The U being, well, The U

I went with a WSJ link this morning to give this blog a more 'serious' tone to it. With that out of the way, what the hell is going on in Miami? Nevin Shapiro, some ponzi schemer that is (was?) a Miami booster, is blowing the whistle on Miami and it's looking kinda bad for the Canes. In interviews with Yahoo! Sports, Shapiro claims some of the benefits he provided to players "included but were not limited to cash, prostitutes, entertainment in his multimillion-dollar homes and yacht, paid trips to high-end restaurants and nightclubs, jewelry, bounties for on-field play (including bounties for injuring opposing players), travel and, on one occasion, an abortion".

The depth of Shapiro's alleged illegal activity with the Hurricanes has people talking about the Death Penalty; something we have only seen once in NCAA football - SMU got sanctioned with it in 1987. In fact, this sanction has only been doled out by the NCAA five times in history across all sports. The Death Penalty prevents a school from competing in a sport for a year. End of discussion. It is the steepest penalty that the NCAA can hand out and you have to be in some deep shit for them to play the card.

That said, I can see where The U is worried about receiving the Death Penalty. SMU had a slush fund set up and was literally paying players while they were playing football. Not to mention that players were being given money to sign with SMU to begin with. When you look at some of Miami's alleged violations, they look pretty similar. Funny thing is, this is only a big deal because the people involved are scholarship athletes. You know what you call cash, prostitutes, and entertainment in mutimillion dollar homes/yachts otherwise in Miami? A typical weekend.