John U. Bacon

On Tuesday night, Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith flew back from New York, where he had been running the NCAA basketball selection committee, to conduct a press conference. He announced he was suspending his head football coach, Jim Tressel, for the first two games of the 2011 season.

It looks like Tressel has gotten himself into a bit of hot water. That’s why Smith, his boss, flew back to make sure everybody said they were “taking responsibility” – a phrase which changed some time in the last decade, and now means the exact opposite.

It was fine theater.

In December, a few weeks before Ohio State’s Sugar Bowl game, five Ohio State players were forced to admit they sold some jerseys, mementos and trophies to a tattoo parlor owner. (And if you can’t trust a tattoo parlor owner with your ill-gotten goods, who can you trust?) Well, he naturally put them on eBay, and there’s your scandal. It all seems pretty petty to most people, but it’s serious business to the NCAA.

In fairness to the NCAA, the players knew the rules – despite initially denying they did – and brazenly decided to do it anyway. They got caught, and they will have to pay the price. Or they might … eventually. You can’t be certain.

That’s because they were not caught by the FBI or the IRS or whatever agency hunts down the scofflaws who tear off mattress tags. They were caught by the NCAA – and that changes everything.

The NCAA started in 1905, after 18 college students died playing football that year. President Theodore Roosevelt wanted to save college football, so he called the presidents of Harvard, Yale and Princeton to the White House to figure out how. And that’s when the NCAA was born.

For decades, the NCAA’s main source of money was members’ dues, which it used to enforce the rules. Simple enough. But about 30 years ago the NCAA started profiting enormously from its basketball tournament – the current TV contract is worth more than 10 billion dollars. The sheriff became the saloon keeper. And nobody can do both jobs equally well.

Six years ago, the University of Southern California Trojans were suspected of giving the parents of its Heisman Trophy-winning tailback, Reggie Bush, a house. A whole house. I said at the time: Watch how slowly the NCAA moves on this one. But even I didn’t think it would take five years for them to find the house – the kind of thing you can find with, say, a phone book.

But when the five Buckeyes were busted, they were in danger of being suspended for their upcoming bowl game. Suddenly, the same Keystone Cops who took five years to find a house sorted out the Ohio State mess in just a couple weeks. Then they allowed the players to serve their five-game suspension the following fall, when some or all of them might already be in the NFL.

Now an email has turned up which seems to prove Jim Tressel knew about all of this back in April – but told the NCAA in December he knew nothing, no-how. Oops.

So that’s why Gene Smith came rushing back to Columbus to announce he would suspend Tressel for two games. Sound serious? It’s supposed to – but those first two games are against the Akron Zips and the Toledo Rockets – games the Buckeyes could not lose if they were paid to.

If the suspended players stay in school, they will miss out on almost half their last season to prepare for their one chance at pro football. Fair enough. They brought it on themselves. But their coach, who covered all of it up for a year, will be just fine.

How can I be so sure? Because his boss, Gene Smith, is currently the chairman of the NCAA committee for this year’s men’s basketball tournament – the NCAA’s cash cow. If he’s not the sheriff, he’s the deputy. He’ll find just enough wrongdoing to make it look like he’s doing something – and not one ounce more.

The NCAA is no longer interested in integrity – just the image of it. That’s what sells. The suspended players don’t get that. But Tressel does, and so does his boss. They know the saloon owners won’t be too eager to investigate the saloon manager and his best bartender when business is booming.

So, drink up. This round’s on the house.

About the author: John U. Bacon lives in Ann Arbor and has written for Time, the Wall Street Journal, and ESPN Magazine, among others. He is the author of “Bo’s Lasting Lessons,” a New York Times and Wall Street Journal business bestseller, and “Third and Long: Three Years with Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines,” due out this fall through FSG. Bacon teaches at Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, and the University of Michigan, where the students awarded him the Golden Apple Award for 2009. This commentary originally aired on Michigan Radio.

Wednesday's Ann Arbor Farmers Market was full of holiday greenery for sale. The market also will be open on Friday evening, Dec. 4, from 6-10 p.m. for KindleFest, with live music, food, drink and local vendors. (Photo by the writer.)

Two people – Glenn Thompson and Luis Vazquez – spoke during the time set aside for public comment, criticizing what they view as a lack of enforcement of the market’s rules regarding, respectively, organic products and made-from-scratch baked goods.

Also, Peter Pollack, chair of the commission, reported that Notarianni was ill, but he was sure that if she had been there to make her report, she would have highlighted the Dec. 4 KindleFest at the public market.

