ESCONDIDO, Calif. – In the summer of 2010, Lance Armstrong told the world about a rising young star in the sport of cycling.

“Remember the name Lawson Craddock,” Armstrong wrote on his Twitter account.

It was a big deal for Craddock, who was then just 18 years old.

But now everything’s changed. In January, Armstrong confessed to several years of lying, doping and bullying in the pursuit of fame and fortune.

What does Craddock think of Armstrong now?

“All of that stuff, I was so young when all that stuff was happening,” Craddock said with a shrug.

The subject is still sore in professional cycling, especially for the young standouts who hope to move out of Armstrong’s long shadow.

Consider what happened here Friday at a news conference to kick off the Amgen Tour of California, the most prestigious cycling event in the United States. Event organizers placed eight cyclists on the podium to answer media questions and pose for pictures. All but one was 30 or under, including Craddock, now 21. Most consider the Armstrong saga to be ancient history, though the issue still pushes complicated buttons of emotion, including embarrassment and even gratitude.

“I’d like to hope that fans move past what’s happened in that whole era of cycling, said Tejay van Garderen, 24, the top American in last year’s Tour de France. “It’s a long time ago now.”

Jens Voight, 41, was the only rider over 30 to appear at Friday’s news conference. After fans clapped at van Garderen’s assessment that cycling had moved on from the Armstrong era, Voight interjected to make an impassioned point.

“Why should he and his generation be punished (for Armstrong’s sins)?” Voight asked.

In an interview later with USA TODAY Sports, Voight said questions about Armstrong are “unfair to the young ones.”

“They were playing Pokemon on their Game Boys when Lance won his first Tour de France,” Voight said. “They simply don’t know anything.”

It was just three years ago that Armstrong last competed in the same event these riders are competing in now. It was May 20, 2010, a very bad day for Armstrong. In the morning, the nation learned that Floyd Landis, Armstrong’s former teammate, had accused Armstrong of doping. Later that day in the Tour of California, Armstrong’s bike skidded on a patch of gravel, throwing him to the ground in a violent crash.

Nobody knew it then, but it was the beginning of the end for Armstrong. Three years later, he’s still picking up the pieces. And so is cycling, whose new generation of riders struggles to unstick itself from the worst parts of his legacy. Last year, Armstrong, now 41, was stripped of all seven of his victories in the Tour de France from 1999 to 2005.

“It’s fair to say the future of the sport is bright,” Craddock said. “It’s going to get worse before it gets better sometimes.”

Craddock, a Texas native like Armstrong, still smiles when asked about that Twitter message Armstrong sent about him in 2010.

“Lance has given me a lot of really good opportunities,” he said, adding that many of his colleagues “wouldn’t be here without him.”

As for Armstrong’s apology to the world in January, Craddock didn’t question it.

“I think he was sincere.”

“He apologized,” Voight said. “That’s good. For me that’s good enough.”

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

More than 150,000 spectators will pour into Saturday’s Kentucky Derby, the largest and highest-profile U.S. sporting event since last month’s bombings at the Boston Marathon.

What they’ll witness is a scene that became familiar in stadiums nationwide after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001: a heightened security presence that will include electronic wand searches of patrons for suspicious objects and a fresh ban on coolers in the infield of Louisville’s storied Churchill Downs.

But who are the private security guards protecting the nation’s stadiums? Are they more often tasked with subduing an inebriated fan than defusing a terrorist plot in the making? How good are they?

It depends. Stadiums and entertainment venues across the nation routinely rely on low-paid, part-time security guards with spotty training and even criminal convictions, an investigation by USA TODAY Sports has found.

Experts call it “security theater” at stadium gates — a show of uniforms and bag searches that does little to protect fans from what we witnessed in Boston. After that attack in broad daylight, they say the entire system needs an overhaul, from security guard regulations to the public’s awareness at major events.

“Security in the United States is all about bells and whistles,” says Rafi Sela, a former official with the Israel Defense Forces. “You see the guards standing at stadiums and bus stations. It’s not even considerable deterrence anymore.”

Security company officials and experts say such guards might be the biggest gap in the security of U.S. sporting events. If intelligence fails to stop a plot before a bomber reaches the gate, the guards are often the next and possibly last line of defense against a Black Sunday scenario — an attack in a crowded stadium as depicted in the 1977 film about a bombing attempt at the Super Bowl. These are the workers hired by private firms to search bags and people, enforce rules and control entry points.

Because security guard companies offer sporadic employment that does not pay well, turnover is high: Security company officials say guards usually don’t stay on the job for more than a year or two. Twenty-three states don’t even require applicants to complete any training.

“In the event world, it is not the fire marshals and police that take care of facilities,” says Damon Zumwalt, chairman and CEO of Contemporary Services Corporation (CSC), one of the nation’s most respected event security firms, based in Northridge, Calif. “It is private security, and the private industry is woefully deficient in knowledge and procedures which could possibly prevent attacks of many kinds.”

