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Lord Ash
10-22-2015, 08:57 AM
Anyone see his series of tweets about the UNC scandal?

"there were no allegations of wrongdoing against UNC men's basketball or Roy Williams."

And then he went on and on, bending over backwards to parse words and avoid saying the obvious; this was a cheating scheme to keep athletes eligible. And I don't get it. Is Wayne Walden not part of UNC men's basketball? I mean, the whole thing centers on the advisors, right? Didn't Roy say he would rather lose his entire coaching staff, rather than Wayne?

And shouldn't the point REALLY be about who benefited, and why the entire program for cheating was likely put in place? I mean, the first guys to benefit were Dean Smith's basketball players, long before any other sport got a chance to cheat as well. And in the years that followed we had entire teams in fraudulent departments, we've had actual star basketball players come out and SAY they were part of a massive cheating scheme.

This seems like such a bizarre "missing the forest for the trees" stance. Yeah, I get that Jay is a lawyer, but this isn't a lawsuit, which can often hinge on semantics.

Such a shame to see a guy with such a huge platform using that platform like this.

mgtr
10-22-2015, 09:19 AM
Maybe this was on orders from higher-ups at ESPN. Seems very strange.

arnie
10-22-2015, 09:26 AM
Maybe this was on orders from higher-ups at ESPN. Seems very strange.

Bilas is entitled to his own opinion- just as we are. I've disagreed with some of his stances, and this is just another one. It would be sad to find out his job is dependent on echoing the highly biased opinions of his UNC boss.

dudog84
10-22-2015, 09:27 AM
I know we're all homers, but just because he went to Duke doesn't mean he has integrity.

This is disturbing. But I don't listen much to Jay anymore.

CameronBornAndBred
10-22-2015, 09:31 AM
Maybe this was on orders from higher-ups at ESPN. Seems very strange.
Well, ESPN is getting ready to a lot of house cleaning, so job security! ;)

DukeFanSince1990
10-22-2015, 09:38 AM
Anyone see his series of tweets about the UNC scandal?

"there were no allegations of wrongdoing against UNC men's basketball or Roy Williams."

And then he went on and on, bending over backwards to parse words and avoid saying the obvious; this was a cheating scheme to keep athletes eligible. And I don't get it. Is Wayne Walden not part of UNC men's basketball? I mean, the whole thing centers on the advisors, right? Didn't Roy say he would rather lose his entire coaching staff, rather than Wayne?

And shouldn't the point REALLY be about who benefited, and why the entire program for cheating was likely put in place? I mean, the first guys to benefit were Dean Smith's basketball players, long before any other sport got a chance to cheat as well. And in the years that followed we had entire teams in fraudulent departments, we've had actual star basketball players come out and SAY they were part of a massive cheating scheme.

This seems like such a bizarre "missing the forest for the trees" stance. Yeah, I get that Jay is a lawyer, but this isn't a lawsuit, which can often hinge on semantics.

Such a shame to see a guy with such a huge platform using that platform like this.

Maybe that's what he thinks? Maybe?

plimnko
10-22-2015, 09:42 AM
only thing i can figure is his tweeter account has been hacked by cheat heels

budwom
10-22-2015, 09:43 AM
Bilas is entitled to his own opinion- just as we are. I've disagreed with some of his stances, and this is just another one. It would be sad to find out his job is dependent on echoing the highly biased opinions of his UNC boss.

But Bilas saying basketball was not named is not just his opinion; it is factually wrong as many have pointed out on other sites. I don't know how he can possibly defend this.

bob blue devil
10-22-2015, 09:47 AM
Yes, disappointing. By all accounts Roy comes across as a decent guy and I'm sure Jay knows him personally. I'll bet Jay just doesn't want to believe the truth and is suffering from biases that are interfering with his judgment. That and he has a history of pandering to the large fan bases.

uh_no
10-22-2015, 09:49 AM
But Bilas saying basketball was not named is not just his opinion; it is factually wrong as many have pointed out on other sites. I don't know how he can possibly defend this.

As a lawyer, I'm sure he could find a way....but he doesn't

It's been a long time since bilas has been just about decent commentary, and like Dickey V, he's become at least as much about his schtick. You can't get 2 minutes into a game before he starts spouting off about the NCAA, Paying players, some rule Bilas doesn't like, or whatever. I've found him insufferable to listen to recently.

