Kansas Crimson

IllinoisJayhawk wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 1:15 pm Meh. Not surprised and don't really care because I don't think the act of the recruits/families getting money is "wrong".

...but I suspect some people who refused to accept this has been going on for decades will be/act shocked.

I'm guessing this is as bad as they've got on us. Thankfully no wiretap stuff.

sdoyel wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 1:44 pm Well, he's done testifying so we may never know.

columbusdjkc wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 2:52 pm Is it really a concern though? All those texts are pretty vague. Money wasn’t discussed so the key issue still isn’t an issue? So what if they talk about recruits? Nothing illegal about it. Now I get we probably did some shady stuff but it doesn’t matter what people think it matters what people can prove and I don’t think just based on those texts that anyone can prove anything.

jfish26 wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 2:56 pm

columbusdjkc wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 2:52 pm Is it really a concern though? All those texts are pretty vague. Money wasn’t discussed so the key issue still isn’t an issue? So what if they talk about recruits? Nothing illegal about it. Now I get we probably did some shady stuff but it doesn’t matter what people think it matters what people can prove and I don’t think just based on those texts that anyone can prove anything.

Agree 100% - I'm just less confident now than I was this morning about the likelihood that there won't be a true smoking gun.

"In my mind, it's KU, Bill Self. Everyone else fall into line. Too (expletive) bad," Gassnola replied. "That's what's right for Adidas basketball. And I know I'm right. The more you have lottery picks and you happy. That's how it should work in my mind."

"That's how ur (sic) works. At UNC and Duke," Self replied.

Gassnola answered by saying Kentucky as well.

"I promise you I got this," Gassnola texted. "I have never let you down. Except (Deandre). Lol. We will get it right."

What that exchange features is Gassnola essentially promising Self that he'll help him land five-star prospects because Kansas is Adidas' biggest basketball program and what's good for Kansas is good for Adidas. Gassnola assures Self he will deliver because he's never previously let him down -- except for that time with Deandre Ayton, the five-star center who enrolled at Arizona, a Nike school, even though Gassnola paid one of Ayton's friends $15,000, according to testimony last week. And Self welcomes the help from Adidas because, he believes, North Carolina and Duke get similar help from Nike. So does Kentucky, Gassnola proclaims.

Simply put, this has been college basketball for a while.

Self was right.

That's how it works.

[...]

And this is a point I've made for over a year now -- since the day Jim Gatto, Merl Code, Christian Dawkins and seven other men were charged with federal crimes via an ongoing investigation into corruption in college basketball -- the point that shoe-company assistance, regardless of what's right or wrong, was largely considered acceptable behavior in the sport before the government said it's not.

That's the truth.

It might sound crazy now, I know. But the perception of shoe-company involvement in recruiting was so prevalent in recent years that I rarely heard a coach complain publicly or even privately about losing a so-called Nike kid to a so-called Nike school, or a so-called Under Armour kid to a so-called Under Armour school, or a so-called Adidas kid to a so-called Adidas school, even when the coach believed a shoe company had compensated a family in violation of NCAA rules. It was, more or less, for many, just considered part of the sport.

Again, Self's texts underline that point.

Why did he want Gassnola working for Kansas? Because, he believed, somebody at Nike was working for Duke and North Carolina. And why was Gassnola so anxious to help Kansas? Because, he believed, somebody at Nike was also helping Kentucky.

That's four blue-blood programs with Hall of Fame coaches.

"That's how [it] works," Self texted Gassnola.

Yep.

That's. How. It. Works.

columbusdjkc wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 5:22 pm How about the other side of it. From a long term financial picture does it benefit the NCAA to put down some of their largest money makers?

pdub wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 5:18 pm I think we deserve punishment from the NCAA.
As long as other schools get punished for skirting the rules.
But we are past that point...so either they put their foot down and hit most everyone or, what I think they do, ignore it and try to enforce/regulate more efficiently in the future.