[RUDEBOY_Participant]

It seems 2 of the Top incoming freshmen have to deal with Eligibility issues…
On Tuesday Kentucky coach John Calipari confirmed that center Enes Kanter hasn’t been cleared yet..Kanter who has been cleared academically but questions have come up concerning his amatuer status..If Kanter isn’t cleared by August 14th he might not be able to go on the Wildcats trip to Canada..Whether Kanter has to sit out games or if his overall eligibility is held up will be determined by the Eligibilty Center..

On Wednesday Memphis’s Will Barton was declared ineligible academically..
Barton Tweeted wednesday on his Twitter account ”That it doesnt get any worse then this..”Where do i go from here”?

[stanford hoops]

is barton lazy,slow? i ask becaus ei think he actually transferred just to get his academics in order for his sr year

[RUDEBOY_Participant]

If he’s not allowed to play,I wonder if Barton will take the Brandon Jennings route and go overseas?

[McDunkin]

I read awhile ago that there was actual proof that showed Kanter was getting paid by Fenerbahçe Ulker while he was there

[JNixonParticipant]

This vicariously could help Memphis. Barton is damn-near a ball-hog and so is Joe Jackson, so with one ball-dominant player out of the way they might be better off in terms of their success in this upcoming season.

But I honestly hope everything goes well for both.

[RUDEBOY_Participant]

Dam thats a shame if neither of these guys arent allowed to play..Memphis & Kentucky are 2 of my favorites teams…

[stanford hoops]

hmmmm i think id rather have joe and will. can never have too much talent and would also helo joe as far as becoming more of a pg in the eys of nba teams instead of coming in and scoring like the kid from florida whos name i forget who was in the same class as sebastian telfair….damn we were just talking about him recently too

[Da1potParticipant]

Damn… I’m a diehard Kentucky fan and that would suck if Kanter coudn’t play. If he is ineligible he certainly has more options than barton though, because of him previously playing overseas. Here are the options though

1. Go overseas- A better option for Kanter becasue of his previous stints, also the most profitable money-wise for both obviously. However, a team will likely not just want to rent Kanter for one year, and there would likely be some sort of hefty buyout involved for a multi-year deal, so this might not be the best option.

2. JUCO- They could both play in JUCO and still declare after one year, but this is very unlikely…

3. Go the Latavious Williams route and go to the D-League. I like this the best for Kanter, because he plays in the NBA minor leagues, and if he puts up good numbers, he will still probably be a lotto pick in the 2011 draft, the first ever player drafted in the first round out of the D-league

[mattyun11Participant]

It’s a shame that he’s not eligible, but Memphis has dealt with these kind of players before so they’ll be fine.

p.s: What do you guys think of Will Barton as an NBA prospect?

[Charlie SheenParticipant]

If he didnt go to Memphis he’d just get probation but because of what Coach Cal did they arent going to work with Memphis they could say as long as you stay at a 2.8 or so with do D’s or F’s and only 1 C maybe they did this with Robert Dozier before the probation he had to stay at a certain GPA when he came in and he did but Coach Cal destroyed any chance of Barton playing in the 1st half of the year he will maybe just have to sit out for the 1st half maintain his grades and maybe play but its too much maybes same with Jennings he siad it was tooo many maybes so he fled overseas

[WrecklessParticipant]

Man this sucks, I really wanted to see Will Barton Ball next year.
If he doesn’t get cleared, I really hope to see him playing in the D-League.

[Rock_Cat78Participant]

Kanter will almost assuredly get cleared in the end. If I had to guess, he sits maybe a few games early in the season and this is ready to go after that.

[delfamParticipant]

the same thing happened to Deniz Kilici of West Virginia last year about playing overseas and getting paid and he got a 20 game suspension. If Kanter does not get cleared I could see a similar suspension.

[BothTeamsPlayedHardParticipant]

It doesn’t matter if Kanter plays on the team’s Canadian tour, he will still practice. Those summer tours are just excuses to get a couple weeks worth of practice. His paperwork will eventually go through, but the NCAA is dumb about these matters. Deniz Kilicli missed more than half a year for the same garbage. If the player didn’t get paid, I have no idea why the NCAA should care whether they play against someone who gets paid.

Will Barton said he will appeal the ruling, but there are worse places for him to go than the NBDL.

[OhCanada-Participant]

It would be kind of hard to label Will Barton a ball hog without watching him play one single college game, but I do agree that Memphis do not need him to be successful. He will most likely be a one, who forces bad shots, while being ball dominant, and disrupts the long term develpment of Memphis’s players and success.