It would be different if he did actually reasonably defend his points against counter arguments, but he says stuff like "players need to be paid. period." I didn't just fall off the turnip truck, jay, give me something intelligent rather than regurgitating something. Flesch out your arguments, convince me.

We see it here too. I don't know if he's being ignorant or a shill...but at least make an argument. Maybe there is a defensible point there, but by just saying something idiotic, he doesn't make himself (or this university) appear the better.

brevity
10-22-2015, 09:53 AM
Bilas is entitled to his own opinion...

Then he should look for it. Regurgitating the company line is a waste of his time.

Not that it matters. Jay Bilas' Twitter account is usually a messy string of replies, because he lacks restraint and takes on all comers. I can still watch and listen to the guy, but I can't read him.

Lord Ash
10-22-2015, 09:54 AM
Maybe that's what he thinks? Maybe?

Hm, here is the thing.

I am not sure if it is factually wrong. I think the report went out of its way to be a bit vague. I think he IS just trying to be "factual" here. So sure, he might "think" that.

But this is certainly one of those cases where the "facts," such as they were presented, seem to be less important than the motivation and underlying story.

There was decades of cheating at many levels in UNC. Entire administrations and athletic departments have been cleaned out. Thousands of athletes have been proven to be involved. It has been proven that the first people to cheat were basketball players under Dean Smith, by looking at the Wainstein report. It is also pretty clear that there was a lot of cheating involving title winning teams, when you consider that the AFAM department is known to be fraudulent and the 2005 UNC team was entirely made up of AFAM majors. We've actually had high profile athletes come out and say that they cheated, that their teammates cheated, and that everyone knew it. We have employees in the basketball department actually emailing about this stuff, we have emails from people discussing how to hide the athlete participation, emails discussing how regular students have found out about the fake classes.

So what's the *point* of tweeting this one single statement?

Is he trying to say that basketball was innocent of wrong doing? That defies all logic and understanding of the situation.

Is he trying to make a point that basketball won't be punished? Basketball is mentioned SPECIFICALLY as benefiting from illicit activity.

Is it JUST to try to make a single factual statement, and then ignore every possible underlying message that goes with it?

I'm just baffled. And as a Duke grad and former Duke athlete, who did an AWFUL lot of work at Duke and did it alongside other athletes in a wide variety of sports (including, yes, revenue sports) I just don't get why a person in Jay's position would tweet this, and then try to defend it.

Ichabod Drain
10-22-2015, 10:14 AM
This isn't anything new, this has been his opinion for a while and he has stated it before. Not sure what the big deal is. I've seen CBB personalities on both sides of the UNC thing since it came out.

Maybe he's trying to sound neutral and not hate on UNC because he's a Duke guy or maybe that's what he actually believes. Either way it's not going to change the outcome for UNC. Whatever that outcome may be.

Indoor66
10-22-2015, 10:20 AM
I know we're all homers, but just because he went to Duke doesn't mean he has integrity.

This is disturbing. But I don't listen much to Jay anymore.

I agree. Jay lost me several years ago. Now, IMO, he has just become another blowhard.

dudog84
10-22-2015, 10:27 AM
Try this one on...

Maybe it's a set-up. Bilas hates the NCAA, wastes no opportunity to slam them. So when the NCAA hammers UNC, he gets to pontificate on how terrible the NCAA is. Must support the agenda at all times and at all costs.

gumbomoop
10-22-2015, 10:29 AM
Lots of good observations here ^.

I agree most with this one:


It's been a long time since Bilas has been just about decent commentary, and like Dickey V, he's become at least as much about his schtick. You can't get 2 minutes into a game before he starts spouting off about the NCAA, Paying players, some rule Bilas doesn't like, or whatever. I've found him insufferable to listen to recently.

I don't know if he's being ignorant or a shill...but at least make an argument. Maybe there is a defensible point there, but by just saying something idiotic, he doesn't make himself (or this university) appear the better.

His schtick gets more embarrassing almost by the day, including his "I gotta go to work" oeuvre. A superb basketball analyst, he seems to find the game itself insufficiently challenging to his intellect. So increasingly he comes across as full of himself. Maybe that's not the "real" Jay Bilas. But it is the public persona he's decided to perform.

