Curious phone records between Blake and agent surface

UNC Scandal30

Tuesday evening the News and Observer posted this article.  It details a strange pattern (and odd  frequency) of communication that former UNC-CH Associate Head Coach/Recruiting Coordinator John Blake had with Gary Wichard, an agent who is a long-time friend of Blake.  Folks, I honestly don’t know what to make of a lot of this, but I am pretty sure that it portends bad things for UNC-CH.

Some highlights from the excellent article:

During the 61 days leading up to the Jan. 4 announcement that six juniors on UNC’s football team would stay in school rather than enter the NFL draft, university phone records show that Blake and Wichard never went more than four days without communicating. The records also show 152 communications (phone calls or texts) during a 235-day period between Blake’s university-paid number and Wichard’s phone.
Asked if it is ever acceptable to have that level of communication between a coach and an agent, UNC chancellor Holden Thorp said in an e-mail: “Whether the level of contact is acceptable or unacceptable depends on what they talked about, and I have no idea what they were discussing. Clearly, Mr. Wichard and Coach Blake have a very close relationship. All things being equal, it’s probably better not to have a close personal relationship with a sports agent if you’re an NCAA coach.”
It is interesting that Thorpe was asked directly whether that level of contact was acceptable, and Thorpe deflected, sort saying that that level of contact could be acceptable if they were talking about innocent things.  BUT – we know that Blake just “resigned” — so were the conversations not legitimate?  Is that what we are learning? 
Some might question the institutional control in place that would allow repeated suspicious contact between an Associate Head Coach and a prominant agent to go on unchecked for such an extended period of time.  In the article Butch Davis is quoted explaining that he had no idea as to the frequency of Blake’s communications with Wichard — “I didn’t know that he was talking to him that frequently. I didn’t know if he was talking to him once a year, twice a month. I had no idea.”  Wow!  Don’t you think he should have!?  This is the type of thing that just screams for an independent review.  Also from the linked  article:
The records do not distinguish between phone calls and text messages, but they show that Blake and Wichard communicated 61 times in the 61 days leading up to UNC’s Jan. 4 announcement that six Tar Heels players – Marvin Austin, Kendric Burney, Greg Little, Deunta Williams, Quan Sturdivant and Bruce Carter – decided to return for their senior seasons in 2010 rather than leave for the NFL draft.
Hmmmm.  I do not know what to make of this relationship between Blake and Wichard.  If you read this article that recaps an early press conference, you will see that Butch Davis is asked if he had any concerns about Blake’s relationship with Wichard and Blake responds “No.”  Davis then goes on to equivocate a little on that topic.  Going back a little further, alert readers will remember this article that we linked that delved a little deeper into the Blake-Wichard relationship.  Some highlights from that article include:

Reached by Yahoo! Sports last week, Wichard said he has not been contacted by the NCAA and described Blake as nothing more than a close friend. He also denied any impropriety involving Austin.

“If the center of this controversy is my relationship with John, there’s really no controversy,” Wichard said. “If that’s what [the NCAA] is investigating, I think it’s just absurd. … I hope – I really, truly hope – that Marvin Austin’s whole case is based on me and John Blake. I hope that for Marvin Austin’s sake. At the end of the day, there’s nothing to investigate.”

and also from that article:

“No, no, no, no,” Wichard said. “John lived [in California] after he was the head coach at Oklahoma. He lived out in [Los Angeles]. We’ve socialized. We’ve been friends. His son is my godson. It has nothing to do with that. He hasn’t worked for me at all. I don’t get where that is coming from.”

It turned out that a pamphlet existed that represented that Blake was employed by Wichard’s company.  Also, there is a lot more (including some contradictory and confusing information) about the Blake-Wichard relationship here toward the bottom of an article I did in July.

Now, what I really can’t get my head around is the actual frequency and length of the communications as reported by the News and Observer.  I will leave you with this.  I am not mathematically inclined and I am not good at recognizing patterns in numbers, but I know many who will read this are.  So have at this list and tell me what it means.  The length of the conversations is particularly bizarre:

The 61 calls from Blake’s university-issued cell phone to Wichard’s cell phone during that 61-day period:
Nov. 5, 7:02 p.m., outgoing 19 minutes

