March and April are two of the busiest and most exciting months for sports fans.  Between the NCAA Men’s and Women’s basketball tournaments, the NFL draft, and Major League Baseball getting underway, there is always something to watch on TV.  These months also bring NCAA hockey playoffs and, inevitably, the conclusion of seasons for those that do not make it further.  With the end of the NCAA hockey season comes signing of players to professional contracts.  This is a pivotal moment in many players’ careers because, much like a football player declaring himself eligible for the draft, once a hockey player makes the decision to forgo collegiate eligibility, there is no turning back.

One of the most discussed players in the coming days and weeks will certainly be Jordan Schroeder from the University of Minnesota.  Schroeder was drafted #22 overall in the 2009 draft and fans of the Vancouver Canucks know him as a future franchise forward.  According to recent reports, Schroeder will inform both the University of Minnesota and Vancouver of his decision by the end of this week.  While Schroeder had mild success at the collegiate level, he admits that it he was disappointed with his production.  After a successful two-year career with the U.S. National Team Development Program (USNTDP) and an equally successful three-time campaign representing the U.S. at the IIHF World Junior Hockey Championships in 2008, 2009, and 2010, Schroeder will almost certainly have success at the NHL level.

If he decides to sign an NHL contract, Schroeder will definitely not be the only NCAA Division I hockey player to make the early jump to the professional ranks in the coming weeks.  Several players have already decided to turn pro and are already playing at minor league levels, and for some, the NHL level.  For example, Casey Wellman, a sophomore at the University of Massachusetts, signed with the Minnesota Wild earlier this week and should see playing time by sometime this weekend.  Wellman followed the path of the starter for the Los Angeles Kings and Olympic backup, Jonathan Quick, who left UMass as a sophomore in 2007.  Soon to follow Wellman to the pros is James Marcou, a junior and also from UMass, whom is reported to be signing a professional contract in the coming weeks.

With turning pro, there are several factors for players to weigh.  Under NCAA Article 12.1.2, student-athletes are prohibited from being paid for playing their respective sport.  This means that a once a player turns pro and starts receiving compensation for playing time, there is no turning back to a collegiate career, even if their pro career is unsuccessful.  While there is a certain allure to being paid to play, players must also keep in mind the best interests of their future development.  All of this information is certainly a lot to consider for a player that is generally around 20 years-old.

On Monday, March 15, the NCAA did its best to assist student-athletes with the decision process by issuing an informational memo to “Men’s Ice Hockey Student-Athletes with Remaining Eligibility.”  Almost every player in the position to turn pro will have an advisor during this process, which is permitted by NCAA rules.  The March 15 memo informs players that an advisor may not “contact teams on [their] behalf to arrange private workouts or tryouts,” but may provide other valuable advice during the process.

An NCAA hockey player’s decision to turn pro is unique in that unlike with the NFL, where players must wait several months between deciding to turn pro and actually being able to play, hockey players that make the same decision, can play almost immediately for a professional team.  For some players, this means going right to the NHL, for others this means starting at other minor league levels, such as the AHL or ECHL.  The professional level at which they play will be a combination of their skills, their player contract, and certain NHL CBA stipulations.

Regardless of whether Schroeder turns pro, this is an exciting time for players that want to see their careers taken to the next level.  What other players do you think will leave early for the pros after their hockey season ends?

James Paxton’s fight with the NCAA brings out everything I hate about organized sports.  When it becomes all about money, power, and respect, people suffer.  Those, like Paxton, who do nothing illegal, unethical, nothing out of hatred or spite, but still get punished, show the problems that may exist in organized sport.  When institutions grow in strength, they feel that they can do whatever they please.  In this case, the institution won.  James Paxton was pushed away from the University of Kentucky, the university he came back to after passing up a seven-figure offer from the Toronto Blue Jays.  This is the NCAA’s way of saying thanks, but no thanks.  We have a boatload of student-athletes; you are just one unnecessary person in a large group of college baseball players.

Here is my most recent post, which explains some more about James Paxton’s situation, in case his name does not ring a bell.  The gist: The University of Kentucky suspended Paxton because he would not cooperate with NCAA investigators who wanted to question him about his advisor (Scott Boras) supposedly having direct communication with someone from the Blue Jays front office after Paxton was drafted last year (an NCAA rule violation).

