NCAA Investigating Michigan for Play Stealing

Had staff attend games of future opponents and playoff opponents to determine signs for O and D.

https://x.com/cfbheather/status/1715058742360748313?s=46&t=ZflAtQu28mE4aUWNMrJBpQ

We’re there any trash cans involved?

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This is stupid. So they scouted the team beforehand?

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Sun Tsu would approve. Wish we could steal horn signs tomorrow. :disappointed_relieved:

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I thought this was how the game had always been played. That’s why teams have those goofy signs, and coaches hold the sheet over their mouth when they call in the play

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If it is in violation of NCAA written rules, why is it stupid?

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Nothing will happen.
But if we miraculously upset Texas our program might get life

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“A heavy cost, i pay it gladly…”

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Someone has it out for Harbaugh.

Written rules can be stupid. And in this case we’re basically talking about basic scouting. If a coach notices a signal correlates with a play through regular means of scouting then that’s on the other staff. It’s not like the scouts broke in to the football facility and stole some playbooks.

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True. Then the rule is stupid and should be changed, not the punishment for breaking it.

or should it be ok to arbitrarily enforce rules that one person may feel to be stupid. That gives us college football where A&M never gets punished but TCU, SMU, Boise St, UH and others do. Arbitrary enforcement seems worse to me.

To be fair, College football is all about how to win (stretch rules) before the game is ever played (not a good thing). Big name schools have been trying to do unfair things for 100 years (under the table payments, hording players, pushing the NCAA enforcement on some but not all schools, etc…) It does not surprise me that there had to be a rule about stealing signals. A fair play would be if teams honestly did not try to steal signals and just tried to call plays on the field. They don’t play fair, thus more rules.

Really, I am only surprised that it is Michigan called out and not Central Michigan.

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Rules that are ostensibly stupid should absolutely be disregarded if one can pay the time for violating them. It also helps to reevaluate them.

What makes this alleged particular rule violation dumb is it’s effectively saying that a team can prep for an opponent by watching their games, diagramming the plays they ran, getting advanced data analytics on when and how often they call those plays and in what situations but using their eyes to figure out that certain signals call certain plays is somehow “not fair”. That’s ludicrous to me.

Agree about the first sentence, but who and how do you choose which ones are ostensibly stupid? I can find several people that find the speed limits on I-10 through the city to be ostensibly stupid. Disregarding them can be dangerous. Anything that gets into one opinion vs another when choosing to disregard something can have bad consequences.

Now on this rule, I think there is a difference in your examples. Have you read the rule? It says they cannot send football reps to the other schools practice facilities to watch them. I do not think it is ludicrous to assume some privacy on your own campus to run your practices. Why should they have to try to disguise their own signals when in their own practice facility not around the opponents? They should be able to be open at home, especially if they are teaching the signals to the players.

I equate it to playing poker. I can watch my opponents style of play. Their habits on when they raise, hold, etc or tells for bluffing, yes. But it is absolutely cheating if I have someone behind them telling me their cards. They should have reasonable expectations of not having people tell their cards from behind them (their home space so to speak).

Dude! Great movie. Underrated.

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Could be. Harbaugh still has an unresolved NCAA investigation for COVID era recruiting violations. There must be something to the allegations, because Michigan issued a self-imposed 3-game suspension against Harbaugh.

No, I would not hire Harbaugh to replace CDH.

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It is very difficult to legislate (rule) human behaviors. History is replete with examples: Prohibition; speed limits; Astros use of technology; mandates of any kind. You would be naive or terribly misinformed not recognizing the basic human motivation of acquiring the most reward for the least amount of effort.
With the advent of exponentially developing AI, it would be easy to feed raw data of sideline signs, lip reading, etc. and correlate plays on the field. If you break the rules, then “If you do the crime…You do the time.”

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Apparently TCU fooled them and thats how they pulled out the win

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It seems like everyone is stealing signs but Michigan was dumb enough to get caught.

Isn’t this just “scouting?” I dont see what all the hubbub is about. Cover or disguise your crap better.

During the Herman years didnt we have a sign where it was basically… “skee-skee…?” (Guy jacking it).

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