Three-Point Stance: Trouble in Mississippi, Trey Smith's ranking

Rivals.com National Recruiting Director Mike Farrell’s thought-provoking Three-Point Stance continues today with his disgust at Mississippi State, feeling lied to by Ole Miss and the controversial Trey Smith ranking.

I wrote back in late March that I didn’t think 2016 five-star recruit Jeffery Simmons should be given a second chance by Mississippi State after he was caught on video pummeling a woman. So you can imagine my disgust when it was announced he would be allowed to enroll in Starkville “under conditions” and would serve only a one-game suspension for his actions.

The justification by Athletic Director Scott Stricklin was all over the map in his interview at the SEC spring meetings, and he even admitted that there was some concern that another SEC school would grab Simmons up if State decided to jettison him.

Really?

After hearing the “punishment” for Simmons and then watching Stricklin try to justify his and the school’s actions, I actually felt sick to my stomach. This was an amazing opportunity for a program to send a message to the world just after the Baylor fiasco, and Mississippi State dropped the ball in a big way.

I guess its OK to potentially endanger all of their female students by letting Simmons enroll, and I guess video evidence of beating a woman warrants the same suspension as an academic hiccup or even a targeting penalty?

Mississippi State could have stood up loud and proud and said “not at our university” and punted this kid like it was 4th-and-20, setting somewhat of a standard at least for circumstances like this one moving forward.

Instead, head coach Dan Mullen, Stricklin and President Mark Keenum essentially felt enrolling Simmons was a safe choice because, as Stricklin said, “this is not a sexual violence issue as defined by law."

OK, that justifies it. I am speechless and I’m honestly surprised female students aren’t lodging protests right now outside the football office.

Something must be afoul in the state of Mississippi these days, because Ole Miss has been under fire as well. While the issues in Oxford are not nearly as serious as they are in Starkville, they are still troubling.

Personally, I feel lied to. I wrote a column back in early February saying we should reserve judgement on Hugh Freeze and Ole Miss in light of the NCAA investigation.

Why did I say such a thing when everyone, even my inner instinctual self, said something was amiss at Ole Miss when it came to landing elite recruits?

I foolishly believed Ole Miss Athletic Director Ross Bjork back in late January when he clearly insinuated that the roughly 30 violations the NCAA found were mainly in regards to women’s basketball, track and field and football with the old coaching staff as well as the Laremy Tunsil, situation which many felt was previously addressed with his seven-game 2015 suspension.

Now we come to find out 13 of the roughly 30 violations occurred in football and only four were under Freeze’s predecessor, Houston Nutt. Only three of those remaining 10 involved loans of cash and cars and improper payments and free lodging in regards to Tunsil and his family, which means this is much more than just a Tunsil issue and certainly wasn’t all about women’s hoops, track and field and Nutt.

Eight of the 13 are Level I breaches, a big deal in the NCAA world. Freeze was so confident he was following the rules that he famously tweeted (and then deleted) the following leading up to LOI Day in 2013…

Now Freeze says these are “mistakes” and “not some staff out trying to buy players.” After being misled by Bjork, should we now believe Freeze?

Fool me once, shame on me. The worst part is that good, honest players who aren’t receiving additional benefits and chose Ole Miss for all the right reasons are being lumped in with the lies and deceit more than ever. Freeze didn’t want the young men slandered or their families insulted, but how do you stop that now?

Rankings are always a sensitive subject, and the biggest controversy this cycle appears to surround offensive tackle Trey Smith, who suddenly shot up to into the top six on two sites after an impressive performance at the NIKE Camp in Chicago. He became the No. 1 player in the country on another site even before his performance in Chicago.

So why is he a four-star on Rivals who isn’t in our Rivals250?

I’ll admit we are being cautious here and want to see more of Smith for a few reasons.

His junior film is awesome -- he’s pancaking everything that moves and hits the second level like a running back. However, he plays for a D2 school in Tennessee and the kids he’s pile-driving aren’t close to elite athletes.

And Smith is listed anywhere from 6-foot-6 to 6-foot-4, depending on the site. He doesn’t look as tall or long levered as the former measurement on film.

However, make no doubt this isn’t a situation like Matt Elam (the defensive tackle not the defensive back) or Lamont Gaillard, two big men who also rocketed up the charts of our competition in recent years. Those guys should have never sniffed a fifth star, much less been in the top 10 like they were on some sites.

Smith looks like a million bucks on film and perhaps our concern over his competition level will make us look slow on this one. I know Ole Miss and Tennessee fans think so.

I think his current ranking is likely his floor and his ceiling is very, very high, but we will see how he does this summer and into next season before we make our judgement.

We were correct on Elam and Gaillard, but this kid is a much, much better prospect, so I’m excited to see more as the 2017 rankings evolve.