Because You Need to Be Reminded How Much the NCAA Sucks

By Joe Parello  @HerewegoJoe

Oh how we all love the NCAA.

Whether it's making arbitrary decisions about a player's appeal for a 6th year of eligibility, making billions off of free labor, allowing "name" programs to get away with murder (Or child abuse) until it is far too egregious to ignore, it's pretty easy to dislike it.

Now, we all know that the NCAA has hidden behind the facade of "amateurism" to avoid paying the people that actually make the money for these giant universities and their high paid employees for years, but today's news that it may not let a particular athlete participate this season is just downright silly.

This isn't about a high-profile athlete that will give a power program an edge over the competition. In fact, this is just about the least glamorous college football can get: We're talking about a walk-on tight end at Middle Tennessee State.

That walk-on is 25-year old Steven Rhodes, who has always dreamed of playing Division I college football. After five years of serving in the Marines, Rhodes thought he was about to live that dream, but the NCAA has stepped in and done what the NCAA does: Kill everyone's buzz.

You see, while serving on active duty in the Marines, Rhodes participated in a recreational league. It wasn't for money, and it wasn't making money for anybody else. It's just something the people protecting this country do to have fun.

But nay, says the NCAA, as it fights to preserve the innocence of amateur athletics. Per NCAA rules, a student that does not play college sports right out of high school must sit out for every year that they played an organized sport while not playing in the NCAA.

This decision is sure to clean out college sports and all those low life punks that fight to protect our freedom, then want to walk-on and become a glamorous special teams player at a Conference USA school. They're only in it for the glory!

Never mind that fact that football and basketball power programs are constantly dealing with shady agents, handlers, dirty AAU coaches, sneaker companies and pay-for-play recruiting services, this is what is really wrong with college sports!

UPDATE: The NCAA just announced it will allow Rhodes to play immediately. I'm sure all the backlash from media and fans today had NOTHING to do with that decision. Here is a great tweet from CBS' Bruce Feldman (One of the best college football reporters in the biz) about it.

After further review..the NCAA noticed the interest in Steven Rhodes--and probably wondered how much $ it could've made hawking his MTSU #49
— Bruce Feldman (@BFeldmanCBS) August 19, 2013

So yeah, this whole situation is totally hypocritical and makes absolutely no sense. It's the NCAA, what did you expect?