El_Diablo
10-22-2015, 10:36 AM
I have said it before and will say it again: Jay Bilas has absolutely zero credibility on this.

As Dan Kane has reported, Roy Williams "told Wainstein’s investigators that shortly after he arrived at UNC, he was concerned that so many of his athletes were majoring in AFAM; the 2005 team alone had 10 of 15 players with that major. He said he told one of his assistant coaches, Joe Holladay, to make sure they weren’t being steered to the major. The report also said Williams knew McCants took 'three or four' independent study courses in the spring 2005 semester. McCants took three that were listed as an independent study. The fourth was identified as AFAM 65, Topics in Afro-American Studies. That, too, was a paper class. In the Wainstein report, Williams said he told Holladay to emphasize that his players should be in lecture classes instead of independent study. After the Wainstein report came out, Williams said in two news conferences that he was concerned about his players clustering in a major."

But Bilas can only muster this type of nonsense with respect to Roy Williams' claims that he didn't know about McCants' classes:

“I find him to be credible, and I believed what he was saying. The idea, somehow, that a coach—especially when you go back to 2005—would know about the players’ choices in classes and electives when they’re juniors, I don’t believe that’s the case, and I believe Roy Williams.”

“The issue really was, McCants declared to go pro in the middle of that (junior) semester and was gone by the time his grades came out,” Bilas says. “So, to expect the coaching staff, somehow, to have their antenna up for that in 2005, I think, is asking a little too much, and I think the context of that time period is very important.”

swood1000
10-22-2015, 10:40 AM
Anyone see his series of tweets about the UNC scandal?

"there were no allegations of wrongdoing against UNC men's basketball or Roy Williams."

And then he went on and on, bending over backwards to parse words and avoid saying the obvious; this was a cheating scheme to keep athletes eligible. And I don't get it. Is Wayne Walden not part of UNC men's basketball? I mean, the whole thing centers on the advisors, right? Didn't Roy say he would rather lose his entire coaching staff, rather than Wayne?

And shouldn't the point REALLY be about who benefited, and why the entire program for cheating was likely put in place? I mean, the first guys to benefit were Dean Smith's basketball players, long before any other sport got a chance to cheat as well. And in the years that followed we had entire teams in fraudulent departments, we've had actual star basketball players come out and SAY they were part of a massive cheating scheme.

This seems like such a bizarre "missing the forest for the trees" stance. Yeah, I get that Jay is a lawyer, but this isn't a lawsuit, which can often hinge on semantics.

Such a shame to see a guy with such a huge platform using that platform like this.
Well, it is clear that there were no allegations against Roy Williams. MBB was mentioned in Allegations 1 and 5 and those were allegations against "the institution" and not against "the men's basketball program." But what difference does that make? Is Jay saying that he thinks that will have some impact on the penalties? Is he saying that wins in which ineligible MBB players participated will not have to be vacated because the allegation was against "the institution"? Is he saying that post-season bans are not imposed if there is a finding of LOIC against "the institution"? Does anybody have his exact tweet? What point was he trying to make?

HK Dukie
10-22-2015, 10:44 AM
Jay says what he believes. And guess what he is right a lot of the time. Personally I think he is wrong this time, but I've never questioned his integrity and I won't here either.

I think at the end of the day he just hates the NCAA rules so much that he doesn't want to be a stickler on these issues. He is not one to kowtow to a UNC grad, just because of an ESPN pecking order (where the boss may actually make less than a few of the on air talent).

oldnavy
10-22-2015, 10:47 AM
Jay and all the other so called experts who announce BB games are the reason I hit the mute button when the game comes on.

arnie
10-22-2015, 11:45 AM
Try this one on...

Maybe it's a set-up. Bilas hates the NCAA, wastes no opportunity to slam them. So when the NCAA hammers UNC, he gets to pontificate on how terrible the NCAA is. Must support the agenda at all times and at all costs.

