Scandals in college football
...yant was know for his incredibly demanding practices. His drill began early and was repeated all day, regardless of blistering heat or driving rainstorms. In 1954, his first year at Texas A&M he took 117 scholarships athletes to a ten day boot camp site in which all, but 28 were either kicked off the squad for failure to satisfy Bryant or quit from their in ability to endure his demanding practice sessions. His team only won one of ten games that season. That same year Texas A&M was put on two year probation for paying money to recruit players. Bryant denied that he personally engaged in illegal recruiting, but admitted that alumni did so with his encouragement. He knew that recruiting prospects were being offered money by other schools and told his alumni to “meet the competition.” In 1961, Bryant was coaching his alma mater Alabama and finally got the national championship he pursued for 16 years. However, the Holt-Graning incident inflamed criticisms of the methods he used to gain victory. Bobby Dodd, the Georgia Tech coach, carried through on his threat to drop Alabama from their schedule because of the Holt-Graning incident. The Holt-Graning incident went like this: it was November 18, 1961, at Legion Field in Birmingham, it was early in the fourth quarter, and the score favored Alabama 10-0. Georgia Tech was punting to Alabama when Billy Richardson signaled a fair catch at the Alabama 31 yard line. Darwin Holt was on of the blockers for Alabama and Chick Graning was racing toward him when Holt crashed his forearm in Granings’ face, beneath his mask and Graning fell to the ground unconscious and was carried off in a stretcher. The Georgia Tech’s team physician called it the worst facial injury he had seen in athletics. His full diagnosis was fracture of facial bones, five missing teeth with a majority broken, fracture of the sinuses, fracture of the bone beneath the right eye, cerebral concussion and possible fracture of base of skull. After that incident Bryant was judged “ the most controversial coach in America” and was accused of teaching brutality to his players, of virtually encouraging them to commit criminal acts. This was not the first time Bryant had come under attack in the press, nor it would be the last. Bryant’s career was changed by challenge, peppered with controversy, and motivated by a fierce determination to win. Bear Bryant was involved in many scandals that are why there is a whole book about it, but there are more that have happened more recently. (Kirby) In the late 1970’s and 1980’s a series of multi-faceted scandals had come to light or were rumbling just below the surface. Episodes already had taken place at Arizona State, Southern California, Clemson, and Florida. Georgia suggested that athletic corruption had become serious. In the early 1980’s, several major scandals erupted at big-time programs, which led to college presidents drawing out plans for an NCAA Presidents Commission. In August 1984, Sean Stopperich, a former football player and student at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, declared that an SMU booster had induced him to enroll at SMU by making cash payments totaling $5000 to him and his family. The 6’4, 272 p...