#AskEmmert: An Epic Fail of a Twitter Q&A

NCAA President Mark Emmert

This is Mark Emmert, the president of the National Collegiate Athletic Association, better known as the NCAA. In case you have not heard, the NCAA has been in some hot water lately as more facts are brought up on the amount of money the NCAA makes while the student-athletes who play the games see none of the cash. Student-athletes recently have said that they sometimes go to bed hungry (maybe that's just Shabazz Napier though) and are trying to unionize, which could be dangerous for the future of the NCAA.

On Friday, Emmert joined ESPN's Mike & Mike in the Morning morning show, and someone (whether it was the NCAA or ESPN is unclear) thought it would be a good idea to have people on Twitter asks questions of the NCAA President by tweeting using the hashtag #AskEmmert.
This is an excellent idea in theory. But, Twitter, for the most part, vehemently sides with the student-athletes against the NCAA and are not big fans of Emmert and the NCAA. As the Social Sideline has previously examined, Twitter has given people a new confidence to say whatever they want, whenever they want. Let's just say that the Twitterverse did not take kindly to #AskEmmert.
It started simply enough, with fans asking straight-forward questions.

Then it started getting a little more personal.

Then it just started getting ridiculous.

A list of more responses can be found here, while the original tweet can be found here.

Whoever thought of #AskEmmert had the right idea in trying to incorporate and interact with fans, but should have realized the high chance of a Twitter revolt like this. If Twitter and the NCAA were political parties, Twitter would be Democratic (young and liberal) and the NCAA would be Republican (older and conservative). #AskEmmert gave the Twitterverse a chance to vent frustration that had been building for months or years even.

There are two lessons to be learned here: 

1. As stated in the Tom Crean's Backfiring Tweet post, you need to know your audience. If you are going to post something like this on Twitter, you have to be prepared for potential trolls. But, if you think that you will get more negative responses than positive ones, you probably should not post it. Even before all the negative tweets came flooding, many people's initial reaction to hearing about #AskEmmert was 'this will end well...' 
2. At the same time, fans need to be more open to the NCAA's mindset. Kyle Kensing, a friend of mine, brought up a very good point on Twitter.
   
   People (myself included) need to work on being more open-minded, both in the real world and on social media. No progress will ever be made if two sides just yell at one another. Perhaps student-athletes should be paid. Perhaps the NCAA is right in trying to enforce the amateur status of their student-athletes. But nothing is going to change if both sides just continue to argue with one another and refuse to change their mindsets on a topic.

Sideline Scoop: Embracing Social Media

There are always those who embrace change and those who fear it, looking to avoid it at all costs. Today's Sideline Scoop will take a look at two coaches representing both views and adding a new dimension to an already classic rivalry, how the NCAA is adapting to new developments in technology and social media, and some interesting stats from social media around the world.

1. Pitino, Calipari on opposite ends of social media spectrum

Louisville and Kentucky is one of the best rivalries in all of college basketball, pitting two of the more successful teams in college basketball history against each other as they share a state. So it only make sense that coaches from both teams take completely opposite views of social media. Louisville's Rick Pitino (on the left in the above photo), who could be seen as the "old school" coach, has actually banned his players from using Twitter and says that social media "poisons their minds." Meanwhile, Kentucky's John Calipari (on the right in the above photo), the most "new school" of the two coaches, openly embraces social media and wants to teach his players how to "use it as a positive."

2. NCAA to allow coaches to use SnapChat for recruiting

SnapChat is one of the biggest up-and-coming apps on smartphones today, allowing users to "take photos or videos and add text or drawing, then set an expiration for the message once it is opened." SnapChat now has a new use: As of Aug. 1, college coaches will be able to use it for recruiting purposes.

3. Who are the ultimate social media winners and losers?

Judging from social media, soccer/fútbol and basketball are the two most popular sports in the world and two retired basketball players remain among the most popular in the world. Find out more - including how local and club teams use social media and who has the most retweeted sports tweet - in this infographic.

Twitter Bringing Fans into the Recruiting Process

Social media applications such as Facebook and Twitter are marvelous creations, giving people unprecedented access to their favorite celebrities, teams and athletes. Unfortunately, this means that fans now risk getting too close to athletes, to the point that it may become detrimental to their favorite collegiate team.

Above, we see a screenshot of a tweet sent by Courtney Pastner, the sister of the University of Memphis head coach Josh Pastner, to Rodney Purvis, who at the time was being recruited by the Tigers. As innocent and harmless as the tweet seems, it could actually be considered an NCAA recruiting violation.

As Yahoo! Sports blog Prep Rally wrote, "there is no doubt that the younger Pastner is making public, direct contact with a recruit via social media, something which would be a clear violation if Pastner was doing so himself. The question is whether Courtney Pastner is 'someone affiliated with the Memphis institution.' Considering her relationship with her brother and her understandably open pro-Memphis bent (see her Twitter background above, for instance), Prep Rally is inclined to say that she should be tabbed as someone connected with the Tigers."

On Twitter, fans do not seem to know where the fine line between appropriate and inappropriate lies, and will often cross the line in an attempt to attract an athlete to their favorite school. ESPN highlighted Tyler Luatua, the No. 3tight end prospect in the Class of 2013, in a recent article, who had a Twitter user tell him, "Come to (Southern California), or I will kill myself."
"He eventually said he was just kidding," Luatua said. "He said he's got kids at home and would never do that, but I thought he was serious at first. That really freaked me out."

"Twitter is the Wild West of recruiting," Adoree' Jackson, a recruit out of California, told ESPN in the article. "I've had some weird things tweeted at me, crazy things. Some I can't say. It does get to the point where fans will tell you, 'If you come to my school, I'll give you this.' 'I'll throw a party for you.' 'I'll name my kid after you,' and stuff like that."

Coaches had enough to worry about before when it came to recruiting just from opposing teams' coaches. Today, they also have to worry about fans from their own school (or even another school) saying something that could influence a recruit's opinion and the possible NCAA sanctions that could come from such an action.

Worst of all for fans, their words often fall upon deaf ears.

"This is my life and not theirs," recruit Cameron Robinson out of Louisiana told ESPN. "I would be a fool to listen to what some person I never met before says, especially some crazy fan on Twitter."
The lesson to be learned from all this? Fans should leave the recruiting to the coaches.