COMMENTARY : Coaches’ Boycott: It’s Time

Once upon a time, before the NCAA rule book was thicker than the Manhattan Yellow Pages, John Thompson could walk into Boys Club No. 2 in the District of Columbia, where he literally grew up, and hug a kid approvingly or put the fear of God into some knucklehead, as the situation warranted.

A high-school coach worried about losing one of his students could call John Chaney or George Raveling and say, “Listen, I need you. This kid’s really on the fence and if you could just come and talk to him for a few minutes. ... “

This ancient method was called hands-on mentoring. Regardless of what you might think of sports and the men who coach them, they more than occasionally helped kids stay off the police blotters and in schools or gymnasiums -- or just alive.

But Thompson can’t just drop by at Boys Club No. 2 much anymore, or any playground or gym or place where you’re bound to find more teen-age boys than any classroom. If a high-school teacher calls Raveling or Chaney, the coach will first have to consult his NCAA rule book to find out if he’s committing a recruiting violation by talking to any recruitable athlete, which means 14 years old or older.

The intention of a wave of NCAA rules instituted some years ago is understandable, aimed at preventing coaches in fertile high-school recruiting areas from having an unfair advantage, and allowing phenoms to have time to do something besides fend off coaches.

The reality, however, is that an increasing number of kids have been cut adrift, left with no guidance. Ideally, mentors in urban settings should be fathers and uncles, teachers and ministers, the neighborhood cop and, yes, coaches. A ride through the District in a car with Georgetown’s Thompson and South Central L.A. with USC’s Raveling, however, will convince you that coaches, specifically basketball coaches, are the respected authority figures with enough influence to make a difference.

When the rules allow.

This is a very sore subject, particularly among black coaches (who comprise the Black Coaches of America), who are blue with anger over having their hands tied while teen-age boys throughout the country desperately need guidance.

Those boys also need a way to go on to college, but the NCAA continues to cut scholarships. They also need people who understand and can articulate their needs, but there are no African-American representatives in decision-making positions in USA Basketball or the NCAA.

Anger has led to decisive action. The BCA, having caucused at length, is calling for a boycott of the NABC Issues Forum scheduled for next week in Charlotte, N.C. Why a boycott? Why not work from within the system to make the necessary policy changes?

“Because they schedule the golf before they schedule the discussion,” Thompson said. “Then, they drag in the food, in a plush hotel. Everybody eats, stands up and shakes themselves off and says, ‘Everything’s fine.’ There’s too damn many commissions, too many studies. ... We’d rather go to Congress to find a way to get this thing changed.”

The BCA, as committed as it is resourceful, will meet with the Congressional Black Caucus on Capitol Hill on Tuesday while their colleagues are shaking the crumbs from their sweats, presumably after 18 holes, in some plush Charlotte hotel.

When Thompson walked out of Capital Centre, Jan. 13, 1989, before the Georgetown-Boston College game in protest of the Proposition 42 rule that said a kid who failed to score 700 on the culturally biased SAT exam not only couldn’t play, but couldn’t receive a financial-aid package, it was Thompson alone. Thompson wanted it that way.

Few other black coaches four years ago had the kind of job security that would allow them to survive that kind of defiant act. This time, there’s a cavalry. Some 30 black coaches are coming to Capitol Hill Tuesday, including some of the biggest names in college basketball.

While some university presidents and athletic directors have made plain to their coaches (black and white) in the last 48 hours they are not to support the BCA, men who can see clearly, like Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski, have telephoned their support.

This is a fight the NCAA doesn’t want, and can’t win. When it was one man -- Thompson -- out front, the NCAA couldn’t win. And it certainly can’t now, not with a new group of activists saying, “Count us in.”

Though these are black coaches boycotting the at-large meeting in Charlotte, it is not exclusively a black issue. Poor white kids have many of the same problems, including the one that relates to mentorship.

I know John Thompson, just to use an example, has altered the course of lives because I know perhaps a dozen men my age (34-35) who have related stories of this time or that when “Coach Thompson snatched me by the collar and told me if I didn’t get off the court and go to class he’d kill me with his bare hands.”

I also can assure you he recruited a grand total of none of them. Every kid in need of a hug or a collar snatching isn’t the next Patrick Ewing, contrary to NCAA rules justification. You see, the barber and the postman can no longer do this in urban America for fear of being shot to death. Thompson and Chaney still have that authority, that respect.

“We can’t solve all urban America’s ills,” Thompson said, “but at least let us be a part of the effort. As it stands (with the rules against having contact with potential recruits), we can’t do a damned thing in the neighborhoods we are from. Our influence has been lessened. The drug dealer has more access to kids now than coaches do. ... I understand the goal of the rules, but there’s a larger ballgame out there than whether Temple can beat Georgetown that we can have an effect on.

As Temple’s Chaney said, “We are charged with the responsibility of being role models, but denied the access to the people who need them.”

Now, the college coach has a limited window to offer counsel, as does, say, a former Georgetown player like Alonzo Mourning. Rules violation!

It’s time for the rules to be changed instantly.

Given the fact that college football and basketball produce about 80 percent of an athletic department’s revenue, it’s time to restore two scholarships to basketball, meaning about 600 more kids will have a way to go to college. Thankfully, the BCA will pass a couple of days of golf and buffet tables in an attempt to find a new bottom line.