HOLES IN THE SYSTEM

Zumwalt says tougher mandates are critical. Just like lessons learned after the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 and the 2001 attacks, he and other U.S. officials are looking to learn from Boston. International security experts in more volatile regions of the world say the U.S. approach to thwarting attacks is part of the problem, a view that has echoed around the globe for years, especially as it pertains to U.S. airports.

Sela, who now works as an international security consultant, says, “Boston could have been avoided.”

An investigation by USA TODAY Sports also found:

Criminal backgrounds. This year, California has revoked 154 security guard licenses, often because of criminal convictions discovered after the license was issued, according to state records. Florida has revoked an average of more than 350 security licenses annually the past five years, also often for criminal records. Those numbers are only known because those states regulate the industry.

Training, licensing gaps. Seven states require no security-guard licensing at all. Among those that do, several, including Massachusetts, don’t require training. Indeed, security at the Boston Marathon’s finish line was staffed by a blend of volunteers and police. In Florida and California, 40 hours of training are required, including a course on terrorism awareness and weapons of mass destruction. In Hawaii, which previously required no training, new requirements taking effect July 1 will stipulate at least eight hours of training. The bill was sponsored by state Sen. Rosalyn Baker, who told USA TODAY Sports that an upgrade was needed because guards “didn’t know what their responsibilities were.”

Cost-cutting undermines safety. Most pro and major college teams hire private security firms for games, often selecting them based on cost or through a low-bid process, event security officials say. This business model can create budget pressures that lead to cutting corners on security at games.

“I get undercut (in bidding) by contractors who cut corners, absolutely,” says Cory Meredith, president of Staff Pro, an event security company based in Huntington Beach, Calif. “We know what it takes to supply a professional well-trained person, and we refuse to go below a certain level. You can only slice the bologna so thin.”

Loose definitions, loose security. Some companies have used employees classified as “event staff” in security roles at stadiums to avoid training requirements and increase profits, says Dane Dodd, CSC’s vice president of training. He says he’s seen event staff doing bag searches and controlling access to restricted areas — jobs that he said should be done by higher-paid trained guards. “This is one of the ways the industry gets around regulation, where it exists,” says Dodd, whose company has staffed more than 100 stadiums and more than 50 branch offices across the nation.

A ‘SUPER’ FAIL

With video cameras fastened to their foreheads, students Malachi Youngblood and Joseph Roberts recently filmed a documentary claiming how easy it was to sneak into the biggest, most secure game of the year — the Super Bowl in New Orleans on Feb. 3.

The video shows the duo as they casually walked past several police officers and security guards before getting inside the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. The video shows nobody really checking them — not even the guard who let them in the door without asking questions. NFL spokesman Greg Aiello says the matter is under investigation and declined to identify the responsible security contractor. The NFL’s main security contractor at the Super Bowl, S.A.F.E Management, also declined to comment.

“If this could happen at a Super Bowl, imagine what is going on at other venues,” Dodd says.

Last year, a KDVR reporter tested pro stadium security in Denver, where the state of Colorado requires no training to get a license. For the second year in a row, she and a colleague were able to sneak in a real pistol (but with a concealed weapons permit) and a fake gun at stadiums.

Such venues have long been thought of as prime targets in a post-9/11 world, well before the magazine Inspire, a propaganda tool for al-Qaeda, drew attention recently because it listed “crowded sports arenas” as ideal targets. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has been advising stadium officials for years and has conducted assessments to detect vulnerabilities.

But the department only has an advisory role in relation to the guards hired at these venues. As a result, no national enforceable standards guide the industry, leaving a patchwork of regulations and practices that vary from state to state, team to team and contractor to contractor.

Ultimately, it comes down to trust. A stadium or team must be able to vouch for the security it hires.

“Each facility might have a different answer for this,” says David Scott, president of the Stadium Managers Association. “But as a general statement, there are long-standing relationships with the companies that provide that staffing.”

CSC says it goes beyond state requirements, including additional training and assessments as well as using people to test their security with banned or suspicious objects.

In 2005, the company was staffing a University of Oklahoma football game when a student, John Henry Hinrichs III, blew himself up with a bomb about 200 yards from the facility. Zumwalt, the company’s CEO, suspects the man probably wanted to enter the stadium with the device but was thwarted by the sight of vigorous bag searches. The FBI investigated and deemed it not to be an attempt at terrorism.

THE ISRAELI MODEL

At the Boston Marathon, security at the finish line was provided by police and volunteers donning yellow jackets, lined up next to each other on both sides of the street. Almost all appeared to have their backs to the crowd when the first bomb exploded behind them. Though it might not have prevented the attack, experts say better-trained security guards might have helped reduce the casualties.

Marathon spokesman Marc Davis says the volunteers near the finish line perform a simple security role but also are there to help runners.

That’s a key difference, says Sela, the Israeli consultant. Trained security people “don’t watch the race, they watch the crowd. That’s what they didn’t do (at the finish line).”

