SEC fails Texas A&M as Aggies are hit with NCAA probation
Texas A&M has been in the SEC since 2012, but the hazing continues.
The SEC just sacrificed the Texas A&M Aggies to put them in a display case an example that the league is tough on crime when the universally agreed perception of the league is that it’s a CHOP zone.
No conference takes care of its own better than the SEC, because it just means more. What the NCAA announced is that the Aggies are in the SEC by name only.
On Thursday, the NCAA announced the findings of its one-year investigation into the Texas A&M football program under head coach Jimbo Fisher.
Someone in the SEC violated the unwritten code that says you report any violations to the SEC, and let the SEC handle it rather than the NCAA. No conference turns on each other more than the SEC, but they keep their cheating in house.
At least we know Texas A&M is trying to act like an SEC team.
Someone in the SEC office should be getting an earful from either Jimbo, or athletic director Ross Bjork. Texas A&M President Micheal Young should be in on that Zoom call, too.
Jimbo was slapped with a meaningless, six-month show-cause penalty, which essentially means he’s not leaving for another job.
The NCAA stated that the agreed upon violation was an assistant coach had “impermissible recruiting contact with a prospect at his high school. The conversation was impermissible because it occurred before the completion of the prospect’s junior year in high school.”
The NCAA also said, “The head coach failed to promote an atmosphere of compliance because of his personal involvement in the recruiting violation. The agreement also said the head coach failed to monitor his staff when he did not ensure the program was staying within the allowable number of countable athletically related activity hours.”
The penalties are graded as Level II, which are not disastrous for Jimbo or the Aggies. The recruiting limitations are the only hits.
The NCAA’s penalties include:
* One years of probation
*A $5,000 fine, which Fisher can find in his car glove compartment.
*A reduction in football official visits by 17 days during the 2019-20 academic year.
* An off-campus recruiting ban for the entire football coaching staff for November 2019, which reduced the permissible evaluation days for the 2019-20 academic year by 19.
* A seven-day off-campus recruiting ban for the football coaching staff for the 2020 spring off-campus recruiting period and a 10-day off-campus recruiting ban for the football coaching staff for the 2020 fall off-campus recruiting period.
* The university ended its recruitment of the prospect
* A ban on recruiting any prospects from the prospect’s high school for the 2019-20, 2020-21 and 2021-222 academic years.
* A six-month show-cause order for the head coach. The terms of the show-cause order include a previously served nine-day ban on phone calls, emails or texts with prospects in January 2020; a reduction in off-campus recruiting contact days by three for the December 2019 through January 2020 contact period; a ban on all off-campus recruiting activities for the fall 2020 contact period; additional one-on-one rules education; and a public statement from the head coach addressing the violations.
* A six-month show-cause order for the assistant coach.
Texas A&M and Jimbo were essentially busted for standard college football coaching behaviors.
The only difference is someone ratted them not to the office in Birmingham, Alabama (SEC) but the big office in Indianapolis, Indiana (NCAA).
Texas A&M has been in the SEC long enough that this should conclude the hazing procedures.
This story was originally published July 2, 2020 at 12:51 PM.