After James Paxton withdrew from the University of Kentucky, the institution of higher education released the following statement (with my emphases added in certain parts):

The University of Kentucky is very disappointed in James Paxton’s decision to not meet with the NCAA about a potential amateurism issue. No one wanted James on the mound in a Kentucky uniform more than UK head coach Gary Henderson, athletics director Mitch Barnhart and the UK Athletics staff. Due to the possibility of future penalties, including forfeiture of games, UK could not put the other 32 players of the team and the entire UK 22-sport intercollegiate athletics department at risk by having James compete. It’s about the team and giving student-athletes the opportunity to achieve their goals. Throughout the process, UK has remained confident that James would be able to pitch for Kentucky during the 2010 season and UK offered every bit of assistance to aid James in that NCAA process.

UK does not know all the facts of last summer’s post-draft interaction among James, his advisors and the Toronto Blue Jays and has not prejudged his situation. James has an obligation under NCAA Bylaw 10.1 (j) to answer questions that relate to his amateur status. On advice of his counsel, James has elected not to be interviewed by the NCAA. UK has offered to pursue an immediate application for reinstatement for James with the NCAA if that became necessary. However, no request for reinstatement of his eligibility can be made based on mitigating circumstances until the student-athlete and his family cooperate and make all facts known to UK, with the NCAA having the opportunity to verify those facts. UK has never been provided all pertinent information from James and his family, who are following the legal advice of his attorneys not to be interviewed by the NCAA. Without knowing all the facts, UK cannot present mitigating circumstances to the NCAA on James’ behalf.

UK is more optimistic than James and his family that any period of ineligibility could be shortened to allow James to pitch during the last and most important part of the season, the Southeastern Conference schedule. So it is disappointing that James is unwilling to go through the normal NCAA process, allowing UK to appeal for him, if necessary. The University of Kentucky is sad to see James leave its baseball team, especially after other players gave up portions of their scholarships in August so that he would have a substantial scholarship for his senior year.

While UK is extremely disappointed in the decision made by James to not meet with the NCAA, he will always be a member of the Wildcat family. UK hopes that James will stay and earn his degree and wishes him the best in his professional baseball career. Should James change his mind and be willing to cooperate with the NCAA inquiry, the door is open for him to return to the UK baseball team and UK will seek any immediate appeal necessary for his reinstatement.

If it truly is about the team and giving student-athletes the opportunity to achieve their goals, wouldn’t that mean that the team/school would rally behind its individual athletes?  Does UK think that the stance it has taken will encourage future baseball players to attend its school any more after not backing up one of its own student-athletes?  And that sentence about UK being sad to see Paxton leave, especially after other players gave up portions of their scholarships…Please!  Do you care about Paxton, or do you wish you had the money to pay the other guys?

Now take a look at Paxton’s attorney’s statement regarding Paxton’s decision to leave UK.

In light of UK’s decision to issue a press release Friday evening, I feel compelled to explain this sad state of affairs, none of which would be occurring, if UK was not scared to death of the NCAA.

UK’s fear of the NCAA has resulted in UK withholding James from intercollegiate baseball competition, when there are no allegations or evidence against him, when he is eligible to play, and when UK admits that it cannot compel James to speak to the NCAA. This fear is based upon the unsupported supposition that someday allegations would be filed against James predicated upon some unknown set of facts that would result in some unknown NCAA retaliation down-the-line.

As everyone knows, James turned down a lot of money from the Toronto Bluejays to come back to UK to play with his teammates and for his coach with the hopes of reaching the post-season and the possibility of winning the College World Series for the Wildcats.

The past several months have been very challenging for James and his family as well as for his teammates and coach. To the many who have stood by him, he is forever grateful for their support.

Much has been speculated about why the NCAA wishes to interview James, even though UK admits that it does not know, and this speculation has focused on a single, unverified blog entry, which is vague at best. However, the implication is that James’ attorney violated the NCAA’s No Agent Rule, which attempts to limit his attorney’s representation of him, and which would be held invalid in Kentucky, if James were ever charged with such a violation—just like it was held invalid in Ohio in the Oliver v. NCAA case last year. The NCAA’s presumptive penalty for a No Agent Rule violation is permanent ineligibility, and not six games or the like that has been bandied about as a possible sanction for such a violation.