It’s one reason Sela believes a similar attack probably would not have succeeded in Israel. Decades of attacks and constant threats have forced the nation to think differently, using methods that have helped prevent hijackings and spectacular attacks at public events.

“In Israel, you cannot leave a bag unattended for more than 10 seconds before someone will ask questions,” Sela says.

“For some odd reason, the United States doesn’t want to adopt the European-Israeli way of doing business in security.”

He says the U.S. strategy is like trying to find a needle in a haystack by sifting through every piece of hay. By contrast, he says the “European-Israeli way is to blow the hay away and just leave the needle to be checked.”

Most importantly, he and others say, identifying potential terrorists before they even arrive at a marathon or stadium is the surest way to prevent the carnage witnessed in Boston.

“It is all about people and not their belongings,” Sela says, referring to Israel’s use of individual profiling, a controversial subject in the U.S.

“Israel relies heavily on the efficiency of its intelligence apparatuses, and most of the terrorist plots are being thwarted before they materialize,” says Boaz Ganor, executive director of the International Policy Institute for Counter-Terrorism in Israel.

Sela says there isn’t enough emphasis on this in the U.S. because it’s expensive and doesn’t help politicians get re-elected. “It is away from the public eye so politicians cannot brag about it,” he says.

As for security guards, Israel has a governing body with more enforcement power than the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Sela says the Israel Security Agency requires such guards to have background checks and have training tailored for their jobs — training for a school guard being different than that for a guard at a stadium.

“The security personnel should be at least on the same learning curve and understand the terrorist’s calculations … and tailor the security plan accordingly,” says Ganor.

In the U.S., the quality of event security often comes down to the company. But those with better training and pay are more expensive. Because of this cost factor, Dodd says the trend has been for event organizers and venues to seek “the cheapest security providers and reward them with low-wage contracts that require the contractor to sacrifice training in order to make a profit.”

To make money from a contract, the security companies in turn try to reduce their own expenses, often by keeping costs down with labor that gets paid around $13 an hour on a part-time, irregular schedule.

But dollars, Sela argues, shouldn’t be a reason to compromise safety.

“What is the cost of human life? If you want to have a bomb in a stadium and 20 or 30 people killed and 170 wounded, and that’s not worth a half-million dollars in security, then human life is less favored than human life in Israel. … At the end of the day, it’s about how much you value a human life.”

Follow Brent Schrotenboer on Twitter @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com

SECURITY AT EVENTS AFTER BOSTON MARATHON

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

As a 21-year veteran of the U.S. Secret Service, Branch Walton once provided protection for Presidents Nixon, Carter and Reagan.

It was an impossible job in one respect: No matter how much attention was given to prevent bombings and assassination attempts, there was no guarantee it would be enough.

Monday’s fatal bombings at the Boston Marathon offer another case in point.

“Everyone should understand there’s no guarantee, no matter what you do and how much training, manpower and money you put into it,” says Walton, now retired from the service. “There’s no guarantee you can prevent it, but you sure can reduce the possibilities.”

Videos of the blasts on Monday showed several police and security personnel nearby, but it didn’t matter. If one person with a bomb in a backpack secretly intends to kill, it’s virtually impossible to thwart unless warning signs are detected well enough in advance.

“Pre-incident indicators” is what Walton calls them, usually in the form of suspicious behavior. It’s what authorities at the London Marathon will be looking for before and during Sunday’s race. Authorities in Cleveland, which will host a marathon in May, also said they plan to increase patrols and preparation.

In the case of an assassin or bomber, warning signs vary. Walton recalled that in the days before the assassination of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy in 1968, his killer, Sirhan Sirhan, made unusual inquiries about RFK’s whereabouts and plans at the hotel where he was shot.

“In hindsight, the (hotel) employee said it was something weird and should have reported it to somebody,” Walton said.

In other words, it’s the old mantra: If you see something unusual, say something and share it. That is still the best way to reduce risks of an attack, Walton said.

The Chicago Marathon includes that advice in its public-safety message: “If you see a suspicious person, object or vehicle along or near the race course, report the sighting to 9-1-1 or to law enforcement personnel.”

Even that only works if the would-be bomber leaves clues about his intent.

And with an event covering as much territory as a 26.2-mile marathon, there is no practical way to sift through that many haystacks to find a single deadly needle.

“Along 26 miles, my goodness, anything could happen,” says Ed Connors, president of the Institute for Law and Justice in Virginia.

Searching and screening every square foot of that area is not realistic, he said.

“It would cost so much money, and nobody would want to spend the money on it,” says Connors, who has authored guidelines for law enforcement in planning event security.

Making matters worse, not only is the haystack too big, but the needles are becoming smaller and more difficult to detect because of advanced technology. During the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, a bomb in a knapsack hidden under a bench killed two people and injured more than 100. On Monday in Boston, at least three people died and more than 140 were injured, and authorities again believe small devices triggered the explosions.

