King Kaufman's Sports Daily
The NCAA's Williams rules: Wreak havoc in society and you're OK, as long as you can play ball. Threaten the NCAA cash box? Sit tight, we're thinking.
July 29, 2004 | You'll be happy to know that the Williams kid will be able to play college football after all.
Oh, I don't mean Mike Williams, the USC wide receiver who declared for the NFL draft in February after a judge ruled that the league's age restrictions violated antitrust law. That Williams kid, who broke no laws or rules and did nothing even slightly unethical by hiring an agent and declaring his intention to play pro ball, is still hanging after an appeals court overturned that ruling, making him ineligible after all. The NCAA is considering his application for reinstatement.
I have the utmost confidence that the NCAA, in its Solomonic wisdom, will find a solution to this sticky situation that will result in the NCAA best protecting its income sources.
I also don't mean Ricky Williams, by the way, whom I only mention because a reader said he'd beat me up if I mentioned him again this week. Come on, then! If I hadn't blown it on Tuesday, I could have had a shot at an all-Williams week.
No, the Williams I'm referring to is Willie Williams, the top high school linebacker in the country last year by some accounts, about whom the University of Miami has decided, well, OK, sure, you can come play ball for us even though you have a rap sheet longer than our opponents' longest play from scrimmage last year -- when we went 11-2 and won the Orange Bowl, woohoo! -- and you neglected to mention this to us when we were recruiting you, during which time you also added two items to it, both on your official visit to a rival school.
That Williams kid, the one in good standing, accepted probation and pleaded no contest last month to a felony charge of setting off fire extinguishers at a hotel during his visit this winter to the University of Florida, and also to a misdemeanor battery charge for hugging a woman without her permission on the same trip.
No reason that last item should set off alarm bells in today's college football world, eh? Williams also agreed to pay $1,300 in damages to a man he had a fight with in a nightclub on the same visit, though charges in that case were dropped. That was some busy visit. I don't know when Williams had time to check out the library.