Some people wonder why James won’t just go to an NCAA “interview,” if he has nothing to “hide,” so let me tell you why:

First, at UK, students have due process rights under its Code of Student Conduct, faculty have these rights by Kentucky statute, James’ coach and the athletic director have these rights via their lucrative contracts, and UK has these rights via NCAA Bylaw 32, which affords it the rights, when it is being investigated, that it has ironically denied to James. In addition, all of these persons have the rights guaranteed by the Kentucky Constitution. However, James is being denied these rights. Indeed, despite making massive profits on the backs of student-athletes, the NCAA provides no due process protections to student-athletes like James;

Second, what the NCAA cloaks as an “interview” is in reality a prosecution and execution by ambush without notice of what the subject matter will be. On top of that, the NCAA sometimes relies on confidential witnesses, dubious so-called “evidence,” like blogs, without any standards for credibility or weight, and so on. The NCAA acts like an unscrupulous bully by doing essentially whatever it wants without regard to the rights of student-athletes;

Third, at the end its prosecution and execution of a student athlete, the NCAA, does not even have to put its reasoning or the alleged violations in writing to James. With absolute power over the athlete—as the UK AD put it, “the NCAA holds James’ life in its hands”—the NCAA is completely unaccountable to student-athletes;

Fourth, the schools like UK, which described itself to James as just the NCAA’s messenger, are forced to do the NCAA’s dirty work. Under NCAA rules, only UK can suspend James, and all suspensions are indefinite by definition. Indeed, UK indicated to James back in September that, if he went to the NCAA “interview,” he would be suspended— even though UK said that it did not know why. Thus, James has already been told going to an interview means suspension, and under NCAA rules, the suspension is indefinite and possibly forever;

Fifth, in December, James was told by UK that, if the interview was about the No Agent Rule, and if James went to the “interview” and asserted his attorney-client privilege regarding his communications with his attorney, it would be interpreted as not cooperating, and he would be suspended. In fact, UK told James that the NCAA Bylaws superceded his right to have confidential and privileged communications with his attorney, which is mind-boggling. In a nation built upon due process and equal protection, the NCAA’s refusal to respect student-athletes’ right to counsel is staggering;

Sixth, once suspended, only the NCAA can reinstate James, and it can impose whatever penalties it wants as a condition of reinstatement. James has no right to even seek his own reinstatement, and only UK can supposedly “represent” him on reinstatement, subject to whatever position regarding his future it decides to take, even if James disagrees with it. Thus, in layman’s terms, the NCAA has banned James from having any individual right to appeal, so it can do whatever it wants to him, and he has absolutely no recourse of his own; and

Seventh, UK which is beholden to the NCAA, scared of the NCAA, and the selfdescribed messenger of the NCAA, stated in its press release that it is “disappointed” that James is unwilling to go through “the normal NCAA process.” This is astonishing, because in a civilized society, the “normal NCAA process” is hardly normal and is about as un-American as it can get. Hypocritically, UK and the other NCAA members do not believe that such a process would be fair to them, since they have negotiated their own due process protections that apply to them, when they are investigated by the NCAA.

James’ lawsuit against UK was a civil rights case under the Kentucky Constitution, where he challenged the denial of due process rights to student-athletes, yet the circuit court did not even discuss the merits of this challenge. Likewise, the court of appeals did not analyze or even discuss any of the specific arguments advanced on James’ behalf, and, instead, it blamed James for this situation, which was hardly of his own making. While James could have sought discretionary review in the Kentucky Supreme Court, any such review, if at all, would most likely have come long after the baseball season was over, thus making the effort a futile one, all the while leaving James in limbo during the remainder of the season.

At some point, James believes you have to stand up for what is right, and James has decided to do so by taking a leave of absence from the University. James understands that his life will be defined by his principles, and he is making a heartbreaking sacrifice to stand up for what he believes is right. James is a wonderful young man with a bright future, and he will emerge from this process stronger and wiser than he was before. I look forward to that day very soon, when I will be able to see him pitch in the Major Leagues.

In conclusion, James apologizes to his teammates and coach, who are stuck in the middle, just like he is. James wishes his teammates and his coach a successful season, and he will be there in spirit cheering them on. James is and always will be a Wildcat at heart.

Sad ending to a sad story.

When I first reported on Andy Oliver back on June 2, 2008, no one had heard of him.  Since then, he has made national headlines in every major paper for his lawsuit against the NCAA, which eventually was settled for$750,000.  The antiquated NCAA Bylaw 12.3.2.1 was voided, only to be re-established by the settlement.  It looked like the NCAA would finally receive a blow, but the settlement allowed the organization to remain unscathed ($750,000 is pennies to the NCAA).

Many would say that the NCAA has gone back to its usual tactics of ignoring the rights of student athletes in favor of doing whatever it pleases.  One person who agrees with that statement is Richard Johnson, the attorney who represented Andy Oliver in his lawsuit.  Johnson also has the pleasure of representing another student-athlete who has a solid claim against the NCAA.  This player’s name is James Paxton, and he may have a stronger case than Oliver had.

Just as Oliver was a standout pitcher for Oklahoma State, Paxton is the #1 pitcher for the University of Kentucky.  Oliver was informed of his violation before the NCAA laid down a penalty.  Paxton was not as fortunate.  A University of Kentucky employee basically told Paxton that he would have to sit out from playing and would lose his financial aid if he refused to meet with NCAA investigators for a violation that the NCAA would not disclose.  The employee informed Paxton that when a basketball player cooperated with the NCAA, he only received a 6-game suspension instead of having to sit out the entire year.  Recently, UK has stated that Paxton will not have to sit out.

Paxton was drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays in the Supplemental First Round (#37 overall), largely due to his fastball, which has been clocked up to 98 mph.  He decided to come back to UK for his senior season instead of signing for the offer presented to him by the Blue Jays.  In all likelihood, the NCAA investigation surrounds Paxton’s actions regarding the draft.  Did his advisor have direct contact with someone in the Blue Jays organization?  His advisor was the same man who most recently represented Andy Oliver: Scott Boras.  Boras has already said that he is compliant with NCAA rules and regulations.

“We are compliant with the NCAA rules by mandate,” Boras said. “We have to go to families and charge them for information that we would otherwise not charge for. And we have to go through the bailiwick of having the parents deal with the teams through our counsel, which is crazy.”

The most shady part of how the NCAA has handled this thus far is that the NCAA told Paxton to keep the investigation hidden from his parents and lawyers.

Enjoy the Memorandum in Support of Plaintiff’s Motion for a Temporary Injunction, replicated below.

The NCAA has formally approved the use of Twitter for recruiting purposes.  This is definitely big news for college coaches, who will use Twitter to sent direct messages to high school recruits.  But what about agents?  Agents are bound by strict NCAA regulations that prohibit contact with a student athletes until a certain point of their collegiate careers (depending on the sport).  Now, can agents, like college coaches, use sites like Twitter and Facebook to talk to athletes of any age, as long as they follow specific instructions?  These are the instructions for coaches:

1. On Twitter, stay away from @ comments.  Instead of reaching out to student-athletes by sending a message via @ reply, send it in a direct message.  This way, the conversation is 2-way and not open for all to see.
2. On Facebook, stay away from wall posts.  Send messages to individuals, instead.  Again, this creates the 2-way convo and does not allow others to chime in.
3. No problem being an athlete’s Friend on Facebook or Follower on Twitter.

Such Facebook messages and Twitter direct messages are considered to be the equivalent of an e-mail or blog post.  Interestingly, Instant Messages and text messages are still prohibited.  Almost anyone who uses Twitter on a phone receives Facebook and Twitter messages as texts…why make the distinction when there really is none?  A text is also kept private like a Direct Message on Twitter.  Is it because Facebook messages and Twitter DMs leave a trail, whereas texts are not kept on any type of server?  This way, just in case, the NCAA could sweep in and take over a student-athlete’s account and check on the messages going back and forth; something you cannot do with texts, which are often times deleted from a phone after roughly 15 days.

Anyway, NCAA Division I Bylaw 13.4.1.2 does not make it clear as to whether or not agents now have the same rights as coaches.  Anyone at the NCAA reading this that can fill us in?

Today I had a chance to check out the first day of the 2009 College Sport Research Institute (CSRI) Conference in Chapel Hill at the Friday Center. It was great hearing about some of the major issues in college sports and meeting some very interesting people. I especially enjoyed meeting Tim Newman (TimNATC on Twitter), who is the Sport Management Program Coordinator at York College of Pennsylvania, and Jeremy Bloom, who gave a great keynote speech from the perspective of a world-class skier and former college/pro football player who was denied two years of collegiate football eligibility because he accepted endorsements in skiing (that was the only way he could afford the costs of competing).

