Sugar Bowl 2011: Ohio State Ready To Roll Amid Illegal Player Allegations

The Ohio State Buckeyes and Arkansas Razorbacks are getting ready to square off in the 2011 Sugar Bowl in what shapes up to be one of the most intriguing match-ups of the Bowl Season.

Arkansas QB Ryan Mallett will be looking to elevate his draft stock with a big game under the national spotlight. As for Terrelle Pryor and his crew? Well, they've been a little busy dealing with the press of late.

After reports surfaced that several Ohio State players, including Pryor, had been swapping autographs for tattoos, there became an intriguing subplot to this already highly anticipated match-up.

Despite the NCAA ruling five of the team's players ineligible for the first five games of next season, they're all very eligible to play in the 2011 Sugar Bowl.

Huh? How does that make any sense? It doesn't. Unless you work for the NCAA.

These guys aren't stupid; they put one leg through the hole of their jeans at a time, just like the rest of us. Because of that, the NCAA understands that if they were to suspend those players and declare them ineligible for the pending bowl game, ratings would take a huge hit and the NCAA would suffer tremendously.

Because of this, the NCAA has once again made themselves out to be one of the most hypocritical governing bodies in sports. Rather than taking proper action, they've missed the ball once again.

If you really want to punish these kids, they shouldn't be playing in the Sugar Bowl.

But in all actuality, it's the NCAA that needs to punish itself for being so unbelievably weak, and creating an infrastructure within itself that is bound to crumble in the very near future.

These kids don't play for anything but pride, and now you're trying to strip them of that, too?

Well done.