Ah, tense times. I see you Hokies are burning up the Internet, wringing hands and fearing the worst in regards to the Collegiate Times story about Kam Chancellor and Tyrod Taylor appearing in promotional fliers, and the potential for NCAA violations.
The story is here: http://www.collegiatetimes.com/stories/13744
So, let’s just address this, shall we? I just caught up with Virginia Tech’s NCAA compliance guy, Tim Parker, who answered all my questions and probably put to bed any fretting you folks are experiencing.
I’m covering an LPGA tournament in Williamsburg at the moment, about to head back out on the course, so forgive the raw nature of the below comments. I hung up about five minutes ago, and I’m just posting the Qs and the As exactly as they came flowing through the phone and out of my fingertips. Hope there are not too many typos.
Just thought you fanatics would want quick answers ...
* TIM PARKER, VIRIGINIA TECH DIRECTOR OF NCAA COMPLIANCE
ON THE COLLEGIATE TIMES STORY ABOUT QB TYROD TAYLOR AND FS KAM CHANCELLOR APPEARING IN PROMOTIONS FOR SOME HAMPTON ROADS CLUBS AND PARTIES, A POTENTIAL NCAA VIOLATION: “Our staff has had conversations with both players, and we’ve been assured that they were unaware of the use of their image or their name prior to these events. And that’s really the key element. The names and images were used without their permission. That’s what we know right now. I’m going to have a more extensive conversation with them tomorrow. We run into this type of situation a couple times a year, where a promoter will use an athlete’s name or likeness to promote an event. If the event hasn’t occurred, we send out cease and desist orders. It’s not uncommon. Most major programs have to deal with this every year. If the event has already happened, we’ll get in touch with the promoters and make them aware of the NCAA rule so this doesn’t happen again. It’s pretty run-of-the-mill stuff. The Collegiate Times was really looking for something to grab a hold of and make a story.”
ON TOMORROW’S CONVERSATION WITH THE PLAYERS: “There are other things I need to find out. We’ll find out if they were at the event, whether they received anything. We just have to make sure they didn’t give their permission. If it had turned out that these guys knew about this in advance, we would have to submit that as violation. We would self-report. But based on what I’ve been told, I have no reason to believe a violation occurred.”
ON THE POTENTIALLY MORE SIGNIFICANT PROBLEM, WHETHER THE PLAYERS WERE PAID TO BE USED IN THE FLIERS: “We will ask them that. We will go through everything, just to do our due diligence. But right now, that appears to be a mute question. Everything else is a dead issue, since our guys didn’t give their permission for any of this.”
ON THE CT STORY SAYING THE PLAYERS MIGHT’VE BEEN PHOTOGRAPHED TOGETHER AT THE EVENTS IN QUESTION: “If they were there, that in and of itself is not an indication of a problem. But if they were, I would just ask to make sure they didn’t receive anything while they were there.”
ON HOW COMMON THIS PROBLEM IS: “When Mike Vick was here, we ran into this all the time. Every ACC, SEC school, we all face this. It’s so easy now to pull photos off the Internet. You just toss it up on the flier. It’s really easy to use anyone else’s image without them knowing about it. Hopefully after tomorrow, we can go ahead and put the whole thing to bed. As a department, right now, we feel very confident that there’s no issue. Just another normal, minor headache. It’s actually amazing to me that we don’t have to do this more, honestly.”
So there you have it. It’s Tim Parker’s job to be worried about such things. If he isn’t worried, doesn’t sound like Tech fans should be either.
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