Here are some notes I took from some of the panels today.

Panel 1 – Special Admit Limbo: How Low Can You Go

The discussion centered around the criteria and amount of student-athletes who are admitted into various schools on a sports scholarship, even though they may not meet the minimum academic requirements for that specific school. Pellom McDaniels (Assistant Professor in the History Department at Univ. of Missouri-Kansas and former NFL defensive end) kicked off the discussion by saying that schools need to be selective in choosing who to admit, but careful that they don’t lump special needs athletes into a category where they don’t see their potential. John Blanchard (Senior Associate Athletic Director, UNC-Chapel Hill) said that the US is the only place in the world where athletics and higher education are so closely tied together and that “this is a question no one wants to talk about publicly.” Carie Leger (Director of Academic Support Programs for Athletes, NC State) mentioned that higher education requirements (during the time that athletes are in school) have led to improved graduation rates. Richard Lapchick (Endowed Chair and Director, DeVos Sport Business Program, Univ. of Central Florida) said that this isn’t a new problem and that another big concern should be the disparity between graduation rates of white athletes vs. black athletes (30% higher for white athletes from teams in this year’s Men’s NCAA Basketball tournament).

I was especially interested in how various universities treat “special admits.” At UMKC, McDaniels said athletes aren’t treated any differently than other students in the admissions process–there’s no specific process just for athletes. Blanchard and Leger mentioned that their schools have certain thresholds that athletes must meet to be admitted, but Lapchick said most schools do not operate like this. Lapchick gave the example that 95% of the football players at Univ. of California-Berkley are special admits, compared to just 2% of the general student body, and 94% of football players at Texas A&M are special admits, compared with 8% of the student body.

The APR has changed things to some extent in that coaches don’t want to risk admitting a large number of these athletes, since they risk losing scholarships if their graduation rates suffer. I think a lot of the discussion was good, but the bottom line is that if a coach really wants a “special admit” athlete to come to his/her school, it’s probably going to happen–especially at bigger schools where the coaches have a lot of influence. What do you think?

Panel 2 – ESPNification of College Sport

This panel had a catchy headline, but the discussion really centered around how college sports are being commercialized and how various players (not just ESPN) are using college sports content to generate revenue.

Amy Perko (Executive Director, Knight Commision on Intercollegiate Athletics) said the main issue relates to how various games and content are packaged and sold, and the lines between college and pro sports are becoming more and more blurred. Can universities pull back control of their content and how it is packaged from media companies?

Leonard Moore (Associate Professor of History and Assistant Vice President, Division of Diversity and Community Engagement, Univ. of Texas-Austin) said this is really about how media companies are promoting and exploiting black athletes, specifically male football and basketball players. He referred to National Signing Day as “ESPN’s annual trip to the hood.”

Burke Magnus (SVP for College Sports Programming, ESPN) said the discussion should focus on the balance of what’s good for athletes and what’s good for media companies. Danny Green (valuable member, UNC TAR HEELS, NATIONAL CHAMPIONS) was present to offer his perspective on some of the issues, and Jay Bilas (basketball analyst for ESPN) had some really interesting thoughts on the tension between academics and athletics and commercialism and amateurism.

Some of the discussion centered around whether or not ESPN and other media companies are negatively impacting college sports by televising certain events at certain times. The bottom line is that a media company is never going to say no to access; it should be up to the universities and conferences to establish limits to ensure that sports aren’t over-commercialized. But it’s tough for these players to say no to the money…

Another issue that was discussed was the control that the NCAA has over players’ images, names and likenesses. The NCAA is clearly profiting off certain players and allowing others to make money off them. For example, the NCAA lets players’ numbers and likenesses be used in video games, but won’t let actual names be used, even though everyone essentially knows who these players are. Jay Bilas had the perspective that pure amateurism doesn’t exist anymore, and I tend to agree with him on this. If this is true, should certain players who generate a lot of revenue receive extra benefits, such as not having to pay for insurance against injury? In the very least, I think universities should cover the full cost of attendance, instead of just the cost of a scholarship. What do you think?

