Welcome to the latest edition of Talking Hoops With Ted Sarandis, one recorded before re-launching Hoopville. We hope you are enjoying the new look of the site and continue to check out our written and recorded content.
This issue gets away from the court, as the big news that has come involves off-court matters. The NCAA has adopted a host of new rules, which leaves a lot still to be determined, and there is another matter that is staring them right in the face that we talk about later.
We begin by talking about one aspect of the NCAA’s action that doesn’t reflect well on them and tells you there is much more to be done: the NBA and USA Basketball, two entities the NCAA is apparently counting on for some of these new rules, were blindsided by some key details.
With regard to the NBA, the NCAA is now allowing players who enter the Draft early and get invited to the combine to return to school if they are not selected in the NBA Draft. While there has been some buzz about this rule, the conditions upon which a player can return to school are important, and what they add up to is that this is not likely to come into play all that often.
The NCAA is also changing up its enforcement model, which is long overdue. Cases take a long time to be handled as it is – seemingly an eternity. There is also a desire to hold more people accountable so that penalties have more teeth and don’t punish those who come into a program later on and had nothing to do with the violations. It does, however, beg a question: should this mean going even further, like getting government officials involved?
Among the changes coming also involve agents, the recruiting calendar for college coaches and official visits for players, which we also go into some detail on. One aspect that is interesting is the NCAA attempting to get high school coaches into a more prominent role with their players’ recruitment, which sounds nice but won’t be that easy.
Finally, we spend some time talking about an issue that has been off the radar for understandable reasons, but should not be much longer: legalized sports betting. This is something which could become a real problem down the road if the NCAA does nothing about it, and it is one that emerged recently from a Supreme Court decision. Along the way, Ted cites an interesting article about the subject.
We hope you enjoy the podcast and share it with your fellow college basketball fans. Be sure to come back for our next one soon.
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