That line of reasoning had occurred to me and I think you nailed it. Hopefully when the heels are rightfully punished, we will see how far Bilas takes it out on the NCAA.

swood1000
10-22-2015, 11:55 AM
http://forums.dukebasketballreport.com/forums/images/misc/quote_icon.png Originally Posted by dudog84 http://forums.dukebasketballreport.com/forums/images/buttons/viewpost-right.png (http://forums.dukebasketballreport.com/forums/showthread.php?p=832439#post832439)
Try this one on...

Maybe it's a set-up. Bilas hates the NCAA, wastes no opportunity to slam them. So when the NCAA hammers UNC, he gets to pontificate on how terrible the NCAA is. Must support the agenda at all times and at all costs.
That line of reasoning had occurred to me and I think you nailed it. Hopefully when the heels are rightfully punished, we will see how far Bilas takes it out on the NCAA.
So you think Jay is saying that the failure to have specific allegations against Roy or MBB, instead of simply against the institution, shows that the NCAA is incompetent?

Henderson
10-22-2015, 12:02 PM
Hm, here is the thing.
I am not sure if it is factually wrong. I think the report went out of its way to be a bit vague. I think he IS just trying to be "factual" here. So sure, he might "think" that.


I think this nails it. The NOA doesn't specifically allege violations by the MBB program or by Roy. Jay already staked out his position in support of Roy, so he's pretty locked in both professionally and psychologically.

Jay is wrong on this issue. Now I'm off to cut off big chunks of slack to send to him. Jay is a smart, talented basketball analyst who's good on TV and happens to have been instrumental in some important years in the history of Coach K's era at Duke.

P.S. I don't think being consistently critical of the NCAA on certain issues means Bilas "hates the NCAA."

allenmurray
10-22-2015, 12:08 PM
ESPN has a lot of money - the real question isn't why Jay tweeted - the real question is how much money is he willing to walk away from

dudog84
10-22-2015, 12:13 PM
So you think Jay is saying that the failure to have specific allegations against Roy or MBB, instead of simply against the institution, shows that the NCAA is incompetent?

No, no, no. I'm saying that Jay avers that Roy is an upstanding man who would never do anything wrong. His stance is that the NCAA is the bad actor, not incompetent. Though he may think that also.

cspan37421
10-22-2015, 12:22 PM
Is it not to Jay's advantage as a reporter to keep Ol' Roy on his good side? Don't you think Roy (and staff - by extension!) is less likely to share insider scoops with a reporter taking a publicly adversarial position?

I'm not saying I share Jay's publicly-stated opinion - far from it - but the incredulity kind of fades if you realize what motivations Jay may be balancing here.

Steven43
10-22-2015, 12:27 PM
I first became aware of Jay Bilas when he played for Duke in the early-to-mid 1980's. He was a pretty good player, definitely not close to great. But I liked him because he played for Duke. But around ten years ago when I started to see Bilas consistently overpraising UNC while underpraising Duke, I lost all respect for him. It was so very obvious that he was bending over backwards to find ways to compliment UNC while doing the same to slight Duke. Yes, it takes a lot of inner strength as a commentator and public figure to go against the general feeling of love towards UNC and hatred towards Duke amongst the vast majority of North Carolinians. It's not easy to be in Bilas' position. But, if he truly had integrity he would not have done what he did.

Jay has always been quite smug, bordering on arrogant. I could overlook those personality failings if he were not so biased in his discussions of UNC and Duke. But the fact that he is thusly biased makes it difficult to listen to the guy. Whenever he comes on the radio or the television I usually feel compelled to change the channel. And now he comes out with these lame comments in regard to UNC and their recent scandals? It's all too much.

MaxAMillion
10-22-2015, 12:28 PM
Show me some examples of TV analyst saying a coach should be fired? They rarely do it. Any TV analyst blaming Roy Williams or Dean Smith? These guys develop relationships with coaches. They check in with them before games. Access is received and info shared based on positive relationships. Jay Bilas is doing what most TV analyst do. He takes the side of the coach.

swood1000
10-22-2015, 12:40 PM
No, no, no. I'm saying that Jay avers that Roy is an upstanding man who would never do anything wrong. His stance is that the NCAA is the bad actor, not incompetent. Though he may think that also.
In this article (http://chapelboro.com/news/unc/jay-bilas-believe-roy-williams/), Bilas says that he believes that Roy Williams did not know anything about Rashad McCants getting help to remain eligible. OK, well no smoking gun has been found in Roy's hands yet so it is possible for (credulous) people to still give Roy the benefit of the doubt. But Bilas apparently does not deny that McCants did receive the extra help, meaning that he would not blame the NCAA for bringing charges against UNC for infractions involving MBB. Does anyone have a link for a statement by Bilas that there were no allegations against MBB. It would be helpful to see what he was getting at.

