Money Players

Smart people in sports saying smart things

SI's Luke Winn interviews Klay Thompson, Wazzu basketball player currently playing on USA Basketball's U19s. Klay is also the son of former NBA player Mychal Thompson (#1 pick in the 1978 NBA Draft).

I love Klay's comment on "one and done."

"I'd just say, go [pro] whenever you want, because it makes no sense to force kids to go to just one year of college. I don't get that. If a kid is already planning on being one-and-done, then he's going to school for the wrong reasons. He's going to go for one semester, and then he's gone."

Also, John Thompson interviews Maryland coach Gary Williams.

They talked about the insanity of barring athletes who sign with agents from returning to school: John Thompson: Why is that if a kid tries out for a pro team and does not make it, even if he was paid something for doing that, why can't he come back to college based on the redefining of what an amateur is now and how inconsistent it is among all sports? Gary Williams: I'll give you an honest answer. I think the NCAA is really out of touch with the kids today. I'm 17, 18 years old, I think I am good enough to play. I sign with an agent, I may get $5,000 from that agent. I go tryout, get cut. Why can't I come back to school and be able to play? I've never understood this. We're supposed to be in this for the benefit of the student athlete...Things change. These kids think they can play. So let them try. If they can't, they'll be back...[and] more kids would get their degrees because they'll realize they may never make it [in professional basketball].

"One and done" is never done

I doubt there is anyone who has written more about "one and done" than I have. Click here if you don't believe me.

On one hand, it is absurd to get completely bent out of shape over a just a few players. On the other, "one and done" brings to light many of college basketball's dirty secrets. To name just a few: unscrupulous agents, shady coaches, academic shananigans, AAU "non-profits" funded by agents, financial advisers and, oh yes, boosters (Say it ain't so!). Many would love to see the NBA create a system similar to MLB, where players can go pro right out of high school, but if they choose college, they are not eligible NBA draft for three years. But, college basketball is no longer the only route to the NBA, so further restrictions could drive more American players overseas.

NBA commissioner David Stern deftly points out: "This is not about the NCAA. This is not an enforcement of some social program. This is a business decision by the NBA. We like to see our players in competition after high school."

The best solution, in my opinion? Let the marketplace decide. If being unproven translates to poor performance, then NBA GMs would just resist the temptation to select these young prodigies. Of course, that's not how it works. And, let's not forget an important reality: Players who turned pro when they first became NBA Draft-eligible have performed very well. See previous post on analysis by Grant Wahl and Michael McCann, from one of the earliest known Money Players posts.

Mike DeCourcy will undoubtedly email me to say that Kobe, LeBron, Dwight would have performed better if they went to college, even for just a year. And maybe that is true, but it's unprovable.

The often-wacky Dick Vitale actually makes a lot of sense on this issue, writing:

It is time to end the one-and-done, baby!

It is unfair to an athlete who has to go to school for one year when he has no desire to be in the classroom. College is supposed to be for those who want an education, for those who want to be there.

It is time to end this mockery. If these kids want to make themselves available for the NBA, then so be it. If the NBA sees fit to draft them, so be it. The league should determine which players legitimately have a chance.

Sunday's Outside the Lines focused on the impact of "one and done."

The comments from Jay Bilas are worth examining:

Nobody ever talks about agents being a problem in the Olympics. The problem is the puritanical view we've got of the NCAA rules. And if you violate their rules, they are made to be a criminal.

In other words, agents aren't the only problem. Yes, we don't want unscrupulous agents, but we also don't want unscrupulous coaches and boosters.

If you read the NCAA rule book, coaches are seen as bad influences on kids. The rules contemplate keeping coaches away, while agents and runners have complete access. College coaches are not bad influences. They have to be allowed more access.

I am totally in favor of getting rid of the two-hour per week limitation that coaches can workout current players during the offseason. We pay college coaches ridiculous salaries and then tell them they cannot coach. Total nonsense. If an elite player wants 20 hours of training, it should be mandatory that someone from the coaching staff is at their beck and call.

