Sptspage: The Pizza Papers and TCU's 1985 football scandal

[Eight]

When we finally paid and got the right players, we drew attention and got exposed. The idea of Wacker not knowing the situation when he got here is crazy. He just wanted it to stop

wacker knew it was going on before he got here because one of the first things he did when he got to tcu was meet with the players and in a second meeting certain alumni and tell them all the cheating had to stop.

there has been this claim by some protecting names from the past that the former ad and hc at the time didn't know about the cheating which would have made them the only two people near the program who didn't know about the cheating.

it wasn't hard for smu to know about what was happening at tcu. tcu was in direct bidding competition with smu for multiple players out of dallas, two resulting in a very interesting direct stand off between staffs. heck, if i remember correctly one linebacker from a certain high school in south dallas had signed to go to smu, was denied admittance, and then ended up at tcu with the other collection of golden bears

don't disagree wacker was put in a bad place, we did get hit worse than anyone other than smu, but i don't agree with those who say it was simply because we were the small private school.

 

[Eight]

SMU had a "dirt file" not only on us, but on every other SWC program. The reason the NCAA lowered the boom on SMU was that they were 1.) Flagrantly guilty, and 2.) As an group of petty "Enforcers" the NCAA needed to make an example of somebody, and they chose SMU to do it. They certainly weren't going to lower the Death Penalty on A&M, even though they were far more flagrantly guilty than SMU, because they were A&M! Nor were they going to smack UT dead for the same reasons. SMU was a fine "gettable" program. Crushing them would allow the Name Brand Programs to regain the top spots and restore the proper order of things.

Wacker was faced with an array of bad options, and chose the one which he considered the best based on his trust that the NCAA actually believed in it's stated goals and purpose. As events showed, the NCAA is not interested in any of that, and cannot be trusted. Not much has changed in 30-odd years...

don't completely agree with atm was dirtier than smu and smu in anyone got scape goated for the sake of the conference

smu basically screw you to the ncaa by upping the ante in their cheating after they got nailed and remember that it had not been that long before when dave smith was at smu following fry and there were rumors of cheating by the ponies. this wasn't simply a matter of under meyers, but back to smith and continued for over 10 years.

 

[BrewingFrog]

don't completely agree with atm was dirtier than smu and smu in anyone got scape goated for the sake of the conference

smu basically screw you to the ncaa by upping the ante in their cheating after they got nailed and remember that it had not been that long before when dave smith was at smu following fry and there were rumors of cheating by the ponies. this wasn't simply a matter of under meyers, but back to smith and continued for over 10 years.

We know more about SMU because of the Death Penalty and the number of former players who have spoken about it as they years have gone by. It remains a Big Story. A&M, OTOH, is not now, nor ever was under the spotlight in the same way SMU was. Oh, some things have wiggled out over the years, but nothing like the confessionals that took place in the SMU story.

 

[denverfrog]

wacker knew it was going on before he got here because one of the first things he did when he got to tcu was meet with the players and in a second meeting certain alumni and tell them all the cheating had to stop.

there has been this claim by some protecting names from the past that the former ad and hc at the time didn't know about the cheating which would have made them the only two people near the program who didn't know about the cheating.

it wasn't hard for smu to know about what was happening at tcu. tcu was in direct bidding competition with smu for multiple players out of dallas, two resulting in a very interesting direct stand off between staffs. heck, if i remember correctly one linebacker from a certain high school in south dallas had signed to go to smu, was denied admittance, and then ended up at tcu with the other collection of golden bears

don't disagree wacker was put in a bad place, we did get hit worse than anyone other than smu, but i don't agree with those who say it was simply because we were the small private school.

That linebacker had already received his car from SMU, we took pics of him pulling the little mustangs off the side of the car off. But, he was not the only player that had a car from another school at TCU and Dickersons car at SMU came from A&M, different times back then