Rich Rodriguez is in a peck of trouble at Michigan, mostly because he went 3-9 last season — which is causing people to come out of the woodwork to cause him problems.

Now I have no feelings about Rodriquez, either way, but I’d say this: There isn’t a successful Division I program in the country that could stand up to serious scrutiny about how much time its players spend practicing — in season or out.

The NCAA mandates 20 hours a week, which doesn’t begin to cover the amount of time these kids spend in and around football. The summer “voluntary” workout program is a joke. You have entire teams choosing to spend their summer in some little college town working out together, as a squad. If you’ve ever seen some of these workouts, you’d know that while coaches aren’t there, they are behind the scenes pulling the strings.

You can say that in exchange for a scholarship at a school like Michigan, a student-athlete ought to be willing to work hard, like a full-time job. That’s fine — then don’t make any rules about practice time. But the sad thing is, if you don’t make those rules, the practices would NEVER stop.

The ridiculously deceptive world of big-time college sports rolls on. And it isn’t going to change, folks. And I guess that’s fine. Just understand what it’s about. And a lot of time it’s not pretty.

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