Monmouth77
10-22-2015, 12:42 PM
Is it not to Jay's advantage as a reporter to keep Ol' Roy on his good side? Don't you think Roy (and staff - by extension!) is less likely to share insider scoops with a reporter taking a publicly adversarial position?

Sure, but wouldn't silence on the matter suffice? I find very cynical the idea that Jay Bilas would express publicly an opinion about the UNC cheating scandal generally, or about Roy Williams' alleged complicity in the scandal, in particular, if he did not believe that opinion.

If what many upthread have suggested is true -- that Jay is tweeting these remarks as a proactive effort to maintain journalistic access to UNC's program, or to "circle the wagons" in some way to protect the blue-blood coaching fraternity, or, more cynically yet, to sell a narrative he or his employer is invested in above the truth -- I find his motives disturbing.

The thing that has occurred to me since the very beginning of this scandal -- and certainly since the Wainstein report was published -- is that I cannot imagine this happening at Duke without a swift, significant, and painful re-evaluation of sports and academics that would cut to the bone and radically re-orient Duke University's relationship with sports. For someone like Jay Bilas, who no longer speaks for Duke, but who is deeply tied to the Duke community, to make public statements that downplay the significance of what apparently happened at UNC, really bothers me. And that is regardless of whether Jay may be right in his own criticisms of the NCAA and its exploitation of the student-athlete relationship.

Olympic Fan
10-22-2015, 12:45 PM
But the issue that Jay should address is this -- recently Jim Boeheim and Larry Brown have been sanctioned by the NCAA for issues that they were not charged with doing or even knowing about ... in both cases, the issue was something the NCAA deemed they SHOULD have known about.

In Roy's case, does it matter if he knew or participated in the academic scam that the NCAA claims involved men's basketball (page 49-50, Jay, look it up)?

Won't he be sanctioned anyway under the same standard that got Boeheim and Brown?

PS I get tired of hearing how men's basketball wasn't specifically mentioned in the NOA -- but keep in mind the NOA that was released was HEAVILY redacted by UNC. There are quite a few e-mails about specific students -- their names redacted -- in the NOA. There are more than a dozen e-mails from or to Wayne Walden, the academic advisor for men's basketball to the major players in the scandal. What sport do you think the athletes mentioned in those e-mails played? Water Polo? Jousting?

The idea that no basketball player was named is a fairy tale that the UNC spin machine has concocted.

PP One of the PP sleuths has looked into their e-mails closely and makes a pretty convincing argument that the redacted names in one incriminating e-mail is Quentin Thomas and involved a phony class he was steered to 2005 (when he played on Roy's first title team).

johnb
10-22-2015, 12:54 PM
Jay's wealth, fame, and entire adult life are based on basketball holding an outsize role in our country. I'd guess a blind spot would be his inability to look critically at a system that has treated him so well. Pampering of athletes hardly occurs only at UNC. It boggles the mind to think that Jay believes a big time coaching staff doesn't pay extraordinary attention to eligibility. If he believes this Carolina situation doesn't stink, I have to take a second look at the whole enterprise of college sports and their role in the University.

swood1000
10-22-2015, 01:15 PM
But the issue that Jay should address is this -- recently Jim Boeheim and Larry Brown have been sanctioned by the NCAA for issues that they were not charged with doing or even knowing about ... in both cases, the issue was something the NCAA deemed they SHOULD have known about.

In Roy's case, does it matter if he knew or participated in the academic scam that the NCAA claims involved men's basketball (page 49-50, Jay, look it up)?

Won't he be sanctioned anyway under the same standard that got Boeheim and Brown?

