Opinion: Will Miami survive the hoopla?

The "U"

Yes. By now, most of you are familiar with the current craziness going on at the University of Miami. You know about Nevin Shapiro. You know about the allegations he has made. And you also know about the lengthy report on the whole thing delivered by Yahoo sports.

But the questions are beginning to surface. If this is all true, what does the NCAA do? The list of high profile schools in trouble seems to grow every couple of months. Yes, the NCAA threw a pretty big penalty on USC, and they should have. They are still contemplating what to do with Ohio State and depending on who you listen to, it may or may not be serious.

This case....could be different. Miami is not without a past. They've skirted and in some cases crossed the line in the past. But it has never been this serious.

In that vein, many columnists and so-called-"In the know" sportswriters are saying they should get "The Death Penalty". You know, shutting down the program.

That ain't gonna happen.

Yes, they will be penalized. And a lot of people have already convicted the school. And convicted them on the word of a guy about to spend a long time in prison after stealing hundreds of millions from people. There is no guarantee everything he said was true.

There's talk that if Miami gets a version of the "Death Penalty", they'll be shunned by everybody. Really. Would the ACC say bye-bye to a football program that couldn't compete? Could they? Where would they go? And actually, a weakened Miami, wouldn't be much worse than any other of the mediocre teams in that conference.

No, we don't think that will happen. Why? Because the program isn't going to say "bye-bye". And the ACC would be crazy to get rid of them. The conference is already a prime candidate to be raided, they are in danger of not surviving the "Mega-Conference" scenario even if they do nothing.

Yes, this story deserves to be played out and we really think this may be the case that forces the NCAA to change the way things are done. It should.

In the meantime, though it is early, here is what we think will happen. Miami will be put on "Double Secret Probation for a long time--say 10 years. There will be a bowl ban. They won't be on TV for a long, long time. There will be scholarship reductions. There will be a revamped compliance department. Some people, administrators will lose their jobs. And the once vaunted program will not be what it was for at least a generation.

This is only fitting: