As we come to the end of Classic Monster Movie Month, we also come to the final Universal Pictures performance of Frankenstein’s Monster. It was not a horror film but a slapstick comedy featuring Abbott and Costello, entitled Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. It is probably for the best that The Monster’s run ended with this picture because the performance of Glenn Strange as The Monster was almost painful to watch; not for Strange’s acting ability but for the scenes the character was given, either lying, sitting or simply walking like a plank destroying anything it his path. There was none of Karloff’s pathos nor any of the stylized character elements brought to The Monster by Bela Lugosi in Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man or by Lon Chaney, Jr. in The Ghost of Frankenstein. So with the final Friday in October 2018 we bid the classic Universal role of The Monster adieu. (That means only 8 more shopping Fridays until Christmas.) Yet this turgid slapstick informs today’s comedy – corruption in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA).

I know you were as shocked, just shocked as I was when the FBI swooped down and arrested 12 individuals last year for being a part of a massive scheme to pay players to get them to certain universities. How long has this massive fraud been going on? How was it our government had only just discovered that college athletes were paid to play college sports? Like I said, I was just as shocked as you.

This week, the first of three trials wrapped up with guilty verdicts for all the defendants. The always excellent Michael McCanin, writing in a Sports Illustrated piece entitled “Why the Prosecution Won in the College Hoops Corruption Trial and What’s Next”, said “In a decisive victory for federal prosecutors and a frightening warning to those involved in the payment of college recruits, a New York jury has convicted Adidas director of global marketing James Gatto, Adidas consultant basketball organizer Merl Code and client recruiter (a.k.a. runner) Christian Dawkins of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud charges.”

Just how did the prosecution convince a jury that conduct which has gone on since James Naismith invited baseball (older for older sports) was not only a federal offense but that the defendants deserved to be punished for it? McCanin wrote, “The more difficult challenge for prosecutors was to persuade jurors that these payments were not only NCAA rule violations but also, much more importantly, crimes. They did so by depicting the universities that enrolled the paid student-athletes—namely Louisville and Kansas—as victims. This deduction may seem illogical since those universities enrolled players who would helped their basketball programs win games and generate accompanying revenue. But prosecutors convinced jurors that they should regard the basketball program and its coaching staff as possessing disparate interests from the rest of the university. While the coach may gain from the enrollment of a superior player, the university provided that same player a full athletic scholarship and financial aid under a false pretense.”

But that is only one part of this sordid saga. Apparently, the fact that these universities make literally millions of dollars off the backs of these teenagers was not a part of the jury’s decision. The prosecution was somehow able to sell the fantasy of amateurism actually existed and more importantly violating this sacred calling was a criminal offense. Yet no one above these low-level functionaries have yet to be charged. For instance, it came out during the trial that Kansas basketball coach Bill Self was in constant contact with defendant Gatto about the recruiting of  Silvio De Sousa to come to Kansas. Michael Rosenberg, writing in another SI piece entitled “Bill Self Should Be Suspended If Kansas Is Serious About Following the Rules”, said that the attorney for defendant Gatto, “told the jury that Gatto approved the $20,000 payment because “Kansas’s head coach knew of and asked for a payment to be made to Silvio De Sousa’s handler.”” Of course in the great tradition of the no-nothing clowns who run the NCAA, it was De Sousa who was suspended, not Coach Self.

And where was the NCAA? Dan Wetzel of Yahoo Sports had one of the best lines I have heard that he said on the podcast Hang Up and Listen, which “College basketball is burning, right here for everyone to see and hear, and Mark Emmert [NCAA President] can’t even be troubled to show up and fiddle in the back of the courthouse.” In other words the NCAA was nowhere to be seen at this trial. Why? As Rosenberg wrote, “The biggest booster of Kansas athletics is Adidas. Adidas invests millions in the program, Adidas has direct access to the basketball coach and Adidas is the one that paid the players that Kansas coaches told Adidas it wanted. If that’s not a blatant recruiting violation, then there are no blatant recruiting violations. The NCAA might as well fire its enforcement staff… This isn’t about a rogue assistant or a head coach who doesn’t want to know. It’s a business operation, and Self is the CEO. Why should the CEO skate?”

Here is the bottom line in college sports. The head coach of a sport can make $5 million per year. A university can make anywhere between $10 to $50 million (and maybe more) off their sports program. But pay a basketball player’s father $20,000 over 18 months and now the FBI may well come knocking at your door, enforcing a NCAA rule. How is that for pure slapstick?

Although times have changed. When I was in high school, my local college had a basketball player  ruled ineligible because it was alleged a university booster had bought his mother a refrigerator and washing machine. I guess inflation has driven the price up in 40 years.

I hope you have enjoyed reading and learning about some of the classic monster movies I have always enjoyed. I will return to their theme next October and I hope you will return to join me then.

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