There are several things that make this case unique in NCAA history. But one thing in particular stands out: Victims
The only other scandals that I can think of where there were victims were:
1) Some criminal at an institution victimized other members of the institution or people from the surrounding community (Sandusky et al)
2) The institution broke rules that robbed their own student-athletes of the education that was their only compensation for their skill at the time (North Carolina)
In both of the above cases, the victims were individuals. Not other teams.
OK... sure... when you play ineligible players, the other team has less of a chance of beating you. But to me that really tortures the definition of "victim". When you consider that some of our past All-Americans had stories of not having enough money to do laundry when they were in school (even though their tiny stipend was literally called "laundry money"): it seems clear that some of OSU's best players received no impermissible benefits. So did the players who did receive such benefits only attend Ohio State because of those benefits? I'm sorry, but that beggars belief; especially when those benefits were famously available elsewhere.
Semantics aside, there can be no quibbling about whether there are victims of the Cheaters' scheme. They stole signs from other teams using impermissible means. Then they used those stolen signs to gain a clear, unfair advantage. The people that they scouted and recorded (both of those things being illegal) were thus victimized directly by this scheme. Not some advantage obtained because some schools had more rogue boosters than others... A direct, intentional victimization of one institution by another.
The lengthy missive about what the COI is doing said that they like to check their boxes and stay "within the matrix". How in the blue hell is this anywhere in the vicinity of the matrix? This was not rogue boosters providing a difficult to quantify advantage. This was an institution stealing 3 straight championships when they had only been within sniffing distance of a championship once in the previous 10 season. Whatever precedent they think applies to this; they think wrong. As has been said many times before: There is no precedent. There is no matrix to fill out. This is something completely unique and it calls for a unique response. If it does not receive a unique response; I will officially be done with college football. I'm hanging on by my fingernails as it is.
