What, you thought you’d heard the last of a controversy involving satellite camps?
Earlier this week, Hal Mumme, the former Kentucky head coach now at Div. III in Belhaven in Mississippi, took to referring to Ed Orgeron as “Paranoid Ed” as Mumme alleged that the LSU head coach and/or those connected to the program used their influence to (twice) cancel a camp in Baton Rouge that was to be attended Thursday by, among others, Texas and Houston. The former, of course, is coached by Tom Herman, who was reportedly close to becoming the Tigers’ coach before spurning LSU in favor of UT. “That failed courtship rankled LSU athletic department officials,” SI.com wrote.
During a radio interview Thursday, Mumme ratcheted up the rhetoric, telling the ESPN affiliate in Birmingham, Ala., that he has turned Orgeron into the NCAA.
“I think the NCAA needs to come in and look at that,” Mumme said. “I don’t see how a public figure at an SEC school can basically extort people into not using their facilities for the public good.”
It’s highly doubtful that the NCAA will do much if anything, but the university could and should. Certainly what Orgeron and/or other Tiger political minions are alleged to be doing will have no impact on the four- and five-star players; they will get signed regardless. What they’re doing, if the allegations are true, is preventing those below the upper echelon of recruits from being exposed to football programs that might otherwise not be an option, and vice versa.
If Orgeron cares as much about the kids in his home state as he claims, he’ll stand down. And tell those around him to do the same.
As for Mumme? He resigned as UK’s head coach right before National Signing Day 2001 in the midst of an investigation into alleged NCAA improprieties, including payments to recruits as well as high school coaches. While Mumme was not found to have committed any violations himself, the football program was found to have committed more than three dozen and was banned from the 2002 postseason as well as stripped of nearly 20 scholarships.
Mumme’s only jobs at the FBS level since his scandal-plagued end in Lexington came as the head coach at New Mexico State from 2005-08 as well as the offensive coordinator at SMU for one season in 2013.