NCAA needs to resurrect death penalty for Auburn, Ohio State, Tennessee, other rule-breakersThreat of shutdown would stop rampant rule-breaking in college football, basketball, other sportsMike BianchiSPORTS COMMENTARY4:06 p.m. EDT, March 31, 2011Death to Auburn.Death to Ohio State.Death to Tennessee.Or, at the very least, the risk of death.The death penalty.VIDEO: Former MVP Jason Giambi testifies in Bonds perjury trialBring it back, NCAA, and threaten to use the death penalty against Auburn, Ohio State, Tennessee and any other school or coach that puts winning games over playing by the rules.It is the only way.Remember what Socrates once said: "Death may be the greatest of all human blessings."If the NCAA is truly serious about cleaning up the rancid cesspool it governs, it needs to resurrect the death penalty and start handing it out to the brazen lawbreakers. You want to know why there is so much corruption in college sports? Because of the sissification of the NCAA investigative staff that used to wield the power of the death penalty but now threatens schools with namby-pamby scholarship sanctions. The NCAA has replaced the electric chair with the easy chair.Is it really any surprise both teams – Auburn and Oregon – that played for the national title in college football are currently being investigated by the NCAA? And why do you think Auburn allowed star quarterback Cam Newton to continue playing last season even though the NCAA found that his father tried to sell his services to Mississippi State? Could it be the Tigers figured out that the school's first national championship in more than a half-century is worth the price of a few scholarship sanctions from the toothless NCAA?Does anybody really think Newton did not get paid at Auburn, especially in the wake of the HBO report earlier this week in which several former players revealed receiving cash from Auburn boosters?Leave it to HBO to uncover these potential violations. The NCAA cannot even conduct a decent investigation anymore. After all, it wasn't NCAA investigators but a couple of reporters from Yahoo.com who unearthed recent revelations that Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel failed to report NCAA violations among his players. Tressel not only covered up the violations; he apparently alerted the "advisor" of one of the players -- star quarterback Terrelle Pryor – presumably so the advisor would aid in the cover up.Yet Tressel has somehow managed to keep his job at O-Lie-O State. Why? Because Tressel is a winner and the Buckeyes have absolutely no fear of the NCAA and its milquetoast penalties. If the Buckeyes were facing the possibility of a death penalty for keeping a proven liar and cheater on staff, Tressel would be out quicker than a Woody Hayes right hook.The same with Tennessee's basketball program, which allowed Bruce Pearl to coach all season despite the fact he broke rules and lied to the NCAA about it. Pearl was only fired after he lost by 30 points in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. If the Vols were playing in the Final Four this weekend, he'd still be coaching and Tennessee would likely be preparing a contract extension for him to sign.And speaking of the Final Four, the two BCS (Blatant Cheater's Syndicate) teams playing this weekend – Connecticut and Kentucky – are coached by men who aren't exactly pillars of integrity.In February, UConn's Jim Calhoun was reprimanded by the NCAA for failing "to create an atmosphere of compliance" within his program. That's the NCAA's feeble way of saying Calhoun looked the other way when rules were being broken by his underlings. His penalty: A three-game suspension … NEXT season.The biggest question surrounding Kentucky, of course, isn't whether the Wildcats will win the national title, but how long before it would be stripped away? Kentucky coach John Calipari has taken two previous programs – Massachusetts and Memphis -- to the national semifinals, but both programs ended up having their Final Fours vacated even though the slippery Calipari was not directly punished by the NCAA."We've gotten into this situation where integrity is really lacking and that's why I'm glad I'm not coaching," said college basketball icon Bob Knight while speaking at a fundraiser a few months ago. "You see we've got a coach at Kentucky who put two schools on probation and he's still coaching. I really don't understand that."It's really not that hard to comprehend. The fact is, there is no fear among the crooks anymore.The NCAA needs to do something about this untreated sewage polluting the environment. It is time to resurrect the memory of SMU and free us from the liars and cheaters who are holding college athletics hostage.Give us liberty; give them death.
Death to Mike Bianchi.
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