Barker: Clemson to review admissions process

NCAA Football Betting Lines

02/13/2007 -

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -Nearly a week after Clemson's football team lost two highly regarded recruits because of academic concerns, university President James F. Barker pledged Tuesday to review the admissions process.

The issue took center stage last week when Tigers recruits receiver Dwight Jones and tailback Jo Jo Cox were denied admission by the school's Athletic Advisory Review Committee. Since then, Tigers fans have lit up phone lines on sports talk shows and filled Internet message boards critical of the decision.

Clemson may decide to keep the admissions process the same or make modifications, Barker said. His only goal will be maintaining academic integrity while ``not putting Clemson at a competitive disadvantage,'' he said.

``Few are improved through hasty changes made in anger or in response to criticism,'' Barker wrote. ``I will commit that Clemson will conduct a thorough review of its process, with full involvement of faculty, admissions officials and athletics staff.''

``The bottom line is that our process is not perfect, but it also is not a barrier to competitiveness as some have suggested.''

After starting last season 7-1 and rising to No. 10 in the country, Clemson dropped four of its final five games and ended 8-5. Those defeats included a 31-28 loss to rival South Carolina and a 28-20 defeat to Kentucky in the Music City Bowl.

Clemson coach Tommy Bowden did not comment last week when asked about the admissions process or the message it sent to Tigers coaches.

On Tuesday, Bowden welcomed the review. ``I have confidence that the university administration understands the importance of recruiting on a level playing field,'' Bowden said in a statement. ``And that we will be able to recruit on a level playing field in the future.''

Jones, from Burlington, N.C., eventually signed with North Carolina. Cox, who played last season at Fork Union Academy after signing at Clemson in February 2006, has not yet signed to play anywhere. Although there are reports that Clemson is reviewing Cox's case again.

Copyright © 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

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FOOTBALL TRASH TALK

NFL Football Trash Talk

Trash talk has a place in every competitive endeavor (except baseball; those stirrup-wearers are too busy chewing on their sunflower seeds and their supplements to worry about what their opponents are doing).

Fantasy sports is no exception. Any intelligent discussion of the subject would probably start with a thesis statement or a definition of terms. Thankfully, this wont be an intelligent discussion.

Let me just say that I am happy to take a place in this space alongside my talented colleagues, even our commissioner. (You should see how she bleats like a demented paper boy about league fees on our fantasy site).

Trash talking, I would argue, is primarily about amusing your friends, their sheeplike demeanors and sloping foreheads notwithstanding. The best place I have found for football trash talking is at www.SportsAlarm.com.

Beyond the entertainment factor, though, I would recognize that the sophomoric ritual has one advantage, when properly applied. It magnifies your fantasy triumphs and mitigates your fantasy failures by transforming the eventual point total into an afterthought. Winning makes it seem like your opponent really is a truss-owning, lapel-pin-wearing nitwit. And in defeat, trash talk can be the air bag to break the fall from your hyperbolic heights. The plug-necked yahoos on your team, you can say, will be sacking groceries by the end of the season.

The best trash talk, in my view, is layered and nuanced. And it doesnt focus only on your opponents team. It picks apart your opponent. The idea is to create a shock-and-awe-scale blizzard of nonsense, and the goal is to make your opponent drop his hands from his keyboard in exasperation.

What team does your opponent root for? Accuse a Giants fan of having a Joe Namath pillowcase. Wheres your opponent from? Give a look of concern no matter his reply, then say, I'll try to type slower for you next time. Is your opponent into politics? Label everyone a tax-and-spend corporate shill.

Cap all that with a liberal application of irrelevance. For instance, dont just conclude by saying your opponent is a twerp who drafts like my grandmother. Say that your opponent is a sweater-wearing, eyebrow-plucking twerp who drafts his team about as well as Zsa Zsa Gabor gave acceptance speeches at the Oscars. By the time your foe makes sense of that, his starting running back will have had puppies.

But what about you? Hmm? Recall a memorable slam? Have a tried-and-true technique? Know someone who seems impervious to insult? Take a moment and tells us about it. Put together some (fit-for-publication) thoughts. You wont be too busy returning phone messages from your friends, Im sure, to reply.

In addition to the trash talking, the Sports Alarm has a huge gallery of high resolution pictures of beautiful women and models in bikinis. The most popular models are: Lindsay Lohan, Carrie Underwood, Alessandra Ambrosio, and Paris Hilton.