When it comes to players not yet in the program, I do not think we should declare open season. Coaches have proven that excess and pushing the bounds of NCAA rules are effective ways to sign players. They would engage in exactly the same activities as agents and runners...if they don't already (see previous post, It's the horse, not the jockey). Do we really want college coaches to become glorified agents? I understand the argument that college coaches need to develop closer ties to top players and their circles at earlier ages, but I would be careful "deregulating" the recruiting process.

--Marc Isenberg

Jeremy Tyler just might be what’s right with basketball

Below is my May column in Basketball Times. Subscribe here. Click here to read the PDF version.

College basketball, as we often are reminded, is about academic achievement and molding fine young athletes. To quote one of the NCAA’s favorite aphorisms, college athletics is about the vast majority of the 400,000 NCAA “student-athletes” who “will be going pro in something other than sports.” Still, every year, there are a few “program changers” who attract extraordinary attention and stir passionate debate.

Last month, I wrote about the “Basketball Underground,” a term I have used to describe how big-time college basketball really operates. As the stakes increase, even in tough economic times, the Basketball Underground will continue to flourish. The big move last month was by Jeremy Tyler, who announced that he’s skipping his senior season of high school to go to Italy and play professional basketball. Tyler is a great talent. He wants – and should have every right – to maximize his abilities. The question is: What is the best use of Tyler’s time for the next couple of years? Some believe he’s making the right decision, given the many factors, including the sham of “one and done,” the decline of basketball development in the United States and NCAA rules. Others believe that not only is Tyler making a grave mistake himself, but he’s setting a bad precedent for young men who may follow Tyler off the same cliff. It’s a quick leap from Brandon Jennings to Jeremy Tyler to the ruination of basketball as we know it in the United States. To me, it’s absurd to make such a big deal about five to maybe 10 players a year. For the vast majority, college is absolutely a place for a young player to develop his or her game, gain maturity, receive a quality education and go on to achieve great things in life. But it’s not for everyone. Further, education is not the sole domain of the traditional classroom.

The Great Debate: DeCourcy v. Isenberg

As many of you know I am good friends with Sporting News senior basketball writer Mike DeCourcy. Mike is one of the best basketball writers around and an absolute must read for those interested in basketball and bigger picture issues.

We both have great passion for basketball at all levels. Mostly we agree, especially on big-picture issues, but not always. And when we disagree, we usually end up in long debates on the phone, via email or when we meet up along the basketball trail. But, it's always done with civility and respect. After I posted on Memphis and Derrick Rose, DeCourcy emailed me:

"Does the age limit lead to cheating? When Corey Maggette was admittedly accepting payments while in high school, the age limit wasn't even a gleam in David Stern's eye." Isenberg response: I should have posed the question, Does the age limit lead INCREASED cheating? (I actually changed the headline so that others would not infer the same thing.) If the top 6 or players per year bypassed college, the "program changers” would then be the players ranked 7 thru 13 -- and they would be the subject to these same temptations. But, the best players -- the one and doners -- still have the greatest value to programs and agents, so I do think there would be some positive benefits if we didn't force or encourage them to go to college. Those who wanted to go to school would go. And the others could go to Europe or the D League.

Does "one and done" lead to increased cheating?

There has been a lot written about the allegations against Memphis and Calipari. Most of you know, I am a big believer in innocent until proven guilty. I won't try to sort out the allegations made by the NCAA against Memphis and the redacted player commonly known as Derrick Rose.

As far as Calipari is concerned, I personally like him. I think he does a fairly good job at putting his players' interests above the program. Would l vouch for Cal? No. But I wouldn't vouch for any other Division 1 basketball coach, either...including the Mount Rushmores of College Basketball, as Dick Vitale likes to call them. College basketball coaches may not be directly involved in cheating, but many do an effective job to make it their business to not know what is going on around them.