Keynote Speech – Jeremy Bloom

Jeremy is a great speaker and is very passionate about his feelings towards the NCAA. And for good reason. He was denied the final two years of his eligibility in college football because he accepted endorsements for skiing. He put forward a great argument about the lack of transparency in the NCAA how the NCAA system is broken. The NCAA makes massive amounts of money off athletes but still considers them amateurs. He stated some of his ideas for improvements and how to help fix the system. Some of these included:

• funding scholarships at the cost of attendance
• taking revenue and putting it in a medical insurance fund for players
• expanding on funds to help former student athletes go to grad school
• giving star athletes special benefits

I don’t have enough knowledge on this subject to comment thoroughly but I do think that something isn’t right when the NCAA, which wouldn’t exist without student athletes, takes a percentage of all dollars generated but doesn’t cover the full cost of attending college for athletes who get scholarships. This is in addition to some other issues which make you wonder if the NCAA really is concerned with what is best for student athletes.

Panel 3 – The College Sports Arms Race – Is There An End In Sight?

This panel focused on discussion of the so-called college sports arms race (paying coaches more, bigger budgets, building new facilities, etc), whether or not this is a problem, and how to deal with it.

Dick Baddour (AD, UNC-Chapel Hill) said that by calling this an “arms race” we assume two things that aren’t necessarily true: 1) this is a new issue and 2) it’s negative. Baddour said that 15 years ago UNC’s athletic budget was 5.4% of the total budget for the university, and today it still makes up about the same percentage.

Robert Malekoff (Professor and Coordinator of Sport Studies, Guilford College) noted that there are many similarities in the way athletic departments operate and the way universities as a whole operate. It’s wrong to look at college sports spending and this “arms race” in a vacuum.

Kelly Mehrtens (AD, UNC-Wilmington) posed an interesting question. “Is it just about athletics?” At the end of the day, it’s about trying to attract the best. From an athletics standpoint, schools do what they can to attract the best coaches and players and from an academic side, they want to attract the smartest students and faculty.

Andrew Zimbalist (Robert A. Woods Professor of Economics, Smith College) noted that revenue and expenses of both FBS football teams and overall universities have grown at roughly the same rate from 2004-2006. He noted that the salaries of coaches from the top 32 FBS football teams and top 30 basketball teams are similar to their NFL and NBA coach counterparts, even though these pro teams generate much more money than college teams. So, coaches are essentially getting paid much more than they’re really worth.

Merhtens said there’s no way to really put a ceiling on coach salaries, and most people tended to agree with that. It would take an act of congress or the NCAA asking for antitrust exemption for them to be able to regulate this.

Most panelists agreed that they don’t see this arms race stopping anytime soon, and it’s not just a D1 issue. Some universities have tried to justify increased spending by saying they operate independently and are profitable. But most panelists agreed that it’s almost impossible to figure out how many athletic departments are actually profitable (The NCAA says six are), due to differences in accounting practices.

—–

There were some great discussions and ideas presented today at the CSRI Conference. The majority of these discussions focused on issues facing sports at the D1 level, probably because that is the level that gets the most visibility. But it’s important to remember that D2 and D3 schools exist, and they make up a large portion of college sports as well. A lot of the issues discussed don’t have as much relevance to the lower levels. That doesn’t mean they’re not important, but we should remember that you can’t over-generalize too much when throwing around issues in college sports, since some of these only affect certain schools, players and levels.

Raymond Lee Savage Jr., the CEO and President of Savage Sports Management was an All-American linebacker at the University of Virginia.  He has negotiated over 60 player contracts as a player agent.  He was arrested and taken into custody last Thursday.

In the end, all the money that you may receive by trying to circumvent the imposed rules is not worth it.  No one wants to be arrested or go to jail, and all of the money in the world cannot make you happy if you end up behind bars.  Universities and state authorities are cracking down and getting serious about prosecuting agents who violate NCAA rules and regulations.  This is most evident in southeastern states like Alabama and Arkansas.  Do yourselves and your clients a favor by adhering to the rules, keeping the playing field level, and resisting the urge to get a quick buck by jeopardizing others’ futures (NCAA athletes).

An important note about registering as an athlete agent in a state: you must only do so if you wish to recruit a Student athlete.  Thus, if you are aiming to sign a player who is already a professional (example: he is already in an MLB Minor League system), then you are not required to register in that player’s state.  However, if you are going to sign a player that will be entering a professional draft and he just finished his final season as an NCAA athlete, you should go ahead and get registered in his state as soon as you begin discussing the potential of representing him at the next level.  Most states offer a temporary license to athlete agents while their applications are pending, which makes sense, because many agents do not apply to become registered in a particular state until they believe they have a solid shot at landing a player there.  Such a plan makes sense when states are charging as much as $1,300 for registration (it adds up!).  We have not even discussed renewal fees, which most states require (often times every two years).