Nov. 5, 7:26 p.m., outgoing, 1

Nov. 7, 8:05 p.m., outgoing, 2

Nov. 7, 9:55 p.m., outgoing, 2

Nov. 8, 11:03 a.m., outgoing, 2

Nov. 8, 10:09 p.m., outgoing, 2

Nov. 8, 10:10 p.m., outgoing, 5

Nov. 9, 6:57 p.m., incoming, 3

Nov. 10, 10:33 a.m., outgoing, 4

Nov. 10, 8:10 p.m., incoming, 3

Nov. 14, 9:06 p.m., outgoing, 1

Nov. 14, 9:35 p.m., incoming, 2

Nov. 16, 2:07 p.m., incoming, 1

Nov. 16, 6:28 p.m., incoming, 3

Nov. 18, 8:59 p.m., outgoing, 8

Nov. 20, 10:04 p.m., outgoing, 3

Nov. 21, 4:13 p.m., outgoing, 3

Nov. 21, 8:01 p.m., outgoing, 1

Nov. 21, 8:02 p.m., incoming, 3

Nov. 21, 8:11 p.m., outgoing, 4

Nov. 22, 10:16 p.m., incoming,

Nov. 22, 10:31 p.m., outgoing, 1

Nov. 23, 5:46 p.m., outgoing, 5

Nov. 23, 5:53 p.m., outgoing, 2

Nov. 23, 10:25 p.m., not listed, 1

Nov. 28, 4:01 p.m., outgoing, 1

Nov. 28, 4:04 p.m., outgoing, 3

Nov. 29, 8:16 p.m., incoming, 1

Nov. 30, 12:10 p.m., outgoing, 1

Nov. 30, 12:31 p.m., ingoing, 2

Nov. 30, 12:32 p.m., outgoing, 3

Nov. 30, 11:35 p.m., outgoing, 2

Nov. 30, 11:36 p.m., outgoing, 2

Dec. 2, 11:18 a.m., incoming, 17

Dec. 7, 7:18 p.m., outgoing, 15

Dec. 9, 7:35 p.m., outgoing, 5

Dec. 9, 8:05 p.m., outgoing, 2

Dec. 10, 1:55 p.m., outgoing, 13

Dec. 12, 8:03 p.m., incoming, 3

Dec. 13, 6:12 p.m., outgoing, 8

Dec. 14, 11:14 a.m., incoming, 1

Dec. 14, 11:15 a.m., incoming, 3

Dec. 16, 9:44 a.m., outgoing, 2

Dec. 16, 9:49 a.m., incoming, 2

Dec. 16, 5:27 p.m., outgoing, 1

Dec. 16, 5:41 p.m., incoming, 8

Dec. 17, 5:40 p.m., outgoing, 3

Dec. 17, 5:47 p.m., incoming, 8

Dec. 17, 8:23 p.m., outgoing, 1

Dec. 19, 9:02 a.m., outgoing, 1

Dec. 22, 4:33 p.m., outgoing, 4

Dec. 22, 11:45 p.m., incoming, 5

Dec. 26, 9:01 p.m., outgoing, 2

Dec. 27, 1:48 a.m., outgoing, 2

Dec. 28, 9:27 a.m., outgoing, 2

Dec. 29, 9:04 p.m., outgoing, 1

Dec. 30, 12:42 p.m., outgoing, 1

Dec. 30, 10:10 p.m., outgoing, 3

Jan. 1, 11:32 a.m., outgoing, 1

Jan. 4, 1:47 p.m., outgoing, 1

Jan. 4, 3:56 p.m., incoming, 1

 

UNC Scandal

30 Responses to Curious phone records between Blake and agent surface

  1. 93Pack 09/08/2010 at 1:11 AM #

    A friend of mine suspected her husband of cheating so she installed spy software on his blackberry. She purchases either MobiStealth or MobileSpy, I forget witch one she went with. She was able to read ALL of his previously deleted text messages. Maybe investigators could do this to Blake’s university-paid phone to retrieve all of his previous text messages.

  2. rky 09/08/2010 at 1:46 AM #

    ^I think you may mean ‘which’ . . . but in the context, perhaps witch was just a Freudian slip.

  4. 93Pack 09/08/2010 at 2:12 AM #

    ^Thanks rky, it was originally a typo that I corrected with the wrong witch. I think you are right about the Freudian slip.

  5. wufpup76 09/08/2010 at 3:18 AM #

    “Michael L. Buckner, a Florida lawyer whose specialty is advising universities on NCAA probes and audits, said the extent of the phone calls appears to show more than a casual relationship between the two. Investigators, he said, would be trying to fully understand those communications. UNC’s head coach and athletics administrators should have been closely monitoring that relationship, Buckner said, given Blake’s possible past ties to the agent.

    “You need to be more proactive in making sure that there’s not anything illicit going on,” Buckner said.”

    [snip]

    “Buckner said “messy situations” erupt when agents and active collegiate players mingle; typically, universities are on guard to prevent it.

    He said that, if Blake had a past close tie to a particular agent, the university should have taken steps to ensure that any financial ties and professional connections to the agency were severed, and that the coach not be involved if the agency tried to sign a player.”

    Awesome. A must read.

    Investigative journalism … Who knew?!

  6. Wufpacker 09/08/2010 at 5:04 AM #

    It doesn’t take an NCAA investigator or an investigative team from the SoS office to realize that even the CLOSEST of friends do not call one another this frequently, then only speak 1 or 2 or 3 minutes (at first quick glance it appears that most often the calls were 3 minutes or less in duration, though frankly I’ve not counted).

