People In The Peach State Can’t Grasp Green’s Suspension (And Neither Can I)

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The news that UGA wideout AJ Green will have to miss three more games — four total — for selling a game-worn jersey hit the state of Georgia like a lightning bolt yesterday.  I know.  I happened to be in Atlanta when the story broke and “shock” is the only way to describe the reaction.

The morning after, shock is still the operative word.

Mark Bradley of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution sums up most Dawg fans’ feelings thusly:

“… it remains incongruous how AJ Green’s image can be used to promote games televised by networks paying millions of dollars for the broadcast rights and the player himself can’t bank a dime for selling his own shirt?  (Even though UGA can sell a replica jersey bearing Green’s number, for which Green himself gets not one red cent.)“

Bradley’s fellow blogger, Tony Barnhart, goes down a similar path:

“Yes, the financial end of college athletics is certainly to the benefit of the schools. It’s all one big double standard, we know that.  But certain things are just a blatant slap in the face to these guys.  The fact that AJ Green may lose a third of his junior season for selling a jersey while the University Bookstore sells six different versions of it with his name on it, is a double slap.  It’s the establishment telling these kids: We can make money off your talent and game in every damn way we please.  If you try it, though, we’ll use the rules to take you out and keep you in line.”

True and truer.

This story’s conclusion comes after a flurry of internet rumors.  Green’s family is out of work and he needed the money.  Green sold more than one jersey.  Green was going to get off with time-served.

In the end, he got a heckuva spanking and we’re all left to wonder how the sale of one jersey equals the loss of four games.  Especially in light of the fact Alabama’s Marcell Dareus took two agent-tainted trips to South Florida, had to pay back about $1,700+ and yet his suspension was dropped from four games to two.

1.  Perhaps the NCAA is most concerned with who Green sold his jersey to than the fact that he sold his jersey at all.  Had he sold it on eBay to Ma and Pa Dawgfan, it’s hard to imagine he would have been slapped so harshly.  Instead, Green sold his jersey to someone the NCAA considers to be an agent.  And we all know that the NCAA is clamping down on player-agent connections in 2010.

2.  Perhaps the NCAA will hear UGA’s appeal and stamp it “approved.”  Like Dareus, Green might still receive a lesser sentence.  It could be that the governing body was simply trying to send a harsh attention-getting warning to others… while knowing very well that it would eventually cut that suspension down.  You can bet college players across the country have now received the warning — Sell a jersey and miss four games.  If the suspension is later knocked down a bit, the message from the initial penalty will still have received a whole lot of press and pub.

3.  Perhaps there’s more to this story than we know.  Green + Agent.  Did the NCAA’s investigation find more connections between the two than a simple jersey sale?  It’s possible that the NCAA could only find hard evidence of the jersey sale, while it might have scads of circumstantial evidence suggesting a deeper connection between Green and the agent.  That’s speculation, but hey, we’re trying to figure out how a player can lose four games for selling his own jersey.

After a night of thinking about this, I’m beginning to lean toward Possibility #2.  Asked yesterday (by the fine folks on CSS’ “SportsNite”) if I believed the NCAA would lessen the punishment, I initially said that I did not.

But the more I look at the Dareus-Green comparisons, the more I believe that either a) the NCAA will cut the suspension down or b) the NCAA has reason to believe Green has a deeper connection to the agent.  Since the latter is simply speculation at this point, the former will have to be my choice.

Gut feeling — The NCAA was sending a message to other players and agents with such a strong penalty.  Green’s suspension will eventually be lessened a bit.

(But my gut feeling has changed once already, so I wouldn’t take that one to the bank just yet.)