These days there is just no moral highground in basketball. Calipari's problem is not that he is a two-time ALLEGED cheater, but that his programs GOT` caught. And that makes it easy for his detractors to explain his incredible success coaching college basketball.

DeCourcy on Mayo

I'm quoted in Mike DeCourcy's article, "One year with Mayo could prove costly."

"It's like the lottery. It's a dollar and a dream," said Marc Isenberg, whose book Money Players is a guide for young athletes dealing with issues of amateurism and professionalism. "These are the program-changers, and it's very difficult to turn your back on these types of players -- knowing that if you don't take them, somebody else will.

"These guys have an artificial market value of zero and a true value of something greater. Even if we want them to be amateurs and we want them to follow the rules, the underground economy is going to kick in."

It's another good article on the high risk of bringing in top talent to our great universities. Unquestionably, there were some bad dudes involved with Mayo. I just hope the FBI and other law enforcement leave Mayo out of the mess.

The never-ending Jeremy Tyler debate

NY Times writer Pete Thamel puts together a great sampling of opinion on Tyler's decision.

In Jeremy's own words

“If I go to college and fill up an arena with 30,000 people, I don’t get a penny. In my profession with what I’m doing in my life, it doesn’t need a full college degree. I’m definitely going to take classes over there. I want to be there, have fun and learn stuff that I don’t know. I’m going to study the culture, study the language and how their lifestyle is different than mine. I don’t know another language. I want to learn something else.”

Great point. Education does not have to take place in the classroom.

Sports Illustrated's George Dohrmann offers a couple interesting revelations about Tyler and his recruitment by both Louisville and by sports agents. The first one is hardly shocking: A sports agency offered cash to the Tyler family to tide them over until he declared for the NBA draft. The next one is a bit more salacious. Drumroll please...

"Around the same time [agents were offering money], coaches at Louisville and other schools began reviewing Jeremy's transcripts. They looked for ways to get him into college next fall, a full year ahead of schedule for a student in the class of 2010. "They went through his grades and wanted to help set up a program with online courses and other things," James Tyler said. "These schools have their ways of getting things done. They were saying, 'Let's see how we can get him a year early.'" (Louisville declined to comment, citing NCAA recruiting rules.)

For those who believe that agents and runners are intruding in the lives of young basketball players for their own benefit, stand in line. In my world, online courses equals GED! Bomani Jones has a great interview with my guy Dan Wetzel, who broke the Tyler story for Yahoo! Sports. The entire interview is worth listening to, but here are a few highlights from Dan...

He's getting shredded all over the country for this decision. If he just went to one of these high schools that doesn't even exist, They have 16 kids in the high school and 12 play basketball. 

There's no actual books. That would be fine. Oh, he's a high school kid. But those things have nothing to do with high school. They are basically a glorified AAU team with a home-school curriculum. Why bother? Why is that charade socially acceptable, but going to Europe with your dad isn't?

This is how you stay eligible for a one and done. You take four classes in the Fall. You get 2 Ds and 2 Fs. Then you don't show for a single class in the Spring. And you playing in the Final Four. That's all it takes.

[The Tylers] do think it's the right thing for them. Having talked to them and kinda liking them, the only thing I hope is people allow them to make their own decision and not just sit there and say, Oh this kid must do this and just stereotype him and call him a fool for trying.

It's a complete joke. They know it's a joke. They are told it's a joke by the coaches recruiting them. The academics mean very little in this case. These people do think it's the right thing for them. Having talked to them and kinda liking them, the only thing I hope is people allow them to make their own decision and not just sit there and say, Oh this kid must do this and just stereotype him and call him a fool for trying.

I posted a response on the DoubleAZone, the NCAA's "official blog. This elicited the following from Greg Johnson...

There's nothing wrong with enjoying your high school or college years and becoming a more rounded person. Someone needs to explain to me why finishing high school and going to college, even for a year in some cases, is the worst thing that can happen to a person.

