'...Several SDSU athletic staff members have checkered pasts, burdened with accusations of academic dishonesty and a range of recruiting miscues.

Athletics Director Jeff Schemmel leads the pack in both Aztec authority and prior suspicions.

Before coming to SDSU on July 6, 2005, Schemmel was the senior associate athletic director and chief operating officer at the University of Minnesota. He left Minnesota when it was rocked by an athletic scandal caused by a lack of compliance and institutional control. While he was there, the university dealt with academic fraud and was reprimanded for allowing cheating under the supervision of the men's basketball coach.

Schemmel, of course, isn't the only interesting athletics character.

One rung down on the Aztec ladder of importance, as far as visibility and revenue-producing ability go, are the men's basketball and football coaches.

Football head coach Chuck Long is a pleasant guy. Never without a smile, Long emphasizes senior leadership and academic progress amongst his team.

His previous post as offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Oklahoma, however, is a bit tainted.

Oklahoma boosters were found giving Sooner football players jobs with unreasonable salaries last year and the NCAA recently hit the university with a loss of scholarships and forced it to vacate all victories from the 2005-06 season.

Nor is men's basketball head coach Steve Fisher without flaw.

Yes, he's a good guy who brought national recognition to a once decrepit program. And yes, Fisher had success coaching at Michigan before joining the Aztecs. He led the famed "Fab Five" and won a national championship there. His players, however, were found to have accepted money from boosters, resulting in forfeits of victories and tournament championships.



They're three affable men who wield plenty of power in the athletics department - who all, by the way, have ties to shady programs.

Oh, the tangled web we weave.

And who's the guy who began netting this framework of questionable characters? President Stephen Weber, and he's got all the answers - logical ones at that - for everything and everyone.



How about some of those hires, Mr. Weber?

"First of all, we live in a fishbowl in athletics, but we know that and so (we) hire athletic directors and coaches that know they're (going to be) in that fishbowl."

But why get guys with histories steeped in controversy if you know there's going to be scrutiny?

"The shorthand is simply that you don't want a case of guilt by association," Weber said. [That's why we associate with the guilty!] "But the history of (some of the hires) very much weighed on our decisions because we had to do our due diligence. We had to be satisfied that (the hires) weren't involved in bad situations. It's more difficult to make some of those decisions because you know the press will run every story down and you have to be confident that they're not going to find something that you don't know about. [It's not that we want these hires to be moral. It's that we want to be able to handle the fallout when their immorality goes national.]"

Luckily for Weber, little dirt has been found.

Academic progress rates have increased in the football program, Fisher's basketball team has become a haven for transfers seeking better opportunities and Schemmel has steered clear of trouble.

Fisher has executed his job almost to a tee, getting to the NCAA Tournament and fielding a strong team annually.

"He's definitely bought himself some respectability and fans because he's got the chips stacked up," Weber said, "and that's good for everyone."

Long and Schemmel, on the other hand, still have work to do.

Schemmel's job focuses on producing successful athletic programs, and not every SDSU team is first-rate. His is a never-ending, rarely rewarding job, but it is what it is.



Schemmel's glaring blemish is the floundering Aztec football team, which, not coincidentally, is what keeps Long's status in the red too.

Long's first season was a 3-9 catastrophe. Injuries and a lack of talent resulted in one of the worst seasons ever for SDSU.

But Long has rebounded - somewhat - in the summer and fall practices to date. His players had almost perfect attendance in off-season workouts and are determined to improve.

Long's first year was a disaster, but a recipe of health and hard work should steady his standing.

"I love everything about Long that I've seen so far," Weber said. [That losing streak is a thing of beauty.] "He's trying to set the right standard and if things go the way I hope they'll go, (I think) Chuck will develop a winning program."

So all is good, right? Not exactly.

Aztec athletics is a fuzzy picture at this point. From afar, that picture looks clear.

The basketball team is on the rise, the football coach is optimistic, several other athletic programs are succeeding and the director of athletics is presiding over a relatively scandal-free program.

But come a few feet closer, take a clearer view, and all of the blemishes show up.

The football team was absolutely abysmal last year, the basketball team had just one great run in 2005-06, no other program is at the top of its respective food-chain and Schemmel's primary past experience is still marred in scandal.' [Mired in scandal? Think the writer was reaching for this.]