Even more frightening is Connors’ nightmare scenario – the potential use of drones in terror attacks. A small unmanned drone could bomb a stadium full of people, avoiding radar detection while flying in from out of the clear blue sky, Connors says.

“There’s been incredible advancement in technology of these little drones,” Connors says. “When they first started, drones were big. Now, goodness sakes, I’m not sure how they can stop it.

“That’s the real scary one to me, the Black Sunday scenario with a little two-foot drone.”

Lou Marciani, director of the National Center for Spectator Sports Safety and Security, called Monday’s bombing “a sad day for America” and said he hopes to help improve security as it becomes known how this attack was carried out and who did it.

At the same, there’s still no guarantee it won’t happen again, no matter how many more police and security measures are added.

“These open events… you’re wide open,” Marciani says. “Sure enough, something happened.”

Follow Brent Schrotenboer on Twitter @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

To defend himself from several recent lawsuits, Lance Armstrong has employed a small army of attorneys in three U.S. time zones, plus one of the top law firms in Britain.

It’s not cheap. At least one lawyer charges more than $800 an hour, helping drive up Armstrong’s expenses at the same time his income has slowed to a trickle.

What can he do to reduce the financial hit?

For starters, he can sell his home in Austin, as he did last week. Though the sale price was not made public, the 1.7-acre property was appraised last year at $3.9 million, according to Travis County (Texas) records. The buyer, a founder of a Texas oil and gas acquisition company, took out a $3.1 million loan related to the purchase, records show.

The 7,806-square-foot house once was featured in Architectural Digest, which noted Armstrong’s children designed their own bedrooms. “You will graduate from high school in this house,” Armstrong told his children in an article published in July 2008. “I promise. Dad’s not moving again.”

The oldest of his five children is now 13, but things have changed. The home is a casualty of the former cyclist’s downsizing as he faces more than $110 million in potential liabilities from at least six lawsuits. All generally accuse him of defrauding them, saying he financially benefited from cheating on the bike and lying about it for several years.

Last October, all of his major sponsors fired him after the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency released a damning file that detailed how he used banned drugs and blood transfusions to boost his performance.

Armstrong, 41, called the loss of income a “$75 million day. Gone. Gone, and probably never coming back.”

He’s also banned for life from sanctioned sporting events, including marathons and triathlons. Last year, the World Triathlon Corporation had a $1 million deal with him and his cancer foundation. This year, he can barely jump in the local pool without protests. Armstrong was forced to withdraw from a masters swimming event in Austin last week after the International Swimming Federation enforced the ban.

A person familiar with the situation confirmed to USA TODAY Sports that Armstrong is downscaling as his legal costs rise and his income has declined. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation.

Armstrong hoped his confession to doping in January – delivered to Oprah Winfrey on television – would help pave the way for public redemption. But many sponsors might never come back, and he has dug in his heels against those trying to recover money from him. The federal government, two insurance companies, a British newspaper and two potential class-action plaintiffs all want their money back.

Last week, Armstrong’s attorney asked a state court to dismiss one of those cases – a suit filed by a Dallas sports insurance company that paid his bonuses for winning the Tour de France. He argued the court lacked the jurisdiction to get involved in the case because the two sides previously reached a binding settlement.

It’s the kind of legal battle that costs money.

“It’s fair to say that loss of endorsement income combined with expensive litigation would cause someone to watch the bottom line pretty closely,” said Marc Mukasey, a New York attorney not involved in the Armstrong cases.

Austin still will be Armstrong’s primary residence, his representative Mark Higgins told USA TODAY Sports.

Follow Brent Schrotenboer on Twitter @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

INDIANAPOLIS — No other chief executive in the history of the NCAA has stirred up a storm quite like this.

Since the hiring of President Mark Emmert in 2010, the NCAA has handed down 48 major rules violation cases against member schools – a rate that is far higher than any of Emmert’s predecessors, according to a review by USA TODAY Sports. It’s 25% higher than the previous NCAA president and doesn’t even include the two most controversial punishment cases under Emmert’s watch – Penn State and Miami.

“That’s as aggressive as we can possibly be with it,” Emmert told USA TODAY Sports in an exclusive interview last week at NCAA headquarters.

It’s all part of a jolting reform process designed to change the NCAA – step up rules enforcement in college sports while speeding up the process with a rulebook that’s less complex. But it’s a mission that has been hounded by resistance to some proposals and controversy, particularly over the handling of the Miami and Penn State cases. While Emmert says he is trying to transform an organization with nearly 1,100 member schools, he’s faced lawsuits and accusations of moving too fast, overstepping his bounds and firing employees who thought they were doing what he wanted.

“You get confronted with all the schools and interests (in the NCAA) and all the reasons why things move slowly come up, and it hit him in the face,” said Jo Potuto, a Nebraska law professor and former chair of the NCAA infractions committee.

