Every time I turn around, Johnny Manziel is in the headlines, and usually not the good kind. Apparently the sports memorabilia market has been flooded with stuff bearing "authenticated" Johnny Football autographs. One sign of a civilization in an advanced stage of deterioration is a lucrative market for the signatures of football players. But that's an issue for another time.
When all this junk with the authentic JFF autograph on it appeared in the internet marketplace, eyebrows went up and eventually the NCAA started an investigation. JFF has been pushing the boundaries since the night he accepted the Heisman Trophy, and I've been expecting him to get caught up in something more consequential than embarrassing pictures and text messages.
The story is that Manziel agreed to autograph hundreds of items in exchange for compensation of several thousand dollars. He's already acquired two new nicknames: Johnny Cash and Johnny Paycheck. Of course, marketing himself in this manner affects his status as an amateur collegiate athlete.
As things stand, there are three possible outcomes to this fucking mess. In the best case scenario, the NCAA completes its inquiry, announces that Manziel agreed to autograph all that crap, and the sleaze merchants he was negotiating with agreed to donate 99,000 dollars in his name to research organizations seeking a cure for cancer. The season goes on as planned, and the Aggies finish in the Top Ten again. Since this is real life and not an episode of a 1950s TV sitcom, I don't expect this to happen.
In the worst case scenario, the little bastard took the 99,000 dollars, lied about it, and left a trail of incriminating evidence a mile long. Johnny gets his opportunity to try pro football, and Texas A&M launches its post-Manziel football era a year earlier than anticipated. The last time the Aggies played an SEC schedule with an untested quarterback, it worked out okay. I'm not counting on a repeat, though, so the Aggies probably finish 7-5, maybe 8-4, in a minor bowl game, and College Station is no longer the center of the football universe.
The third possibility, the one that seems probable at the moment, is that the NCAA accumulates a small mountain of circumstantial evidence, but for various reasons, Manziel retains his eligibility after being suspended for several games. In this case, the season record is probably pretty good, but is tainted with an implied asterisk: "Yeah, they won, but..."
After last year's Alabama game, when Manziel moved into the top tier of Heisman contenders, I had misgivings. My personal preference was for him to finish second in 2012, then win it this year and again in 2014 as a junior. We don't always get what we want, but life would be simpler today if Manziel's autograph didn't have so much historic significance.
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