More now than ever, I have been watching as college sports programs fall victim to violations in the recruiting process that I have come to know. Interestingly enough, I have found that there are sometimes teams being hurt for violations that really need not be an issue. The rulebook that was constructed by the NCAA has the ultimate goal of making sure the process is fair for all schools, as well as for the athletes. However, the rulebook has gone overboard, with so many rules that many are unfair or are unenforceable to begin with. Programs are penalized for violations of rules that shouldn't be there in the first place, and the rulebook is overdue for deconstruction and revision.

From a young age it is the dream of many to one day make it as a professional sports star. The path to do so is a long and rigorous one, filled with work that these kids really don't realize, understandably. However, the older they get the more they realize that there is a path to be taken. The most important of these steps comes to be the college level of athletics, the make or break for major athletes. For this reason, the effort that goes into getting into the best program possible for many high school athletes is incredible.

In my own life, I have witnessed this process of recruiting, a process where coaches and athletes communicate to try and get the best athlete-program fit possible. The end goal is for the program to get the best athlete they can, and for the athlete to go to the best program they can. I had the opportunity to watch a multitude of my friends be recruited to Division I schools for mostly running, but even a few for sports like basketball and football. It intrigued me greatly, watching them receive letters from schools as well as known as Yale, all the way down through Division III schools I had never heard of. It seemed to be as much fun for me as it was for them, getting letters that were often personalized with notes and comments about recent races or games they had been a part of. The process is an interesting one, accompanied by an unnecessarily lengthy rulebook, I have come to learn.

Most all sports fans have had some sort of heartbreak when it comes to their respective college teams. For myself, the Syracuse basketball program recently got in trouble for violations they were found guilty of, with punishments that many including myself felt were harsh and unnecessary, as the NCAA was punishing a team for actions of people years before the current team was even there. St. Mary's is another prime example of where this occurred. The real issue wasn't whether or not St. Mary's broke the rules, but more so whether or not the rules they broke should have been in place to begin with, and if the punishment was too harsh (NCAA penalizes St. Mary's for recruiting). It's instances like these where many analysts and NCAA critics speak out about how it is time for change.

These changes actually have slowly been becoming more and more real, with either proposals regarding the rulebook being passed, or even just the debate coming to light more publicly. However, not all of the decisions being made are ones that I, as well as others, agree with, in terms of loosening the recruiting rules currently in place. Recently, a new rule was passed where junior college athletes require a higher GPA to be eligible for college recruitment than high school students do. As if it wasn't hard enough for students who come from hard backgrounds to achieve the grades they need to be eligible, the NCAA had to take it farther to make it not only more difficult, but also more complex by making the GPA requirements different depending on the educational standings of the students (Crabtree, par. 2). It is obvious that it is much more sensible to have one GPA that is used for student athletes across the grid. The fact that the NCAA takes the rulebook as far as creating entirely different requirements for junior college versus high school student-athletes just shows how difficult the situation can become for programs that are breaking rules that they don't even realize exist.

In order for big name programs to try and avoid being punished for pesky rules, they find ways to bend them. They take things as simple as letters, and use them in ways that may seem illegal but are in fact very allowed. For example, the NCAA sets rules on who, how, and what can be put into letters sent to recruits. The letters for recruits have to fit onto a normal 8.5" by 11" page, must be written only by the head coach, and must be handwritten. This makes for some interesting interpretations by head coaches. The best and funniest way this rule was bent was committed by Nick Saban, the head coach of the Alabama football program, and what he did with his letter. Apparently, he had 105 handwritten letters delivered to a running back recruit, which definitely caught his attention (Murphy, par. 3, 11). This concept, while it would definitely be frowned upon the NCAA, is actually completely legal according to the rules set fourth. More than anything, it just shows how needless rules can still be manipulated, begging the question, what is the point of rules like this in the first place?

In a similar fashion, programs all across the country are witnessing an extreme growth in staff, especially employees involved in recruiting. Just like the letters, the NCAA sets restrictions on who can actually interact with the student athlete recruits. This however does no good in stopping big name programs from expanding the staff involved, with titles such as "assistant athletics director for recruiting", now joining the faculty. Multimillion dollar programs have grown to have as many as 24 non-coaching employees, yes, non-coaching (Mandel, par. 8). This rule bending proves that programs are going to find ways around pesky rules, in any ways they can imagine, using their, what seems like, infinite cash flow.

While this rule bending situation proves that the NCAA needs to revise their rulebook, there are some that would argue these revisions need to take the rulebook farther, and actually make it larger. In the same article as the staff growth explanation, Dabo Swinney offers his own opinion on what the rule bending means for smaller programs with smaller budgets. "It's not right to have a donkey running in the Kentucky Derby". He believes that his program, along with so many others, just does not have the money to maintain competition with programs like Alabama and Texas, who, thanks to their money, gain an edge by hiring dozens of employees for things like recruiting alone (Mandel, par. 19). Small school coaches still see rule bending as an unfair move, something that must be fixed and punishable, for what they believe to be the sake of fairness in recruiting.