Seems like it is only NCAA officials who spin the tale that one year in college is better than none. Maybe if these players actually stayed the entire academic year, I would grant that point, but as soon as the season ends most (probably all) "one and done" players drop out to prepare for the draft. Let's not live in a fantasy world. One and done is a farce for both athlete and institution.

To me it's crazy to make such a big deal for five to maybe 10 players a year. For most players, college is absolutely the best model.

If this is all about allowing kids to be kids, how come there's not similar outrage when football coaches encourage talented players "go college early" in order to participate in spring practice?

--Marc Isenberg

Update: Henry Abbott over at TrueHoop writes: "To me the best part of all is having more than one system, which is new. There was not much pressure on the NCAA to prepare athletes better than anybody else (whether for basketball or life after basketball). They got all the athletes!" Another good point.

Stay out of school

CBS Sportsline's Garry Parrish writes that "John Wall must try to enter the NBA Draft." Thought provoking. But not really. It's just some people in college athletics have diverted our attention from reality to truthiness (a word invented Stephen Colbert or perhaps one of his writers), rather than the truth. Thankfully Parrish applies some sense and sensibility to John Wall's situation. Wall, one of the best high school basketball players in the country, may or not may be eligible for the 2009 NBA Draft. Parrish writes:

"Despite what some uninformed people try to tell you, there is no evidence that suggests prospects develop at a better rate in college than they do in the NBA. In fact, history suggests prospects like Wall (i.e., high school players good enough to be lottery picks) are virtually guaranteed success -- proof being how the high school players who were selected in the lottery from 1995 until the age limit was implemented became some of the best players in the world with almost no busts among them."

And for every article that looks at this issue through an objective lens, there are at least 10 articles that come right out of the Stay in School Handbook.

Today's installment comes from Post Tribune writer Mike Hutton who wonders why Notre Dame basketball coach Mike Brey is encouraging star underclassman Luke Harangody to find out if he's ready for the NBA? Hutton thinks Brey and other college coaches should push college. He writes: 

"What I don't get is that, at least publicly, I have never heard a coach stick up for a college degree when a player is good enough to go early. Just once, it would be nice to hear a coach say, 'You know, he should stay in college because getting his degree is the right thing to do and because you signed up for four years.' Just doesn't happen anymore. Thirty years ago, if Digger Phelps had helped his best player, who was still a junior, find a job in the NBA, the priests that run the place would've spit up their cereal."

Actually, college coaches telling players to do what is in their own best interest is not a new thing. Flashback to 1972. The Marquette Warriors are 21-0 and ranked #1 team in the country. The ABA’s New York Nets offered Marquette's star center, Jim Chones, $1.5 million in cash…right in the middle of the college season! McGuire advised Chones to “take the money and run.”

Why?

“I looked in my fridge, and it was full,” said the always honest McGuire. “I looked in Jim’s, and it was empty. Easy choice.”

Staying in school versus going pro has become a never-ending debate on this blog. If you want to get knee-deep in the truth, at least the way I see it, here are some posts from Money Players past...

NBA's age limit creating red, blue differences of opinion My debut column in Basketball Times. One and never-quite done My response to some comments by NCAA president Myles Brand. Going Pro or Stay: The Truth Grant Wahl and Michael McCann use statistics to make their case to go pro. Crazy.

--Marc Isenberg

Basketball Times article

Starting in the August issue, I became a Basketball Times regular contributor. It is an honor to be associated with a publication that includes such stellar basketball writers as John Akers, Dick "Hoops" Weiss, Bob Ryan, Chris Rivers and Dick Vitale. My BT column is an opportunity to delve deeper into the issues we cover here on the Money Players Blog.

Below is an excerpt from my first article that includes what I think could be a step in the right direction on the "one and done" issue ...