But Boeheim was slammed because his subordinates were caught holding the smoking gun. The Syracuse decision said:

Further, the institution's head basketball coach failed to promote an atmosphere for compliance and monitor his staff. In particular, he failed to promote an atmosphere for compliance because his student-athletes and staff did not understand applicable NCAA legislation or engaged in conduct that violated NCAA legislation. He failed to monitor the director of basketball operations – who committed academic violations after being hired by the head basketball coach to address academic concerns within his program.

But before it can be said that the head basketball coach should have known about something his subordinates were doing they have to be shown with the smoking gun in their hands. Wayne Walden's position is that his knowledge was exaggerated in the Wainstein Report. See this story (http://www.scout.com/college/north-carolina/story/1501251-walden-responds) for Walden's position, which the enforcement staff apparently was unsure that they could penetrate.


PS I get tired of hearing how men's basketball wasn't specifically mentioned in the NOA -- but keep in mind the NOA that was released was HEAVILY redacted by UNC. There are quite a few e-mails about specific students -- their names redacted -- in the NOA. There are more than a dozen e-mails from or to Wayne Walden, the academic advisor for men's basketball to the major players in the scandal. What sport do you think the athletes mentioned in those e-mails played? Water Polo? Jousting?

The idea that no basketball player was named is a fairy tale that the UNC spin machine has concocted.

PP One of the PP sleuths has looked into their e-mails closely and makes a pretty convincing argument that the redacted names in one incriminating e-mail is Quentin Thomas and involved a phony class he was steered to 2005 (when he played on Roy's first title team).
MBB was specifically mentioned in the NOA (in Allegation 5, and the actions of specific players in Allegation 1). Bilas is saying that the allegations were against the institution and not against MBB, but I don't know what point he is trying to make.

BD80
10-22-2015, 01:33 PM
Jay is a lawyer. When friends or family ask me who would/should win a legal issue raised in the news, my standard answer is "which one is my client?"

Jay has the same approach. The unc scandal is bad for his "client," ESPN basketball. Downplaying the scandal is good for his business.

Remember, this is SOCIAL MEDIA. This does not even rise to the level of a blog, and is well below anything approaching journalism, even TV journalism.

Jay is by far the most well-informed basketball analyst, and may be the most well-informed ever. We should be proud that he is a Duke alum, but we do NOT have to agree with everything he says.

swood1000
10-22-2015, 02:29 PM
Is Jay's animosity toward the NCAA based on anything other than his belief that student-athletes should be allowed to be paid?

luburch
10-22-2015, 03:30 PM
Is Jay's animosity toward the NCAA based on anything other than his belief that student-athletes should be allowed to be paid?

I think it stems more from the fact that he believes the majority of the entire NCAA rule book is "silly."

83and86
10-22-2015, 03:53 PM
I've always thought Jay's principal motivation was his desire to be taken seriously and not be seen as a Duke homer. So whenever Duke and/or Carolina are involved, Jay bends over backwards to take the Heel position. He's been pretty consistent throughout his broadcasting career on these issues. Many Heel fans will hate anything related to Duke just because that is the way they are. But the "thinking" Carolina fans (yes, I know there aren't that many) actually really like Jay because of his pro-Heel stance. This just strikes me as more of the same from Jay. When you add in his hate for the NCAA, it all just fits.

budwom
10-22-2015, 03:54 PM
There are still a number of people on this thread who fail to acknowledge that Bilas is factually wrong. He said there were no allegations against men's basketball.
This is unambiguously wrong. It's not a matter of what he believes to be true. He clearly misstated a fact. There is no excuse for this whatsoever.

It is true that Roy Williams was not specifically named, but that's a separate issue (and I happen to believe the NCAA was wise to not specifically allege this).

swood1000
10-22-2015, 05:32 PM
There are still a number of people on this thread who fail to acknowledge that Bilas is factually wrong. He said there were no allegations against men's basketball.
This is unambiguously wrong. It's not a matter of what he believes to be true. He clearly misstated a fact. There is no excuse for this whatsoever.

It is true that Roy Williams was not specifically named, but that's a separate issue (and I happen to believe the NCAA was wise to not specifically allege this).
Well, the allegations were technically against "the institution" and not against "the men's basketball program" although I don't know what difference this makes or even whether allegations are ever made specifically against "the men's basketball program." (My Acrobat is busy converting to searchable text these huge PDF files that were just released and I can't open any other PDF files until that's done.)