In the recruiting argument, there seems to be one thing that is discounted much more heavily than it should be, and that is the perspective of the players. While the NCAA and the different sports programs make the debate seem very political, and impersonal, the decisions made affect the lives of the students being recruited very directly. It seems forgotten, that high school students are the ones being recruited, presented with decisions that will change their life completely, and these students are in some cases harassed by coaches of different programs. Often, the parents have to monitor the contact with coaches, to make sure it doesn't interfere with things like schoolwork or practice. Too much interaction could take away from time that can be spent elsewhere like doing homework or practicing (Medcalf, par. 10, 17). Not to mention, it's understandable how parents and guardians wouldn't want too much attention to go to the head of their kids, rendering them to believe they are too important to do things that high school kids must do.

These kids, many believe, need to be protected by the NCAA, and think that the rules need to be taken farther, and more restrictive. They view the rules being bent as loopholes, needing to be solved. While it is easy to see where this argument can come from, if programs are held back any more, the NCAA runs a risk of the recruits not being given a fair look at what different programs have to offer. Too many rules and then there are actually detriments to the recruits' decisions on where they think is best for them. They will be unable to develop as close personal relationships as they should be able to with coaches, and they might not be able to see what they could possibly be committing to.

Even though there are still many issues to be tackled, there is now beginning to be hope for the rulebook. Recently, there have been many new proposals set, and there appears to be more support for the deregulation of the rules. This means that while there is still plenty of work that needs to be done, there has at least been a start to addressing the issues. In fact, a series of proposals, 25 out of the 26 made, were passed that will lead to deconstruction. These proposals have the purpose of aiming to eliminate some of the unenforceable rules that I addressed. They address the overwhelming complexity of the rulebook, and work to try and simplify the rules that so many programs have issues running into.  President of the NCAA, Mark Emmert offered, "There was virtually no debate on it. Everyone agreed that those rules need to be changed," he said. "That was probably the least controversial issue in this whole process (The Associated Press, par. 3, 6).

In the same way, a new proposal was made that would take away restraints on the limited number of the staff that can be involved in recruiting. As we saw, programs have their own ways of getting around the former restraints set on them, but this proposal addresses the issue. With this rule passed, more staff could actually help with the real recruitment and actually be involved with how the recruit is contacted by the program (Wolken). While this is exactly what opposition of loose recruiting rules would hate, in my opinion it would help allow the recruits get a feel for what they are getting themselves involved in if they are choosing one program over another.

Mark Emmert, the President of the NCAA, as mentioned earlier, is actually an advocate for the changing of the rulebook. In this way, he has been making moves and supporting ongoing changes to the way recruiting works. Recently, in reaction to new proposals being made, he said that the NCAA needs to narrow the rulebook to, "focus the rules on those things that are real threats to integrity of sport rather than things that are mostly annoying" (Jussim, par. 2). The rules as they stand now often are annoyances and not worthy of standing in the book. If this isn't a call to action for change, then I don't know what is. When the president of the operation feels that changing rules that were in place for years is needed, then it is most definitely time for change.

It is evident that there need to be changes made to the rules surrounding recruiting of high school, and even junior college student athletes going to Division I schools. Basketball and football programs all across the nation are getting penalized and are experiencing difficulties in recruiting thanks to an overcomplicated rulebook of guidelines that are either unnecessary or unenforceable to begin with. There needs to be action in getting proposals passed by the Board of the NCAA that will make the process easier and less volatile.

As a college student at an SEC school, with huge football and basketball programs, I can see the impact recruiting has on programs. If recruiting is done poorly, there is a reflection on the field or court. Programs work toward having the best players they can, which starts in recruiting them from high school. There isn't enough reason to tighten the rules programs have to abide by, when the rulebook is already in such need of revision. The players deserve the opportunity to develop relationships with more than just the head coach, and they deserve to be able to be contacted in more ways than an unreal amount of letters stuffed in a mailbox.

As programs continue to get in trouble, like my own beloved Syracuse Orange basketball team, there will continue to be a call to get something done. In most instances, violations are punished well after the perpetrators are gone, and often these violations aren't worth the time, effort, and money that goes into pursuing them. The cost of the complex rules, that are found to be so difficult to follow, outweigh the reward for what few, at this point, argue is an equal opportunity for all teams to get a level playing field when recruiting student athletes. No matter what the rules state, there will always be programs with an edge in recruiting, as they will possess better coaches, and a better tradition for sports than the smaller schools who sometimes argue that the problems lay elsewhere. There needs to be acknowledgement that there is at least an outlined hierarchy in the college sports world, and then progress can be made from there. The rulebook can and will be deconstructed, it is just a matter of time, and punishment, that will be facing teams before it is all said and done.