Under the supervision of his bosses on the NCAA executive committee, Emmert’s task is to lead major reforms at the NCAA. The agenda has three main components, all stemming from a retreat Emmert held with college presidents in August 2011: improve the academic performance of athletes, get tougher on rule-breakers and simplify its notoriously complex rulebook.

Many member schools also wanted reform to help curb the runaway costs in college athletics – an effort that has failed to take off because of disagreement about what to do about it between schools with athletic programs struggling to pay bills versus the powerhouses that drive the price tag ever higher.

Overall, Emmert says the reform effort “has been quite successful despite all the noise that’s been screaming around in the background.”

A progress report:

Academic performance: The NCAA increased the Academic Progress Rate standard and enforced a postseason ban for teams that fall below it. If you’re not on track to graduate at least half your players, you don’t play in the postseason. “Sitting here today, I’d say we got an `A’ on that one,” Emmert says.

But there is a side effect that can form in college sports when academic expectations are increased. Some athletes flock toward majors that give them more flexibility to remain eligible for competition. For example, at LSU, where Emmert was chancellor from 1999-2004, the 2004 LSU football media guide listed about 44 of 90 football players as general studies majors. It’s an issue that has continued at many schools.

Emmert acknowledged the tradeoff.

“Whenever we increase academic expectations… we run the risk of student-athletes having a more difficult time filling in specific majors, and you see fewer students gravitating toward engineering majors or other majors where they don’t have as much flexibility,” Emmert says. “It doesn’t surprise me.”

Rules enforcement: More rules enforcement staff has led to more infractions cases. The rate of major infractions cases under Emmert is more than double that of longtime NCAA chief Walter Byers, who retired in 1987, according to NCAA data. Of the 48 major infractions cases under Emmert, 13 were in major college football and another 13 were in Division I men’s basketball

“We set up a penalty structure that reinforced the serious concerns – those infractions that were serious threats to integrity – in a way that the penalty structure was shifted so there was much greater emphasis on those and not so much worry about little things,” Emmert says.

Emmert said this effort is “on track.” But more aggressive enforcement has brought controversy. The NCAA lacks subpoena power – the power to compel witnesses to cooperate. Instead, “innovative” investigative techniques were encouraged, at least until they backfired during the NCAA’s recent investigation of the University of Miami football program. In that case, an NCAA investigator arranged to pay the attorney of a Miami booster to gather evidence through the booster’s bankruptcy court proceeding.

After the tactic became public, Emmert and Miami President Donna Shalala condemned it. The investigator was fired, and so was the NCAA’s vice president for enforcement, Julie Roe Lach, who recently was replaced by attorney Jon Duncan on an interim basis. To critics, it seemed Emmert was feigning outrage and sacrificing his subordinates in the face of criticism over his own agenda. Moreover, what innovative tools can the NCAA use to gather evidence and stay on the right side of ethics?

“That’s a conversation we’re having right now in the enforcement department,” Duncan told USA TODAY Sports last month.

Deregulation: In 1952, the NCAA published its first rulebook. It was 25 pages and included just three paragraphs to regulate recruiting. In 1977, the rulebook had grown to 148 pages. In 1987, it was 299. Now it’s over 700 pages covering three divisions. The Division I rulebook is “overly complex,” Emmert says.

Emmert says the effort to reduce it is making “good progress, but we’re going have to debate some of the more controversial pieces and see where they go.”

It probably won’t be easy.

One example came recently when coaches and athletic directors objected to NCAA plans to deregulate restrictions on recruiting staff size and printed materials that can be sent to recruits. Without limits, many coaches and athletic directors grew concerned it would lead to an “arms race” to outdo and outspend the competition, more like the NFL.

“Historically any time the association has tried to have any significant reform, it learns those rules were all put there for a reason,” former NCAA President Cedric Dempsey told USA TODAY Sports.

Misunderstood job?

Emmert says the hardest part of his presidency so far is dispelling what he says are “mythologies” about the way the NCAA makes decisions and the power of his office. Unlike the heads of pro sports leagues, Emmert does not decide punishments. He also doesn’t make the rules. Those generally are the duties of the NCAA’s committee on infractions and the representatives of NCAA schools.

“I always tell people, Don’t think about it as a command-control structure,’” Emmert said of the NCAA’s balance of power. “Think of it like the United Nations. The decision-making structure looks and feels much more like that. In many ways, it’s more complex than Congress.”

Some Penn State supporters argue the structure is less democratic than that. Last year, the NCAA slammed Penn State with a four-year bowl ban and $60 million fine last year related to the alleged cover-up of child sex abuse by former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky.

Instead of investigating the case on its own, the NCAA bypassed its judicial arm — the NCAA infractions committee – and accepted the findings of an investigation commissioned by the university. The case was fast-tracked by Emmert, the NCAA executive committee and the Division I board of directors. Penn State ultimately agreed to the penalties under the threat of even harsher punishment from the NCAA.

The state of Pennsylvania is now suing the NCAA, saying the aggressive action was an overreach to “boost the reputation and power of the NCAA’s president.”