NBA's age limit creating red, blue differences of opinion

By Marc Isenberg

The “one and done” debate has raged since 2006, when the NBA—in agreement with the NBA players union—began requiring players who enter the NBA Draft to be 19-years old and one year removed from high school. 

It’s become basketball’s “red state, blue state” issue, where reasonable minds differ with seemingly no middle ground.

When it comes to solutions, people either want additional age restrictions or want these restrictions removed entirely. From the NBA’s perspective, the age restriction makes sense…but it pushes other, more serious problems down to the college level: what to do about players who don’t want to be in school, plus various amateur and agent issues.

Two (more points of view) and done (for the day)

Got two interesting comments/e-mails regarding my earlier post "One and not quite done." The first is from Mike DeCourcy, one of my favorite college hoops writers (even if we don't agree on every issue), and Majorie Leunen, mother of 4 sons, including Maarty (former Oregon player and current Houston Rockets draft pick). Mike, who interviewed me after the O.J. Mayo story broke, disagrees with my view:

They're not forced to go to school. If they prefer Europe or the D-League, they can try it that way. Obviously, the best means of building both an NBA-worthy game and a world-class brand is going through college basketball. But nobody's forcing anything on anybody. After 10 years of allowing players the "freedom" to enter the league out of HS, David Stern realized this policy was killing his product. Too many players entered the league as unknowns, and the league had no mechanism to train these players to reach their full potential. It took 13 years for one of these HS guys to be the principle force on an NBA champion; meanwhile Duncan wins four titles and a team of low-first-round college guys (Detroit) makes six straight conference finals. That's no accident. The NFL realized it had a great deal with the colleges and never let it come to this -- and the game has exploded to heights hard to imagine 25 years ago. The NBA decided college basketball was more a competitor than an ally -- and the league wound up damaging itself more than the colleges. Stern thus made a business decision regarding the age limt. It was a wise one. If the Players Association wanted to make an investment in the future income and stability of their members, they'd be on board and pushing for two years, also.

I agree that college basketball is a great place for players to build their own brand and to develop their games. While players are not forced to go to college, until the NBDL and/or Europe become viable alternatives to college, most great players will choose college. My big issue is that the NCAA should not lobby either way. The NBA and the NBPA will hash this out in the next collective bargaining agreement and the NCAA membership should decide how it should respond. Unless schools agree to look the other way when it comes to the activities often associated with these great players, we're just asking for more problems.

And this from Marjorie Leunen:

Dear Marc: It was wonderful to sit and chat with you at the NBA Summer League games in which my son, Maarty was playing. I am enjoying reading your "Money Players" book. I wish I had read it before Maarty graduated from the University of Oregon, but now is better than never. I feel the same way that you do. Don't push a kid into college if they have no interest in getting a meaningful education. My son got his degree in Econ, but he really liked college life and he was not ready for the NBA right out of high school. I totally think it should be on the athlete and his family to make that 1 to 4 year commitment to college. The NCAA should not lobby when players should leave for the NBA...the NBA can figure that out just fine. Remember they picked my kid.........haha. Thank you, Marjorie Leunen Mother of 4 sons

I appreciate Marjorie's plug for my book -- and also her view of "one and done." If the NBA does not want these young players in the league because, as DeCourcy suggests, they can't win big games, NBA GMs should discount these players in the draft by not selecting them so early. That would provide a strong financial incentive to stay in school, wouldn't it? But in reality, NBA GMs draft these young players presumably to help them do one thing -- WIN CHAMPIONSHIPS. I do think the longer players stay in school, the more the NBA community and media pick apart their game. (Perhaps Michael McCann will share his view here.) Interestingly, when it comes to the NBA Draft, the marketplace does just the opposite of what DeCourcy says should happen -- the younger players historically get picked earlier than the 3- and 4-year guys. On a related note, Maarty played very well in NBA Summer League and definitely showed he was worthy of being drafted higher.

What do you think? Send your comments and/or questions to Marc Isenberg via e-mail at marc.isenberg@gmail.com