The funny thing is, it's now being reported Pryor's driver's license has been suspended for over 90 days. So what was he doing driving off in his 350Z last night?
Russ, about the Bball program, it wouldn't surprise me if something turned up but I don't think anything major is going on there. Matta has brought in a bunch of talent though, so I wouldn't be shocked.
Wally, the Jim O'brien thing is misrepresented all the time. I think that guy was as honest and upstanding as a coach can be. He sued and won that he was wrongfully terminated by OSU. The thing he got in trouble for was giving a Serbian player money. But he did so AFTER he was declared inelgible to play at OSU because he was deemed to have been a professional in Europe. The guy never played a minute for OSU and his home/family was in the middle of the war. O'brien gave him his own money as a humantitarian gesture.The NCAA did come down hard on OSU/O'brien but I would never lump O'brien in with Tressel. O'brien was a good guy, Tressel acted like one.
He was paying the kid prior to him being declared ineligible because he said after looking into the kids background he knew the NCAA would declare him ineligible.
Even the judge who ruled in O'Brien's favor said it was the result of a bad contract not a lack of wrong doing by the coach.
"It is clear that this seemingly unfair result arises from the extremely favorable provisions of the contract," Ohio Court of Claims Judge Joseph T. Clark wrote in his decision.
"The contract is extremely favorable to the plaintiff but it is not unreasonable," Clark said in his decision. "The parties in this case negotiated a contract virtually guaranteeing [O'Brien] that he could not be terminated for an NCAA infraction."
I complained then they weren't cited for LOIC for giving such a contract.
here's collegehoop.net on the O'Brien story. Shortly after the recruiting trip, O’Brien became aware that Radojevic had played briefly for a professional team in Yugoslavia in 1996 and that this made him ineligible to play for any collegiate program in the United States. O’Brien continued to try to recruit Radojevic in the hopes that OSU could petition the NCAA and have his eligibility reinstated. Radojevic signed a letter of intent to play for the Buckeyes on November 11, 1998 and paid an official recruiting visit to the school the following month. Shortly after this recruiting visit, O’Brien came to the conclusion that Radojevic would not be able to have his eligibility reinstated. At approximately the same time, O’Brien’s staff was contacted by a friend of the Radojevic family who asked for financial assistance for Radojevic so that he could visit his mother and family in Serbia. An Ohio trial court found that O’Brien had “resolved” that Radojevic would not regain his NCAA eligibility and that it would, therefore, be permissible to give his family a loan on a purely humanitarian basis. O’Brien sent one of his assistant coaches, Paul Biancardi, to New York City with an envelope containing $6,000 in cash to a waiter known as “Semi” Patrovic. It was not known at the time what relationship Patrovic had to the Radojevic family, but Patrovic ultimately became Radojevic’s sports agent. No one other than O’Brien and Biancardi were aware of the transaction.
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note, O'Brien did not notify TOSU that he had paid the recruit, they found out 5 years later after they'd spent time and money petitioning the NCAA to reinstate the kids eligibility. There was a whole dirty side to that story that got glossed over because O'Brien won in court. He knowingly broke the rule and let the school continue to petition which implies he was perfectly willing to play the kid after paying him, if the NCAA had reinstated him.
note what the basketball program apparently has to deal with now is that several early stories on this mentioned that Sullinger's signed jersey was hanging in several of the same restaurants and clubs that had signed football memorabilia linked to this scandal. Shortly after the early reports there were stories that those jerseys were all being taken down(football and Sullingers). So it's reasonable to at least assume he may have done the same thing and sold his signed jerseys, but everyone is focused on football, if basketball is involved too then you get the LOIC.
And yes that's the Paul Biancardi who is now in charge of basketball recruiting news for ESPN.
