The final “Meeting of the Minds this week tackles the biggest topic in college football right now: The Miami Hurricanes.
What’s next and where does Miami go from here?
The guys at Crystal Ball Run answer that question.
Michael Felder: By now everyone’s got their chance to talk about how much of a rat fink Shapiro is, how grandiose the benefits were, how incredibly screwed the former Canes coaches are and how “bad” Miami’s overall violations are in total. Let’s talk 2011 in a vacuum though; forget about coming sanctions and what “might” happen and look squarely at August through January for The U.
What do you see happening for the Canes this year? Can they afford to play any of the 12 players who possibly committed violations? Does Al Golden need a good year to engineer his move out of the danger zone? How do they look on the field?
Personally if I’m the Canes I ride it out with these players until the NCAA tells me I have to pull them. If Cam Newton and Ohio State taught us anything it is don’t punish unless you absolutely have to. Keep this group of guys rolling until the charges are substantiated and try to roll up some wins. Given the scope of this investigation, and the wealth of things involved, odds are this doesn’t get wrapped up with a bow until next year.
As for Golden, I hope he’s got his lawyer working hard to get the buyout clause removed from his contract. With Joe Pa’s health in question and the old man seemingly on the way out (again?) he might be able to finagle his way into Penn State with a good season and no buyout to combat.
Aaron Torres: Michael, I heard your podcast with Bomani Jones on Miami (fabulous by the way), and I agree with you: Play everyone until the NCAA says no. Looking at this realistically, major, big-time sanctions are coming; nobody here needs me to tell them that. Quite literally, this could be the last really good run a Miami team has for the very foreseeable future. So with that said, go down swinging.
Interestingly, I never really understood why UNC chose to sit players when they were put in the same situation last year. Being realistic, here are your options:
If you play everyone, and they’re found to be ineligible, what happens? You forfeit games. Weren’t you going to lose them if you’re sitting Jacory Harris, Travis Benjamin, Sean Spence, Vaughn Telemaque and Co. anyway? And who cares about making your sanctions worse… the NCAA is going to crush you anyway. The only way I sit those guys is if I’m Al Golden and I’m already trying to figure out what my next job is. If that’s the case, then I don’t want any NCAA smudges on my otherwise impressive resume.
(And of course what happens if you choose to do the “noble,” thing and sit everyone who is under investigation? Well, that’s very commendable of you, I guess. But what happens if all those guys end up being innocent? Then you’ve done no one any favors)
Speaking of Golden (he, along with new basketball Jim Larranaga) are really the only sympathetic characters in this whole mess. I don’t know how these contracts work, but Miami had to have breached it somehow, by not being straight-forward with him about this mess. No? Either that, or Golden just pretty much has the worst lawyers ever.
Either way, I think he sticks around for this season, while slowly crafting some kind of exit strategy out of South Beach. The fact is, huge sanctions are coming, and I find it virtually impossible to expect him to be able to keep that great recruiting class of his together. Staying at Miami will all but end a bright coaching future before it really even begins. Who wants a 6-8 year rebuilding plan to get back to wear you are now, which isn’t all that good to begin with? As Bomani says (and I’m paraphrasing) “Sometimes, there’s no shame in quitting.”
The way I see it, Golden can either leave for another job, or do TV for a year. Short of going 0-12 this year, there will be enough public sympathy to land him on his feet in a good job in 2013, if he can’t do so in 2012.
Maybe by then, the throne in Happy Valley will finally be vacated.
Of course if that were the case, Golden will have another problem on his hands: Getting that nasty moth-ball smell out of the coach’s office.
Allen Kenney: Ha, you guys have more balls than brains. (And I mean that in the nicest way possible.)
Al Golden is basically standing on a hill a mile away, watching the NCAA slowly descend upon Miami’s fortress. The ‘Canes have peashooters; the Association has tanks. You want him to run in there and get wiped out, too?
The best thing Golden can do for his own career is to try and not get his rep tainted by the mess he has walked into. He had nothing to do with this, but thumbing his nose at the NCAA is a good way to make sure he ends up right in the middle of it.
If he’s got good reason to think the guys under investigation will be cleared and he feels they deserve to play, by all means, go ahead. Otherwise, there’s no sense in playing Russian Roulette with his career.
Hell, if I’m Golden, my lawyers are working overtime to figure out how I can get a year’s salary and the rest of my contract voided. Then, I hit the bricks, pronto.
Tom Perry: How about if Al Golden goes the other route? He chooses to bench/suspend all of them, go to the Miami administration and basically give him a 10-year, no fire contract so he can build Miami back (if the Canes avoid the Death Penalty).
He could wield some serious power and make some serious money.
Miami might lose a lot for four to six years, but he could come off as the guy who cleaned up Miami. Only problem, I’m not sure Miami can be dominant without cheating.
Aaron Torres: Allen, that’s actually a very reasonable point on Golden. Truthfully, I was comparing the situation at Miami to North Carolina without thinking about the obvious: The ship was sinking in both places, but only Butch Davis was going down with it. As you said, Golden’s rep is still spotless at this point.
To Tom’s point, I can’t say that I agree about going to the administration and restructuring your contract. The truth is that within the next few months I fully expect that there is a new AD (hell there have been three in the last four years) and President (sorry Ms. Shalala, you’ll have to bowl elsewhere), and you just never know who you’ll be working for. Golden would be playing Russian Roulette by playing his ineligible players. He’d also be by re-working his contract at this point too.
The place that I absolutely agree with you thought Tom is this: I don’t know if you can win big at Miami without breaking the rules.
As I wrote earlier this week, Miami is a glamour town, and everyone wants to be associated with whatever the “hot thing,” is. We saw it with the Miami Heat last year, and in 1997, when the Marlins set a World Series attendance record.
But guess what? Over the last 30 years it’s been Miami football. Since the last time the Dolphins won a Super Bowl, Miami has won five National Championships in college football. To quote LeBron James, “Not one…not two…not three…five.” You get the point.
Understand that winning brings a lot of things.
In Miami, one of those things is savory characters.
For updates on breaking news, as well as college football insight, opinion and more, be sure to follow Crystal Ball Run on Twitter @CrystalBallRun