I actaully think Barton could benefit from playing in Europe. Players with “Low Ball-IQ”, “Ball Dominant Instincts”, and that “Force Bad Shots”, could all benefit from going to a European structured enviroment to humble themselves and let them truely know what must be done for them to succeed.

Kanter should be fine, and if he doesn’t get the oppurtunity to play with KU, I’m sure European teams will lineup to sign him, and he can always return to Turkey and still recieve Top 5 Draft Pick consideration.

[OhCanada-Participant]

The D-League to me would be a publicity move for Barton and an unwise one at that.

[mikeyvthedonParticipant]

This may come back to haunt me someday, if I ever try to get involved with college athletics, but I think the NCAA rules and regulations are total hypocritical garbage. They are using these guys to make money, and both of them are set to be major pieces for both of their teams. They both WANT to go to college, even if it looks might it be for one year in both cases. Kanter is the son of a professor, and actually turned down big money for a chance to play US college ball. I think it is in the NCAA’s best interest that he play, and that is why I do think he will. But this whole thing about agents and amateurism is just plain old and beat up. It is a broken system and agents have been involved with basketball and other athletic prospects since the inception of pro sport. The Will Barton thing I do not get. He graduated high school, right? Why does it have to be in a mandated 8 semesters? What does that have to do with anything, they have let many players skate by before (I remember they questioned both Jason Richardson and Darrell Arthur about HS credits, after both were done their college careers of course). Why not let the kid play? If players did not go on to pro basketball careers in the NCAA, I gurantee a major drop in ratings and a huge loss of money. They have made themselves the professional training ground, but for a few cases they have to bust some heads to make it seem like they are upholding their so-called sanctity of amateur athletes competing at learning institutions. Do fans of these schools, or the NCAA for that matter, really want these players scholarships going to a 10th man who will stay for 4 years? I just think it makes them look worse if anything. If you can find some defense for them or explaination of why these two potential student athletes have done something wrong, I would love to hear it.

I never heard a good reason Renardo Sidney should not have played last year. I heard he had to pay money back to an agent, and a bunch of scoffing at him even trying to play in the NCAA (I remember Seth Davis saying he had a better chance of playing college basketball. Very sympathetic of you Seth, where was your article explaining why his being allowed to was such a bad thing.), but again, no good stories of why this was so wrong. It happened to JaRon Rush at UCLA, even Kareem at Missouri. I was relatively disgusted that the NCAA did not let Mike Williams back in after he lost a ruling that would have allowed him to leave for the draft as a sophomore, even after he paid back all of the money. I would not have really been bothered had Maurice Clarrett been allowed to go back to school as well, even if he had transferred from Ohio St. I tend to take the players side in these things, I think the NCAA and there schools make enormous amounts of money off of them, and while they have set a precedent that these students should just be happy with an education and their scholarships, it is incredibly difficult to regulate whether these kids are breaking rules, and when it does come down it is either guilty until proven innocent or finishing a case and asking us to forget the past (UMass, Marcus Camby, Memphis Derrick Rose, USC Reggie Bush and OJ Mayo). I know some people see these rules as a moral code, I just want to know what morals these players are really breaking? Do they really have to stand by this practice of amateurism? I think giving money to scholarship players would be incredibly difficult to regulate, and I even thought of possibly starting scholarship funds that could be used for their children or family, but would that stop them from being tempted to still take what is being offered to them on a consistent basis? Doubtful.

I go on these rants because I would like these questions answered, and I never think they truly are. I do not know why willing student athletes are denied the ability to play at schools for petty rules. How are Kentucky and Memphis going to fill these scholarships at this point? What is the NCAA accomplishing by making these players sit out, is it really making college athletics more fair? I look at cases like Schea Cotton, where he actually won a law suit against the NCAA, and I have yet to hear his story, but how unfair can this all be? If you wanted to truly stop all of this, than really just look closely at why a kid is attending a school in the first place. Are they from the state the school is in? Do they have family? Did they see, “Because that is where they told me to go” in their announcement (Albert Means, a DT who signed with Alabama and eventually played at Memphis, but I remember reading it in an old article in SI). Did they maybe, have no announced interest in the school only to call the coach and say he wanted to play there (OJ Mayo, to USC coach Tim Floyd. I believe OJ was suspended 2 games, but, nothing was up there, right?). With everything I named, their could be issues, but honestly, why do we care? Why is Nick Saban such a good recruiter? Because he is so damn charming? He is the Coach Cal of football (apart from the fact he has won championships on the college level). But does no one think it is weird he always has the best recruiting classes? What makes him better than any other coach? It just always seems like something is up to me, and if they are getting advice from connections, how is that not tampering by the NCAA’s rules? World Wide Wes may not be an agent, he may not take any money from these players, but is something not up with him being EVERYWHERE and advising these guys? Like, he is doing this all on his own penny? Just seems like something is up and no one really confronts it. But at the same time, I do not care if this happens, Coach Cal still has yet to win an NCAA title, and his teams are awesome to watch. Nick Saban still loses once in a while, as did Pete Carroll. World Wide Wes can advise whoever he wants, as long as he has the best interest of the players in mind, which from what I have read, he does. I just wish the NCAA would stop riding this ridiculous moral high horse and let these kids play. Why should one mistake on the way to college be punished so harshly. Why should someone who took a little longer to finish high school be made so he can’t play in college? I just do not know what the NCAA really hopes to bring about by enforcing these rules and why what both Kanter, Barton and numerous other college athletes are held back over rules that seem to be incredibly silly, outdated and seem to stem from a bureaucratic system set on turning the attention away from how much the NCAA needs players like these to make the money that they do. If only a few get punished, how bad can it be? Ridiculous.

