ATHENS, Ga. — Georgia coach Kirby Good stated he expects the SEC to implement an harm report, or availability report, by subsequent week, with groups going through fines in the event that they’re discovered to violate it.
“What I’ve been instructed is convention video games may have it,” Good stated. “I’m nice with it, so long as we’re all doing it. I’ve no situation with it.”
Good didn’t provide specifics on what the coverage might be, and the SEC has not confirmed that it’s going to have a coverage. Because it solely would apply to convention video games and there are none between SEC groups this week, an announcement might wait till subsequent week. However it’s far sufficient alongside that Good stated he’s placing head athletic coach Ron Courson in control of placing it collectively.
The SEC would be a part of the Huge Ten as the one energy conferences with a present coverage, though the SEC’s is setting as much as be completely different from the Huge Ten, the place groups are required to offer an availability report — which gamers can and can’t play — two hours earlier than kickoff.
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The SEC has been contemplating tiers of availability, much like the NFL’s system, the place gamers are categorized as out, uncertain, questionable and possible, though the SEC might not go precisely that route.
“I believe they’re going to tie fines and issues to it and all that,” Good stated. “Everyone’s attempting to make this a giant deal about deception or deceptive. If I don’t know if a man can play, I’ve bought to search out out earlier than the sport. If he can play, then he’s going to go on the market and play. However we’ve had numerous quantity of fellows which have gone on the market earlier than a sport and labored out to search out out out if they’ll play or not.
“We’ll abide by the principles they offer us. It’s the identical because the NFL’s. They’ve performed it for years. And it retains the stress off our youngsters from individuals reaching out to them to attempt to get data from them for betting websites and attempting to realize data. There isn’t a achieve in the event you’ve bought correct data. So if it protects our youngsters then I’m for it.”
SEC commissioner Greg Sankey has been open to an harm coverage ever since a Supreme Court docket ruling in 2018 that primarily legalized sports activities playing in the complete nation. However the push to get a coverage in place ratcheted up inside the final 12 months.
“We must be as clear as doable, for all the explanations we all know. The playing. It’s the appropriate factor to do,” Sankey stated throughout SEC spring conferences in Might. “We’ve a practice in school athletics of attempting to be aggressive in each single factor we do. I don’t suppose it actually issues within the aggressive piece. We have to be up entrance and have as a lot transparency as doable.”
Within the NFL, groups are required to file three reviews the week of a sport — normally Wednesday, Thursday and Friday for a Sunday sport — with any injured gamers categorized as out, uncertain and questionable. (Possible was a designation however was dropped.) Groups should announce their accessible roster simply earlier than sport time. The system is usually considered well-followed, with solely occasional cases of groups being fined for not being truthful.
Texas coach Steve Sarkisian, who was within the NFL with the Atlanta Falcons, had a fast reply on the SEC spring conferences when requested find out how to stop school coaches from gaming any harm reporting system.
“High-quality us. That’s what they do within the NFL,” Sarkisian stated. “I’m a giant believer on this: The NFL has found out plenty of these items already. They’ve already needed to reside by way of this stuff which have occurred. So we don’t should recreate the wheel a lot. If I attempt to sport the system and I don’t report a man (who’s injured), tremendous us. All of us like the cash that we make. In order that’s a extremely easy solution to get us to stick to the principles.”
The ACC tried a mid-week report system from 2010-17, but it surely was voluntary and deserted. That was proper earlier than the Supreme Court docket determination primarily legalized playing in all states that select to take action, but it surely has taken time for the faculty sports activities world to do way more than discuss harm or availability reviews. And in contrast to the NFL, which may create guidelines from a central workplace, school soccer is determined by every convention.
Georgia voluntarily did an harm report in the course of the 2013 season below then-coach Mark Richt, that includes a number of updates in the course of the week. However with no groups on Georgia’s schedule doing such updates, Richt deserted the experiment after one season.
(Photograph: Kevin C. Cox / Getty Pictures)
