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Friday, July 25, 2008
It’s time to move SEC Media Days to Atlanta
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Hoover, Ala.-At the beginning of SEC preseason media days on Wednesday, commissioner Mike Slive gave his annual look back at what the conference had accomplished over the past year. Among the highlights were four national championships (LSU football, Tennessee women’s basketball, Georgia women’s gymnastics, and Georgia tennis).
But the thing that makes Slive most proud is the fact that after six years on the job only one sport, Arkansas track, is serving any kind of NCAA probation. Slive, a former judge and attorney, was hired in to reduce some of the excesses that had hurt the reputation of this league. The SEC is far from perfect. No conference is. But by any objective measure, the league is better when it comes to playing by the rules
I had a chance to talk to Slive not long after Tennessee coach Phillip Fulmer was hit with a subpoena as he walked into the Wynfrey Hotel. The subpoena called on Fulmer to give a deposition in a lawsuit by a former Alabama booster against the NCAA. It set off a media frenzy that dominated the second day of the meetings, which is what it was designed to do.
To say that the commissioner was miffed would be an understatement. Here’s why:
This is just the kind of knucklehead stuff that Slive has been trying to get rid of in this league since he became commissioner in 2002. There are mechanisms in place to better deal with rules breaking by conference members. There are specific procedures in place when one school thinks another is cheating. This whole episode started years ago because an Alabama booster believed Fulmer was working with the NCAA in its investigation of Alabama. Now a coach can’t do that. There is a chain of command that he has to follow. In fact, it became known as “the Phillip Fulmer rule.”
This episode brings back the mudslinging days that gave the SEC such a bad reputation. And Slive doesn’t like it.
“It’s just not appropriate,” said Slive. “We are here to celebrate the start of another football season. There is a time and a place for everything and this is not the proper time or the proper place for that kind of action.”
I also had a private moment with Fulmer. He was clearly not happy but would not comment any further. In retrospect, Fulmer could have handled this much better. When all the dust had settled it was clear that the lawyers had choreographed the event and given some of the local media the heads up that it was coming. Copies of the subpoena were being passed around radio row at the Wynfrey Hotel just minutes after Fulmer had been served.
He spent the afternoon saying he had not looked at anything and would not comment. Which was accurate. The paper was handed to him, some say dropped in his lap, and Fulmer said he did not look at it. Then after he left Birmingham he conceded that he had received the subpoena but had not read it before he went into the hotel. Then he released a statement. The fact that Fulmer first denied it, and then had to backtrack, just added to the media hype, which reached warp speed.
In fairness maybe any one of us would have done the same thing and not read the document and opened that can of worms until later.
I also spoke with Jeff Hagood, Fulmer’s lawyer, Thursday night. Hagood told me that Fulmer has turned the matter over to him and will have no further comment on the issue.
So what are we to make of this?
Prediction: There will be a legal challenge to the subpoena by Hagood and the Tennessee attorneys who will attempt to get it quashed. There is no way that Fulmer is going to give a deposition on Sept. 25, two days before the Vols play at Auburn.
And here is the bigger question to ponder this morning. This is the second time in four years that the SEC has had to deal with Alabama lawyers threatening to subpoena a coach at football media days. Hagood said that the lawyers “hijacked” one of the SEC’s most popular functions for their own benefit. Hijacked is probably too strong a word but the lawyers certainly used the event and took away from what it is supposed to be.
Is it time to move the SEC’s preseason media days to Atlanta? The SEC football championship game quickly outgrew Birmingham after two years and is now a tremendous success at the Georgia Dome. Given the infrastructure of Atlanta and the growth and popularity of the SEC on a national scale, maybe the time has come to move this event.
This event draws more national media than any preseason event of its kind. And when something like this happens the league gets embarrassed on a national scale. The SEC does not need this kind of silliness. It’s time to move it to Atlanta.
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