Since many states require sports agents to become registered as athlete agents, athletes might as well use such rules to their advantage.  As Jenn Meale, communications director at the state Department of Business and Professional Regulation of Florida points out,

The advantage of working with a state-licensed athlete agent is that licensure requirements must be met and include a criminal background check. (The regulations also) require that within the preceding five years, the applicant has not had a conviction or entered a plea of no contest . . . for any crime that relates to the practice of an athlete agent.

So athletes have a responsibility as well.  Do your background checks.  If I were not registered in the state of Florida, then you should ask me why that is the case.  Maybe I had some sort of criminal record, which may entice you to stay away from me since I am going to be having an instrumental role in helping you manage your life.  Luckily, my record is clean, but hypotheticals are needed to explain the point.

The individual state applications are a pain, but there definitely is a solid reason behind all of the madness.  Student athletes need to be protected as much as possible before they make the huge decision in selecting an agent.  Many states have made the athlete agent registration process easier by becoming a UAAA state.  All this means is that they have adopted the Uniform Athlete Agent Act of 2000, which attempts to standardize the requirements and process for becoming a licensed agent.

Oklahoma State LHP, Andrew Oliver, is a stud on the mound. In 2006, he was drafted in the 17th round by the Minnesota Twins. He declined joining the Twins organization and instead helped his OSU team break the top 25 college teams in the nation this year with his arm and his heart. In fact, the Sophomore was named Big 12 Player of the Week back in April, after pitching a complete game three-hitter. He was later named to the first-team All-Big 12. This would be the type of guy that a manager wants pitching in an important game that could decide the school’s season. Unfortunately, on May 31, against a strong Wichita State team looking to advance in the CWS, OSU coach Frank Anderson did not have Andy as an option. All because Oliver spoke to someone claiming to be an agent?

The Oklahoma State Cowboys lost the Saturday night game to Wichita State. The result may have been different had the baseball been in Andy Oliver’s left hand. Andy was labeled indefinitely ineligible to perform for the rest of the season, which included yesterday’s day game against TCU and the night match-up against same team from Saturday, Wichita State. OSU won a thriller against TCU, but fell to Wichita State. The team’s season is over…but why?

The whole issue is over whether Andy Oliver had an adviser or an agent. Time to go old-school and reference a post that I wrote back in August of 2006: Agent or Advisor?

Section 12.3.4 of the NCAA Bylaws explicitly allows for adviser panels to exist. Importantly, it states that an adviser can review a proposed professional contract, help in securing tryouts with teams, and even assist a student-athlete with the selection of an agent.

Main benefit of being labeled as an adviser: Your friend (client) can maintain NCAA eligibility – this allows a player considering leaving college early for the pros to return to his/her college team if contract negotiations with a professional team fails. Signing with an actual agent would end friend’s (client’s) college eligibility.

Let me add an additional important item that is sent to college baseball players in a memo titled, NCAA Major League Baseball (MLB) First-Year Player Draft, Agents, and Tryouts:

Question: Am I permitted to have an adviser during this process?

Answer: Yes, provided the adviser does not market you to MLB teams. However, an adviser will be considered an agent if they contact teams on your behalf to arrange private workouts or tryouts.

The Oklahoman wonders, Did Oliver recently drop his adviser, and is this his former adviser’s way of “getting even”?

An inside source tells me that Andy Oliver’s family had an agent advising them while Andy was in high school leading up to the point he was drafted. His family recently started getting advice from a different agent and it ticked the first group off because it became apparent they would not get his signature on a dotted line after his junior year (next year). The first group decided to get even and billed the Oliver family $90,000 for 300+ hours of advice. The family told them to shove it because advice is free and that is how all agents get business. In this case the agent firm decided to get real scummy and turned in an allegation to the NCAA in which they alleged Andy accepted small items of value from them.

If the statement above is true, then yes, sleaziness has gone that far…far enough to intervene in an amateur event. When an agent sticks his nose into a situation and starts to change the landscape of amateur sports, then we as a profession have some serious reforming to do.