NCAA coaches flee from respected schools under investigation

As of last night, Lane Kiffin stepped down as Tennessee head coach and took the place of Pete Carroll at USC. Carroll accepted a job with the NFL's Seattle Seahawks earlier this week. Although he denies running away from USC's ongoing investigation, it seems suspicious that he is bolting from a program he invested so much time and effort into building.

Carroll said [his depature USC] “not in any way” did it come as a result of USC’s impending troubles. Among the allegations are charges that former USC running back Reggie Bush took cash and gifts from recruiters, and later violated rules by helping Carroll recruit Louisiana running back Joe McKnight. -- FOX Chattanooga

Tennessee's football program is also under close watch due to allegations of recruiting infractions. Kiffin pretty much sent out some bombshell to convince some barely legal kid to come play football for his program. If that's not genius then I don't know what is, too bad it's against the rules.

Since Tennessee Coach Lane Kiffin took over in December 2008 after being fired as the Oakland Raiders' coach, the Volunteers have committed at least six secondary N.C.A.A. violations — unintentional violations that provide minimal recruiting or competitive advantage. Interviews with multiple recruits and their family members revealed that the N.C.A.A. has strong interest in Tennessee’s use of recruiting hostesses, students who are part of a formal group at the university that hosts all manner of prospective students at campus visits, including athletes. It is not clear whether the university sent the hostesses to visit the football players. -- NY Times

These Nixonian exits are the American way, are they not? Tell 'em Lane.

Finally!

As of yesterday afternoon around 3, notorious slugger Mark McGwire admitted in a tear-filled interview to the use of performance enhancing drugs during his MLB career. We all know he did it, it just came down to when he was going to come clean (no pun intended) and acknowledge it. According to McGwire, the reason he used HGH and steroids was to recover from injury faster, "I did this for health purposes. There's no way I did this for any type of strength use." McGwire claims he was given a gift to hit a baseball, and the fact that he used these drugs did not assist him in smashing all those home runs.

Tony LaRussa McGwire's manager during most of his MLB career reaffirms McGwire's claims, stating that he is one of the hardest working guys in baseball and still is. LaRussa and the Cardinals opened their arms to the ex-hero of St. Louis in October, putting them on his staff as hitting coach replacing Hal McRae. This was an obvious cry for help from McGwire to baseball. After hired we all played the waiting game, it was just a matter of time until he admitted his wrong doing and we got on with our lives. For those of you that see McGwire as a talentless hack who cheated his way to the top, go try and hit a 95 MPH fastball over 350 feet, then and only then can you complain.

Random thought: Maybe Pete Rose should give Mark McGwire's PR agent a call.