Yet, to some degree, Emmert is herding cats – nearly 1,100 schools have 1,100 different and often conflicting interests. At the same time, critics wonder where the buck stops at the NCAA when things go wrong. Emmert is the public face of the NCAA but often notes the limitations on his power. He also points out the NCAA president doesn’t get involved in infractions cases.

“It is as if each entity or individual within the (NCAA) system can point a finger at another entity or individual actor,” says Richard Southall, director of the College Sport Research Institute at the University of North Carolina.

Southall described it as a “deflection of responsibility.” To Emmert, he is serving the wishes of his membership.

“I think it’s important to differentiate Mark Emmert’s agenda, from what’s the membership’s agenda,” he says. “The confusion that occurs most frequently with the NCAA is people tend to think of the NCAA as like the NFL or NBA. In fact, we’re this very complex 1,100-member voluntary association, and every rule, every policy, every bylaw is a creature of that membership.”

Follow Brent Schrotenboer on Twitter @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com

Contributor: Rachel George.

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

INDIANAPOLIS – Six years after Mark Emmert left his job at the University of Connecticut, the governor of Connecticut ordered an investigation into a massive construction project on campus that had been ravaged by scandal, including more than $100 million lost because of mismanagement.

To find out where things went wrong, the investigators looked at old papers of Emmert, who once supervised the project as UConn’s chancellor. They soon found a bombshell.

Memos from 1998-99 showed that Emmert and two other top UConn officials knew about the construction project’s big problems then, but failed to disclose them to the school’s board of trustees or the state legislature.

The other two officials ultimately resigned after being placed on leave. The third — Emmert — went on to become president of the NCAA.

“There is absolutely no question that he was briefed on the magnitude of the problem three years into it,” Jonathan Pelto, who co-chaired the investigation for Connecticut Gov. Jodi Rell, said of the findings. “He was in a position to blow the whistle and didn’t.”

Gov. Rell called the fiasco “an astounding failure of oversight and management.”

It had no bearing on Emmert. By the time the problems were found, he was long gone, having become chancellor at LSU in 1999. Connecticut officials said their efforts to question him about his role in the matter were unproductive.

The case fits a pattern for Emmert. Rightly or wrongly, he has a history of dodging blame in scandals that have festered on his campuses, sometimes moving on to a more lucrative job before their full extent becomes known. Now as the top cop in college sports, he has talked tough, calling for more integrity in college sports and cracking down on wayward programs, including those that failed to blow the whistle, such as Penn State and Miami. But in his previous positions, Emmert has drawn criticism for not moving nearly as aggressively against problems that occurred under his watch. An investigation by USA TODAY Sports found:

“I never saw an audit issue that was a problem at all, and we certainly wouldn’t have kept it from people,” he said.

His assertion contradicts the findings of two official investigations in 2005 and a 1998 handwritten memo in his name obtained by USA TODAY Sports. Emmert’s role in the scandal never drew much attention because by the time it was discovered in 2005, he already had left UConn.

Emmert even met on LSU’s behalf with the NCAA, which accepted LSU’s findings. But after Emmert decided to leave LSU in 2004, a witness testified in a deposition that the instructor was telling the truth and that the problems were far more systemic than the school admitted, even extending to grades being changed for football players, according to court records.

The culture was “appalling” and “like Romper Room,” the employee said in 2004 testimony.

Furthermore, as a university president and chancellor, Emmert advocated for upgraded athletic facilities and the biggest salaries in the nation for himself and his football coach. Now at the NCAA, he works for schools who want reform to stem the runaway costs of athletics.

“He is a product of that same system with which he is trusted with reforming,” said Jason Lanter, a psychology professor at Kutztown University and past president of the Drake Group, which seeks reform in college sports.

Others see another issue.

“When you Google ‘Emmert,’ you do sort of see this pattern, which is he’s a great front man, but there always seems to be these problems with the people around him,” Pelto said. “Does he trust bad people? Is the problem that he doesn’t know what’s going on? Is the problem that he does know what’s going on and doesn’t do anything about it?”

Steady climb

Emmert, 60, rose through the ranks of higher education by climbing a ladder of administrative posts from Colorado (1985-92) to Montana State (1992-95) to UConn (1995-99) to LSU (1999-2004) and then Washington (2004-2010).

Observers say he is like a politician in many respects — an ambitious and skilled operator, communicator and fundraiser who tailors his message to his audience. In 2004, when he was named president at the University of Washington, he told university supporters that UW would be his “last stop.” But he left to become NCAA president in 2010.

“He is a master of public relations,” said Bill Funk, a friend of Emmert’s and search consultant who helps universities find new academic executives. “He’s extraordinary externally … the consummate president.”

As NCAA president, he’s embarked on an ambitious reform agenda designed to improve integrity and academic performance in college sports. It also aims to simplify the rulebook and get tough on those who violate major NCAA rules.

While he calls the academic reform measures a “rip-roaring success,” the NCAA has faced a barrage of criticism under his watch — mostly over how it handled the cases of Penn State and Miami.