Pollack also gave an update about the work of a subcommittee that’s reviewing market policies and procedures.

KindleFest

In conjunction with the Dec. 4 Midnight Madness shopping event in downtown Ann Arbor, the Kerrytown District Association is hosting its first annual KindleFest, which will run from 6-10 p.m. in the public market space next to Kerrytown Market & Shops. There will be artists and other vendors, live music – including carolers – food, drink and fire pits for roasting s’mores. Peter Pollack, chair of the market advisory commission, said the idea is to attract people to the Kerrytown area, which doesn’t typically get much traffic during Midnight Madness.

Policies & Procedures

Commission chair Peter Pollack gave a report on work of the polices and procedures subcommittee, consisting of himself and commissioners Shannon Brines and Dave Barkman. The current market rules have been in place since the summer of 2007, he said, and since then the commission has been keeping track of questions, observations and other feedback from vendors and customers. The subcommittee is now reviewing the rules – a review that was spurred by the commission, not the city administration, he said.

There are two tracks, Pollack said. First, they are revising the vendor application and vendor inspection form, with an eye toward giving more clarity to both of those documents. The commission can make these changes without getting city council approval, he said, as long as the forms conform with market rules. The subcommittee hopes to have drafts by early next year, then bring in vendors for feedback before finalizing the changes. The goal is to have the revisions completed for the 2010 market season, Pollack said.

A longer-term project, Pollack said, was to review the market’s policies and procedures, and ultimately make recommendations to the city’s administration and city council. He said that the subcommittee would next meet on Tuesday, Dec. 15 at 5 p.m. at the market office, 315 Detroit St.

During the time set aside for public comment at the end of the meeting, Glenn Thompson said he was surprised to hear about the subcommittee meeting. Given that three commissioners served on the subcommittee, which formed a quorum of the five-member advisory commission, Thompson wondered when and where they planned to publish the minutes from the previous meeting, as required by the Open Meetings Act. He said it was unfortunate that they were conducting meetings outside of the public sphere – it seems like a poor approach and poor policy for a body that claims to be working for transparency, he said.

Pollack responded to Thompson’s comments, noting that the commission itself had only five members. To take advantage of the experience and knowledge of commissioners, the subcommittee had three members, he said, likening it to a working session. The meetings are noticed in advance, and open to the public. [A mention of the Nov. 23 subcommittee meeting was reported in The Chronicle's coverage of the Nov. 3 meeting of the full commission.] “We’re not hiding,” Pollack said. “We’re not doing anything behind closed doors.”

Competition for the Market?

During the time set aside for commissioners to raise items for discussion, Dave Barkman said he’d heard of several instances in which developers and landlords in the area are trying to rent facilities to vendors that currently sell at local farmers markets. He said if vendors are offered better facilities, such as a location that’s indoors, they might decide not to return to the farmers market. It’s something to be aware of, he cautioned.

Peter Pollack noted that there was a time when the Ann Arbor farmers market was unique. That’s not the case anymore, he added, and it’s important to stay competitive. One advantage, he said, was that the entire Kerrytown neighborhood is a destination, not just the market.

After Tuesday’s meeting, Pollack mentioned the vacant retail space at Liberty Lofts as one location that has been cited as a possible market. Barkman said there’s possible interest in a market for workers on the University of Michigan medical campus – similar to a farmers market held on the grounds of the Chelsea Community Hospital.

Public Comment

Glenn Thompson: In addition to his criticism of the subcommittee reported above, Thompson urged commissioners to address the fact that some vendors were misrepresenting their products as organic. The Organic Food Production Act makes it a federal offense to label food as organic if the producer hasn’t been certified, Thompson said. Michigan has a similar law as well. Current market rules would be sufficient to address this, he said – such as enforcing the requirement that vendors submit all licenses and certifications to the market manager, including organic certification. Market rules also prohibit misrepresentation, he said: “Organic at the market must mean as much as organic at the supermarket.” If the commission wants to adopt new rules specific to this issue, Thompson said, he has already provided market manager Molly Notarianni with examples from other Michigan markets in Holland and Lake Orion that regulate the use of the word “organic.” The Ann Arbor market should adopt similarly high standards, he said.