[BothTeamsPlayedHardParticipant]

Nothing screams publicity seeking diva like the $400 per game pre-tax life of an NBDL rookie. On the plus side, he might get to live in Sioux Falls!

[JNixonParticipant]

I’d rather have both as well no doubt, but Memphis could be better off next year without Barton. That’s all I’m try to say. Teams with more than 1 ball-dominant player on the wing typically struggle to play unselfishly, and if they only have 1 ball-dominant guy, who will be the PG, it makes it easier on Coach Pastner to decipher who does what and what plays they need to run etc etc.

I loved the pure talent Memphis’ class brought in, but it had the look of a class that would slow down the development of either a few of the current players on Memphis’ roster (Wesley Witherspoon mainly) or limit the development of some recruits (Jelan Kendrick plays the same position as Barton and Witherspoon).

[jeff416Participant]

This sucks I was really looking forward to watching Barton play… And it is really stupid why he is ineligible. Like I have said before he is the best SG prospect next year imo, and it will really hurt his stock wherever he goes. Memphis should be fine though, this will give Jelan Kendrick a opportunity to start and that should help him out alot. But, if Barton enters the draft next year whoever drafts him will get the steal of the draft imo.

[stanford hoops]

yeah because of what derrick rose did@hd the k

why would katner go juco?..he would still be eneligable, juco has the same rules

burton isnt a ball hog though. ive watched a couple of games and when he has good teammates like in aau he passes the ball alot, same thing with jackson. they aer wayyy less ball hogs then victor page and allen iverson were and there back court did pretty well.

all allamericans adjust when they get to college. what you see in hs isnt what youre gonna see when they go to a team with other talented players. in hs they pretty much have to shoot the ball alot because if they didnt they wouldnt win

[stanford hoops]

more recent example is john wall and eric bledsoe. both players were used to being scorers and shooting the ball alot but go to college and adjusted there game. plus a coach isnt gonna let one guy be ball dominate when they have other options

[JNixonParticipant]

Yeah true. I might be overthinking it. It’s worked before so yeah I see where you’re coming from sir.

[stanford hoops]

pretty much if iverson and page can do it then any guard combo can do it because those two LOVEEEEEEED to shoot and control the ball

[mikeyvthedonParticipant]

Stanford hoops, you do mention nice tandems, though none of them ever won chips. I think that Memphis class had a bunch of wings, so it was bound to mean one of them would have to sit more than the others, though I do not think Barton would be that guy. Still, will anyone actually answer my questions or does anyone have more to say on this. I just do not think people here seem to talk about their opinions on this. I know it is a prospect based sight and all, but I think this is an issue people might be into, and would like to know peoples take. I know we all to see them play in college, but do some people think they are actually wronging the system? Do they think one more than the other? Feedback people, please, I know I write a lot of words, I know I may not be a journalist, but damn, I am sure some of the questions I posted make some interesting debate points.

[stanford hoops]

of course the ncaa rules are bs. as far as players playing in systems any player should be able to play in any system because in hs the system they play in is give them the ball and let them go. so there game is pretty much not set in one particular system. plus there’s more then enough time for a bunch of good players to get time and play well( Nolan Richardson deep a$$ Arkansas title team,UCLA of the past,unlv etc.) And many teams dont win the title but that doesn’t mean they weren’t successful. i dont think alot of people are answering because there was a recent post about the ncaa rules

[scoutguruParticipant]

Damn man. Why don’t he just spend this year getting eligible. And come back next year ready to go and start his college career from there. Oh I forgot, he’s a 5 star recruit and this is 2010. Stupid me!

[Lotto StudParticipant]

I say F*uck with a capital F SMDH….. With us not getting Barton now I think that stopped us from solidifying a final 4 spot. I just hope we retain him like Mississippi st. did Sidney

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