Last July, Emmert announced a four-year football bowl ban and $60 million fine for Penn State, saying Penn State’s athletic culture went “horribly awry.” The reason for the punishment was because of findings that Penn State officials didn’t blow the whistle when they should have. They covered up evidence of child sex abuse by former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky in order to avoid negative publicity for the football program, according to an investigation commissioned by Penn State.

“If you find yourself in a position where the athletic culture is taking precedent over the academic culture, then a variety of bad things can occur,” Emmert said then.

Though Penn State had agreed to the sanctions, critics and Penn State fans said it was an overreach of power and unfair to current players and coaches who had nothing to do with the scandal.

In the Miami case, booster Nevin Shapiro allegedly showered athletes with impermissible money and gifts. The NCAA investigated, but was limited in the evidence it could obtain because it lacks the subpoena power to compel witnesses to cooperate. To work around this handicap, an NCAA investigator arranged to have Shapiro’s attorney question witnesses on the NCAA’s behalf at Shapiro’s bankruptcy court proceeding.

Though the tactic didn’t break any NCAA rules, it went against the advice of the NCAA’s own legal counsel. The NCAA also was potentially abusing a bankruptcy court proceeding by paying the attorney of a complaining witness to gather evidence against an NCAA member school.

After it was publicly revealed, Emmert condemned the tactic and said the NCAA had “failed our membership.” Miami President Donna Shalala said the university was wronged by the NCAA. The NCAA’s enforcement chief, Julie Roe Lach, was fired in the aftermath even though Isch approved funding the arrangement to use Shapiro’s attorney on behalf of the NCAA.

To some, it seemed Emmert sacrificed his staff to save himself and Isch, who approved the proposal’s funding but wasn’t responsible for deciding its appropriateness, according to a report on the case.

It was Emmert who promoted Roe Lach as his new vice president of enforcement in 2010. At the time, he praised her “innovative ideas” and said she would be developing “initiatives to discover and address violations.” A person familiar with the internal workings of the NCAA said there was a push “to become more aggressive because the bad guys were becoming more creative.”

“The repeated theme was to try and expedite processes and to become more innovative with what had been traditional tactics of gathering information,” the person said. The person requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation.

Efforts to reach Roe Lach were unsuccessful.

“Julie Roe Lach is one of the smartest, most ethical people they have ever met,” the person said. “People celebrated her being selected in that role for that reason. People who know her are stunned by the way in which she’s been handled.”

Pelto, who investigated the UConn scandal, said he’s not surprised.

“(Emmert) was obviously very bright, very politically astute, aggressively upwardly mobile,” said Pelto, a former state legislator. At UConn, “he was not into detail, and he was very reliant on delegating. He was delegating and not providing the oversight that came with the responsibility of the job.”

The UConn scandal

Pelto had a front-row seat to the inner workings of the UConn administration and the mismanagement of the $1 billion construction project that was designed to upgrade the campus. Gov. Rell had appointed him to find out what happened when the project’s major problems became glaringly apparent in 2005, with severe budget overruns and more than 100 fire and safety code violations that needed to be corrected. Pelto conservatively estimated the project’s missteps cost at least $100 million in state money.

But two investigations — one by Pelto’s commission and another by the UConn board of trustees — concluded many of the problems could have been avoided if somebody had blown the whistle after problems became apparent years earlier.

A handwritten memo on Emmert’s stationery from 1998 lists a “summary of big issues” regarding the construction project. The memo outlines a debriefing by a company, PinnacleOne, which performed an audit that raised several serious concerns, including financial issues, problems with design standards and the experience of the staff working on the project.

“Mark Emmert’s own notes indicate he was aware of at least six key issues,” according to a report by a board of trustees member in 2005.

A new audit of the project in 2005 discovered the same problems that were in the audit seven years earlier — problems not brought to light at the time. Even UConn President Philip Austin said he recalled only a positive portrayal of the audit being passed on to him, though the commission found it hard to believe he also didn’t know about the problems.

“We believe the handling of the report was consistent with the practice at the time to avoid the possibility of negative information becoming public,” says the final report of the commission in 2005.

Pelto said the university might have feared losing funding or control of the project to the state if the problems had become known sooner. He said Emmert was in charge of the project and delegated responsibilities to others without keeping track of what was happening.

“It was just one massive screw-up after another,” Pelto said.

Two of Emmert’s former subordinates were placed on administrative leave and ultimately resigned.

By then, Emmert had left to become the chancellor at LSU in mid-1999. Pelto said the commission tried to interview him about the scandal but it was a “nonproductive discussion. (Emmert) said, ‘I didn’t know what was going on, and I thought it was taken care of.’”

When told by USA TODAY Sports that Pelto said he failed to blow the whistle, Emmert said, “Then he knows something I don’t, because I obviously disagree.”

The LSU case

At LSU, Emmert made changes to help turn around the football program, saying “success in LSU football is essential for the success of Louisiana State University.”