Why do you think it was wise not to specifically name Roy?

OldPhiKap
10-22-2015, 05:53 PM
1. Jay always takes the side of coaches and players against the NCAA. No surprise.
2. The idea that ESPN is somehow dictating or even influencing what he tweets seems pretty far-fetched to me.
3. Jay was responding to a tweet which said the MBB and/or Roy was named. Jay correctly stated that they were not.
4. Twitter is 140 or so characters. It is barely a full thought. I think this is way overblown.
5. Jay apparently knows and likes Roy. None of us know him or like him. If Jay is biased towards a friend (and good source), so be it. We are all biased the other way on this.

77devil
10-22-2015, 06:18 PM
1. Jay always takes the side of coaches and players against the NCAA. No surprise.
2. The idea that ESPN is somehow dictating or even influencing what he tweets seems pretty far-fetched to me.
3. Jay was responding to a tweet which said the MBB and/or Roy was named. Jay correctly stated that they were not.
4. Twitter is 140 or so characters. It is barely a full thought. I think this is way overblown.
5. Jay apparently knows and likes Roy. None of us know him or like him. If Jay is biased towards a friend (and good source), so be it. We are all biased the other way on this.

MBB was named, but I agree with your sentiment re: Jay.

sammy3469
10-23-2015, 07:57 AM
Well judging by the pictures he retweeted this morning, it looks like he doing a debate with one Oliver Luck yesterday. Draw your own conclusions.

mattman91
10-23-2015, 08:22 AM
We can all have our own opinion.

That being said, they are all a bunch of lying, cheating bastards.

Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15
10-23-2015, 09:53 AM
1. Jay always takes the side of coaches and players against the NCAA. No surprise.
2. The idea that ESPN is somehow dictating or even influencing what he tweets seems pretty far-fetched to me.
3. Jay was responding to a tweet which said the MBB and/or Roy was named. Jay correctly stated that they were not.
4. Twitter is 140 or so characters. It is barely a full thought. I think this is way overblown.
5. Jay apparently knows and likes Roy. None of us know him or like him. If Jay is biased towards a friend (and good source), so be it. We are all biased the other way on this.

This is pretty much my opinion too, particularly #1. I am not shocked to learn that an attorney and professional sports personality is more level-headed than most posters on a message board.

sandinmyshoes
10-23-2015, 10:38 AM
This is pretty much my opinion too, particularly #1. I am not shocked to learn that an attorney and professional sports personality is more level-headed than most posters on a message board.


That last sentence really says it all. If I wanted to add some edge to it, I would say that Jay approaches sports as an adult. I hope that some how he gets a chance to some day factor in directly to reforming the NCAA.

jipops
10-23-2015, 12:06 PM
Jay has been on a crusade against the exploitation of college athletes for some time now. One would think he would be all over the uNC scandal which is a prime example of that exploitation, pure and simple. To say what he did with all of the evidence present against the men's basketball program along with the idea that the college coach of about 15 kids would have no knowledge of their academic whereabouts is beyond preposterous. To dismiss all of the evidence completely undermines his own crusade.

bob blue devil
10-23-2015, 12:15 PM
I find it humorous but sad that speaking out of ignorance or cynical self interest can be characterized as being level headed or acting like an adult.

COYS
10-23-2015, 12:35 PM
Jay has been on a crusade against the exploitation of college athletes for some time now. One would think he would be all over the uNC scandal which is a prime example of that exploitation, pure and simple. To say what he did with all of the evidence present against the men's basketball program along with the idea that the college coach of about 15 kids would have no knowledge of their academic whereabouts is beyond preposterous. To dismiss all of the evidence completely undermines his own crusade.

I strongly agree with this. I never minded Jay being critical of Duke's basketball team or praising UNC's, even when it seemed like he was over compensating to avoid any perceived Duke bias. However, what UNC did to its athletes (men's basketball, included) is absolutely a perfect example of how colleges exploit athletes. The NCAA is certainly part of the system that allows such exploitation, but that doesn't reduce the culpability of the individual schools and, ESPECIALLY, the coaches and staff that are supposed to have the best interest of the players in mind. How Jay fails to draw a connection between the bogus classes at UNC and the broader exploitation of athletes by college athletics is beyond me.