Luis Vazquez: Vazquez also spoke twice, at the beginning and end of the meeting. Holding a sign in the shape of a giant-sized slice of pie with “No Faked Goods” written on it, he began by highlighting an article in the recent issue of Current magazine – “Knowing What You’re Getting” – which looked at claims that certain Ann Arbor farmers market vendors aren’t making their products from scratch. Vazquez noted that market manager Molly Notarianni isn’t quoted in the article. Instead, Jeff Straw, the city’s deputy parks manager, is quoted as stating that the definition of “produced” isn’t specified and is a decision of the market manager. If that’s the case, Vazquez said, and if Notarianni has decided that Kapnick Orchards meets that definition, then “shame on Molly.” If she were at the meeting, he said, he’d wag his finger at her. [Vazquez has raised this issue previously, most recently at the commission's Nov. 3 meeting. See Chronicle coverage: "Public Market Seeks Clarity on Vendors"] He brought copies of signed petitions that he had collected earlier this year from shoppers at the market supporting his position. Markets in dozens of other cities have baked-from-scratch rules, he said, as does the Westside Farmers Market in Ann Arbor. He said he doubted that Kapnick would be accepted as a vendor for the westside market, because of those rules.

During his second public comment speaking turn, Vazquez picked up on Glenn Thompson’s remarks about organic certification, saying that it was a watershed moment because he actually agreed with Thompson. He recalled that Ken King – a former market commissioner and owner of Frog Holler Organic Farm, who died earlier this year – had talked to him several years ago about how difficult and expensive it was for small farms to become certified as organic. Vazquez said he thought that organic farmers should be supported even if they aren’t in compliance with federal statutes. He said it would be more helpful for him if he knew what kinds of pesticides were being used on non-organic produce. Finally, he said he didn’t find the claims of organic produce as egregious a misrepresentation as the more blatant misrepresentation by Kapnick.

Present: Commissioners Dave Barkman, Shannon Brines, Peter Pollack, and Genia Service.

Absent: Commissioner Diane Black and Molly Notarianni, market manager.

Next meeting: The commission’s next regular meeting is on Tuesday, Jan. 5, 2010 at 6:15 p.m. in the fourth floor of the Ann Arbor District Library’s downtown building, 343 S. Fifth Ave., Ann Arbor. [confirm date]

John U. Bacon

Last Sunday, the Detroit Free Press ran a front-page story on the Michigan football team that created a national stir. The newspaper said Michigan football players exceed the NCAA rules on the amount of time student-athletes can work at their sport. It prompted Michigan to launch an internal investigation, but it leaves some important questions unanswered.

But before I try to answer those questions, I want to tell you in the interest of full disclosure that I teach at the University of Michigan, and I write books about their teams. I’m not involved in this story, but I’m close to the people who are.

The story quotes 10 players, most of them former, and most of them anonymous. They all agree that Michigan football players put in a lot of time and effort. Some boast about it, others complain. But the important thing to understand is what constitutes an NCAA violation, and what doesn’t.

The NCAA needs two pages and 35 bullet points just to cover a small section of this convoluted rule. Boiled down, student-athletes can spend only eight hours a week on their sports during the off-season, and 20 hours a week during the season.

Sounds simple, right?

It is – until you get into what the NCAA calls “countable” hours, and “uncountable” hours. Under “countable” hours the NCAA lists 11 core activities like practice, games and team meetings.

Under “uncountable” hours, they list just about everything else, 16 items total, from stretching and taping to team meals and travel. In other words, the 20 hours a week the NCAA counts is probably about half the actual time student-athletes put in every week.

It’s not an adventure, it’s a job.

It gets even messier when you count mandatory activities, which count, and voluntary ones, which don’t. Weight lifting, for example, is considered mandatory – except when it isn’t.

How can you tell the difference? Good question. If you write for the Michigan Daily or play in the Michigan Marching Band, you probably have to put in extra hours if you want to become the editor-in-chief or the drum major. Does that make it mandatory? Who knows? The NCAA isn’t watching them, of course.

Even voluntary weight lifting can be tricky. If several strength coaches are in the weight room conducting the session, it’s considered mandatory, and it counts. But if only one strength coach is in the weight room, monitoring the players for safety, that’s considered voluntary, and does not count.

The main motive behind these rules is to make sure the student comes before the athlete. In this case, at least, it does not appear to be a problem. The Michigan football team just notched its highest grade point in 20 years. But that will have no bearing on the investigation whatsoever.

Still confused? Well, now you know how the investigators must feel.

About the author: John U. Bacon lives in Ann Arbor and has written for Time, the New York Times, and ESPN Magazine, among others. His most recent book is “Bo’s Lasting Lessons,” a New York Times and Wall Street Journal business bestseller. Bacon teaches at Miami of Ohio, Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, and the University of Michigan, where the students awarded him the Golden Apple Award for 2009. This commentary originally aired on Michigan Radio.