He hired Saban as coach in 1999 and helped make him the nation’s highest paid coach ($2.3 million) after the Tigers won the BCS championship in January 2004. Two years earlier, Emmert himself had become the nation’s highest-paid head of a public campus when his compensation was increased to about $500,000, a portion of which was paid by the Tiger Athletic Foundation.

Supporters justified his salary in part because he oversaw a fundraising drive that was on its way to bringing in $255 million.

“At LSU, he’s still a God-like figure,” said Funk, the consultant.

But scandal broke in 2001-02. A university instructor accused the school of having systemic academic fraud in its football program, including plagiarized papers on bobsledding players were turning in and un-enrolled students showing up to take notes for football players, who often slept through class. A graduate assistant also spoke out about the plagiarism problem.

At the time, LSU already was on NCAA probation for a recruiting scandal in men’s basketball that happened prior to Emmert’s arrival. Findings of more major violations typically would trigger harsh penalties.

Led by Emmert, LSU investigated the fraud allegations and said they found only five minor isolated problems, resulting in a self-imposed penalty of two lost scholarships in football. “Despite isolated incidents, the allegations were largely unfounded,” says LSU’s 82-page report on the allegations.

The NCAA accepted LSU’s findings in May 2004 and declined to put the school on probation. But the two female accusers had sued LSU, claiming they were forced from their jobs at the university in retaliation for blowing the whistle on the powerful football program.

Shortly after the NCAA case was settled and Emmert announced he was leaving for Washington, another LSU academic counseling employee backed up the women’s claims under oath, saying there were numerous examples of favoritism for football players in academics, including changed grades and having papers typed for them, according to court documents obtained by USA TODAY Sports.

LSU later paid the two women more than $110,000 each to settle their lawsuits.

A person who worked for LSU as an academic counselor in athletics at the time told USA TODAY Sports the investigation was a whitewash designed to minimize damage. The person asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals.

“They’d interviewed the people they wanted to,” the person said. “It was typical, let’s get together and do damage control and construct a narrative that will allow us to say, ‘OK, we’ve done something wrong here, but it ain’t that bad.’”

The attorney for the accusers, Jill Craft, told USA TODAY Sports, that “LSU’s self-report was way downplayed to what they were originally told and what my clients reported. In fact, the evidence that shook out over time revealed that the academic issues, especially in football, were systemic.”

Emmert disputes that.

“The facts speak for themselves,” Emmert said. “We went from an athletic program that was underperforming dramatically in the classroom to one that was performing well. We completely changed the leadership of that enterprise. We brought in a whole new (management) team. We worked closely with the NCAA and with the SEC and dealt with the issue.”

Asked if the two accusers were removed because they spoke out against the football program, Emmert said, “Not that I’m aware of, and I have no reason to believe that’s a true allegation.”

Despite admitting only isolated problems, LSU cleaned up a lot. It switched control of its academic center for athletics from the athletic department to the provost. A new $15 million academic center was opened in late 2002, and the size of the academic support staff for athletes was doubled. Football players who entered LSU from 2002-05 graduated at a rate of 77%, ranking second in the Southeastern Conference.

“It may be cynical, but with Mark Emmert, I saw a pattern,” LSU physics professor Ravi Rau said. Rau said Emmert “feathered his nest” with sports success at UConn and LSU to boost his candidacy for new jobs with bigger salaries.

Back to Seattle

In 2004, Funk persuaded Emmert to leave LSU and return to his alma mater — Washington — as president, where he became the highest-paid public university president in the nation at $762,000. There he received high marks for raising funds, community relations and helping restore the football program from its own previous scandals.

During a time of financial crisis, he also irked some faculty with two bold moves. He pushed to use taxpayer money to fund a football stadium renovation and helped make football coach Steve Sarkisian the highest-paid state employee at about $2 million.

He stands by his view that success in athletics is vital to the school because sports can be a “window into the institution” for the public.

“The image so many people carry from their exposure to athletics, especially football in a place like LSU, in many ways is the definition of the institution,” he said.

Now at the NCAA, Emmert made the equivalent of $1.6 million a year for the final three months of 2010, based on the NCAA’s tax return from that year. Though he’s been criticized for how he NCAA handled the Miami case, Emmert said that contrary to popular belief, “the president of the NCAA doesn’t get involved in infractions cases.” He doesn’t make the rules or decide punishment, both of which are determined by representatives of member schools and conferences. Investigations are delegated to his staff.

But Emmert has drawn criticism over whether he uses the job description to shield himself from blame.

In February, as controversy swirled over the Miami case, Emmert received an unusual vote of confidence from his bosses on the NCAA executive committee. It said, “the road to transformational change is often bumpy and occasionally controversial. “

The committee “unanimously affirmed its confidence in Mark’s leadership as president and its support for his ongoing efforts to implement these essential and historic reforms.”

Follow Brent Schrotenboer on Twitter @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com

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