University's student code of conduct.

It's not a stretch in the least to say that the media often exaggerates the situation, especially with UConn (both because of ESPN's proximity and JC's intractable ways with media members--he's a polarizing figure). For example, the original Yahoo article is responsible for many of the inaccuracies in the Nate Miles investigation. Much of it was unfounded, but once it gets passed along often enough, it becomes "fact".

Being reasonable is separating yourself from media reports and investigating what is in 'official' reports, the primary sources. Most people are more interested in getting up in arms at Calhoun, rather than taking the time to investigate the facts of the matter.

 

[Walker11]

Guy, your brother is missing 4 games. It seems to me that you are overreacting. Why are you even attacking Uconn after your brother had a minor punishment for an extremely minor violation. Most Uconn fans root for your brother and wish that he could have played for us even though it was very hard to project him being such a great player.

Detroit is the only decent game that he will miss and they are going to be missing their best inside player.

 

[upstater]

Agreed that this forum can be a hornets nest, but as for who the NCAA is more unfair to, consider the outcome for UConn vs. Tim. UConn, regardless of what the transgression was, doesn't have Calhoun for three games against teams that they will kill. He can continue to coach forever. Tim loses 4 games, one of which is against a tough Detroit team that has two very good players that are going to be borderline NBA talents. He cannot suit up for ND next year. So yes, preaching to the choir, but I think if the choir were being honest with themselves, they'd recognize that they got pretty lucky relative to Tim.

You act like UConn wasn't docked multiple scholarships for something that isn't even illegal anymore.

 

[intlzncster]

I'm not saying that they should be punished for kicking kids out but for not running a program whose players contribute to the academic environment of a university. That was really a good attempt to spin words though.

As to recruiting players that are early NBA entrants, that should not be a crime, you're right. I think that a better metric than simple graduation rate or even some of the newer "progress" rates needs to be found. But if you were to remove the early entrants to the NBA draft it doesn't affect many graduation rates significantly. The NCAA is historically bad at measuring the right things. I don't know if this is still the case, but players who died, and those who transferred and graduated elsewhere used to count against a school's graduation rate.

The point is that the NCAA is really worried about minutia of rules that don't matter rather than making good rules that actually motivate outcomes that would be consistent with their stated mission.

You won't find a single person on this forum who does not agree with most of this post. The NCAA does not handle transfer situations well either, regarding APR. Upstater was referring to the fact that you brought up "kids getting kicked out" as one of you examples of Calhoun's failings. I'd say it's the right thing to do, more than anything.