Most years Pete Carroll struggles to keep his superstar players from leaving USC and heading to the NFL. This season he is following them.  Pete Carroll and the Seattle Seahawks have agreed *in principle* to a deal that is worth $35 million over the next 5 years.  Pete Carroll didn’t need the extra $2 million dollar a year raise, but more like a way off the sinking ship know as USC athletics.  Reggie Bush,  O.J. Mayo, and Joe McKnight have all become icebergs that have  punched holes in Carrolls once thought to be unsinkable USC ocean liner.  Ok so O.J. Mayo rode on a different ocean liner, but you get the idea.

You have to think with Reggie Bush’s court case with New Era Sports moving forward, and Joe McKnight deciding to enter the upcoming NFL draft Pete Carroll is starting to see the writing on the wall.  Things could start getting very sticky for the soon to be ex head coach if he is called in for questioning as expected when Reggie Bush’s case moves into a court room.  It’s no surprise that Joe McKnight has declared for the draft, after he was spotted driving a Range Rover around. How stupid do you have to be to park your *girlfriends* Ranger Rover outside the USC practice facility? I guess McKnight thought that it would be ok since the the SUV is registered to his girlfriend. He would like us to believe she also makes the $500+ a month payment on it, yeah right. The down payment for the SUV was paid for by an *old friend of the family*, who apparently has no ties with USC football. Once again I say, yeah right.

Due to the allegations that circle around O.J. Mayo the USC basketball program will not be playing in the NCAA tournament this year.  What will come next for USC’s football program is uncertain. One thing that is for certain, players have been getting paid for decades, this is nothing new.  I would expect USC to be placed on probation if these allegations are proven true. One thing USC can be thankful for, they don’t have to be worried about receiving the NCAA death penalty like SMU did in the 80’s. I think the NCAA learned it lesson with that one.

As for Pete Carrolls sudden departure from USC, he knows its time to grab a seat on a life boat and get comfortable. Truth be told if Joe McKnight had never parked his Range Rover in the parking lot of the practice facility, Pete Carroll would be returning next season as USC’s head coach. Various NFL teams have tried to bring Carroll in as their head coach over the years, and Carroll has always declined the job offer. So why now? It all comes back to the fact that once his ocean liner sinks into the icy cold water known as an NCAA investigation, he knows its all over for him at USC and possibly his coaching career.

]]> http://www.ickscorner.com/2010/01/see-the-writing-on-the-wall/feed/ 5 http://www.ickscorner.com/2008/10/boomer-sooner-boomer-eh-nevermind/ http://www.ickscorner.com/2008/10/boomer-sooner-boomer-eh-nevermind/#comments Thu, 16 Oct 2008 18:01:39 +0000 The Bean http://www.ickscorner.com/?p=2018

 Sorry there’s no Hi-larious pics this week.  I did, however manage to include team links because I love you, Ick readers.  I really do. 

 No. 21 Wake Forest (x) at Maryland

Purdue at Northwestern (x)

No. 22 Vanderbilt at No. 10 Georgia (x)

Nebraska (x) at Iowa State

Wisconsin at Iowa (x)

Miami (FL) at Duke (x)

No. 18 North Carolina (x) at Virginia

No. 16 Kansas at No. 4 Oklahoma (x)

Georgia Tech (x) at Clemson

No. 12 Ohio State (x) at No. 20 Michigan State

Michigan at No. 3 Penn State (x)

No. 11 Missouri at No. 1 Texas (x)

No. 13 LSU (x) at South Carolina

No. 17 Virginia Tech (x) at Boston College

No. 25 California (x) at Arizona

Bug: 8-7

Dragon: 10-5

Roberto: 6-9

Lajitas: 11-4

Ick: 9-6

Brandy: 9-4

I finished below Ick!  Sorry for the short post but I’ve got to go punch myself over and over in the face now. 

This week’s games will be up early tomorrow.

Picks (late)

Your correct answers are provided free of charge by The Bean.  Looks like this is the week that the picks get harder.  Great schedule next week.  I’ll get those up in time (with the pretty pictures).  Good luck and Boomer Sooner!

Michigan(x) @ Notre Dame

Central Michigan(x) @ Ohio

UCLA(x) @ BYU

Stanford(x) @ TCU

Oklahoma(x) @ Washington

Georgia(x) @ S. Carolina

S. Florida @ Kansas(x)

Virginia Tech @ Georgia Tech(x)

Ohio St @ USC(x)

Bowling Green @ Boise St(x)

Navy @ Duke(x)

Wisconsin @ Fresno St.(x)

Maryland @ Cal(x)

Washington St. @ Baylor(x)

Finally in the SAT war…

Rice @ Vandy(x)

By now, unless you live under a rock you have heard whats going on with O.J. Mayo. On the off chance you haven’t allow me to give you the cast of characters so we can get you up to speed.

O. J. Mayo – USC Trojan rent-a-player about to enter the upcoming NBA draft.

Definition of *Rent-a-player* Due to the new rules in the NBA a player must attend atleast one year of college. The player will most likely go to a school they feel have a chance to win a championship. The chosen school will most likely issue a scholarship to this player. Then when the school year is up, the player will declare for the draft. If they do not sign with an agent, and they are not drafted, the player could return to school if they wish.

Louis Johnson – Part of Mayo’s inner circle, turned informant. Johnson is the one that laid out the whole operation down from who the runner was paying Mayo, where the money was coming from, and what was being provided to Mayo

Rodney Guillory – Person put in charge of basically keeping money in Mayo’s pocket, and making sure he stays happy..

Bill Duffy Associates- The golden goose!! Sports agency based in Northern California who wanted to sign Mayo after he was drafted.

Ok now lets continue..

USC has released a statement saying they plan on telling the NCAA they had no idea what was going on, and they banned Guillory from getting any tickets. Well what else would they do? Tell the truth? It’s no big secret kids are getting paid, no matter what the NCAA tries to do to stop it, there will always be ways around it. My number one question when all this came to light..

When Johnson was basically snitching his gravy train out for taking money from Guillory he said something that struck me as odd. He was talking about the clearing process Mayo went thru to be accepted into USC. He said that USC had *character issues* with Mayo, and were hesitant to bring him in because they were worried *something was going on*. STOP RIGHT THERE!

If you are going thru the clearing process of bringing someone to your program, this person is a high profile athlete, and your worried something is going on and you have character issues.. WHY TAKE THE CHANCE??? Especially if the name of your school is USC, and your program has been brought up recently for another high profile student athlete taking cash and prizes?? Anyone remember Reggie Bush??? Now I realize that you have to keep not only your fans, but your boosters and alumni happy, by getting top recruits from around the country.. but this really seems like an unnecessary risk for a program that is already on shaky ground after the Reggie Bush fiasco.

Teams around the league including the Timberwolves are saying they aren’t worried about the allegations concerning Mayo, but I still wonder. I don’t see him slipping very far based on ability.. but when your talking about contracts worth millions, endorsements, and marketability of your draft pick to your fans.. Character issues have to be taken into consideration. Well unless your Jerry Jones. ;)