Where USC and Tim Floyd fall in this whole O.J. Mayo debacle

May 13th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanR

After I sifted through all the damning evidence against O.J. Mayo and Rodney Guillory — and there is a lot of damning evidence — I wasn’t quite sure why USC and Tim Floyd should take the fall here. Sure, it’s against NCAA rules for one of its amateur athletes to accept cash and gifts and what have you, but what if Tim Floyd had no clue any of this was going on? (Naive of me, I know.)

But still, it’s somewhat probable Floyd didn’t know about it. And even if he had some inclination and he turned his back a bit to it, I still don’t see why it’s all on them. (It’s more on the one and done rule than anything else.)

But Jerry Brewer in today’s Seattle Times has turned me around on my faulty logic. To wit:

Coach Tim Floyd didn’t recruit the basketball prodigy; Mayo recruited him. Floyd wasn’t allowed to call the kid; Mayo called him. It was an odd, shady alliance, but for victories and recognition, Floyd went along with this dangerous game.

[ … ]

Floyd ignored both logic and evidence, however. The most-hyped player of the 2007 class wanted to come to USC. That’s all Floyd cared to know. With the integrity of his program at stake, he closed his eyes and welcomed Mayo. The entire university enabled Floyd’s recklessness, too.

Why didn’t anyone at USC say no? Plenty of other schools did. After the NBA age limit became official, I remember talking to two prominent college coaches about whether they would recruit Mayo. At the time, he was considered a package deal with his high school teammate, Bill Walker, who wound up going to Kansas State. Get those two, and you’re a legit Final Four threat. So I floated the idea to the coaches.

“It’s not even a consideration,” one coach said.

“You don’t even understand how many problems that could cause,” the other said.

Back then, there was much fear about Mayo’s large circle of friends. There were whispers that he had already been bought, a common rumor about prep basketball stars. There was even speculation that he would skip college and play in the NBA developmental league for a year or play overseas or create some kind of shoe-sponsored traveling team.

I figured Mayo would never play an NCAA game. I figured I had a better chance of dunking on Dwight Howard.

Then he committed to USC. He became academically eligible with relative ease. And finally, when last season began, he was playing for the Trojans.

So basically:  Floyd’s eyes got big even with red flags all around, knew he was getting himself into a heap of trouble potentially, but did it anyways. Can’t say I blame the guy for having a star fall into his lap so easily and complying, but damn, talk about your all-time backfires.