    This is how BUSINESS partners, colleagues, relationships (or whatever one wishes to call them) are handled. Lets’s call them Business Party A and B…

    A: Hello?
    B: Hey, it’s me. Just wanted to let you know “C” about “D” that we’d talked about yesterday.
    A: Ok, thanks for letting me know. Call me later and let me know if “C” happens with “E” too, Ok?
    B: Will do.
    A: And what about “X”, “Y” and “Z”?
    B: “X” and “Z” are definite. Don’t know about “Y” yet. I should know by tomorrow, Ok?
    A: Yeah, but let me know as soon as you find out.
    B: Yes, definitely.
    A: Ok, Bye.
    B: Bye.

    Seriously. You don’t call your really good friend to ask him how his wife, or kids, or great aunt Fannie is doing and then hang up after 1 or 2 or 3 minutes. AND MOST OF ALL, you don’t call him every day (on average) and ask about aunt Fannie one day, the kids the next and the wife the next.

    These guys might very well be friends and their friendship may very well pre-date any business issues or relationships. But these were NOT personal calls….these were business calls as sure as shit.

    And if these phone records weren’t enough, there are two things that make this situation even more obvious, AND more damning for Butchy. Those things are….

    THIS…..

    “It turned out that a pamphlet existed that represented that Blake was employed by Wichard’s company.”

    AND THIS….

    ” In the article Butch Davis is quoted explaining that he had no idea as to the frequency of Blake’s communications with Wichard — ‘I didn’t know that he was talking to him that frequently. I didn’t know if he was talking to him once a year, twice a month. I had no idea.’ ”

    Number one, if you’re a college head coach and you hire an assistant coach that you KNOW has a relationship, quite possibly a business relationship, with an agent….You damn well better know how frequently they’re talking AND what they’re talking about, especially when that assistant has the reputation that Blake has.

    Number two, if you didn’t know it was wrong you would not go into denial mode, as the quote above from Butch clearly shows (“I didn’t know…” and “I didn’t know…” and “I had no idea…”). Unless you know you’ve screwed up, you don’t deny it that vehemently.

    Number three, and there’s really no getting around this for Butch and UNC, there seems to be an increasingly large number of “goings on” that as head coach Butch SHOULD have known about. If he admits to knowing then he is directly branded a cheater. If he denies them, as he has so far, then its lack of institutional control.

    And the case can then be made that not only did Butch not know things he should have known, but also Baddour and others as well. This is especially compounded by the previous and well known past history that Blake brings to the situation that everyone involved should have known about, but apparently they all want to try to convince everyone else they had no clue. That’s not going to go well for them with the NCAA either, unless someone takes the fall on the proverbial sword.

    Their attempt at cutting Blake loose as the scapegoat won’t work, either. Of course HE knew what he was doing. But that doesn’t absolve Butch, et al of their responsibility to monitor a known loose cannon.

    The difference between these two scenarios (Butch knew nothing vs. Butch is a cheater) is huge, by the way. The difference is that in one scenario Butch is professional toast. In the other, UNC’s football program (possibly their entire athletics dept.) is NCAA toast.

    So the question boils down to how much is Butch willing to sacrifice his own future professional well-being, his own “employability” as it were, in order to give UNC plausible deniability? Or, said from a slightly different if more cynical point of view….

    How much is UNC willing to PAY Butch to throw HIMSELF under the bus, rather than the university?

    Knowing that we have two entities, one institutional and one individual, both of whom are extremely narcissistic and self-serving makes for a very interesting situation, indeed.

  7. Wufpacker 09/08/2010 at 5:06 AM #

    It doesn’t take an NCAA investigator or an investigative team from the SoS office to realize that even the CLOSEST of friends do not call one another this frequently, then only speak 1 or 2 or 3 minutes (at first quick glance it appears that most often the calls were 3 minutes or less in duration, though frankly I’ve not counted).

    This is how BUSINESS partners, colleagues, relationships (or whatever one wishes to call them) are handled. Short calls…cover the necessary information and get off the phone.

    Seriously. You don’t call your really good friend to ask him how his wife, or kids, or great aunt Fannie is doing and then hang up after 1 or 2 or 3 minutes. AND MOST OF ALL, you don’t call him every day (on average) and ask about aunt Fannie one day, the kids the next and the wife the next.

    These guys might very well be friends and their friendship may very well pre-date any business issues or relationships. But these were NOT personal calls….these were business calls as sure as shit.

    And if these phone records weren’t enough, there are two things that make this situation even more obvious, AND more damning for Butchy. Those things are….

    THIS…..

    “It turned out that a pamphlet existed that represented that Blake was employed by Wichard’s company.”

    AND THIS….

    ” In the article Butch Davis is quoted explaining that he had no idea as to the frequency of Blake’s communications with Wichard — ‘I didn’t know that he was talking to him that frequently. I didn’t know if he was talking to him once a year, twice a month. I had no idea.’ ”

    Number one, if you’re a college head coach and you hire an assistant coach that you KNOW has a relationship, quite possibly a business relationship, with an agent….You damn well better know how frequently they’re talking AND what they’re talking about, especially when that assistant has the reputation that Blake has.

    Number two, if you didn’t know it was wrong you would not go into denial mode, as the quote above from Butch clearly shows (“I didn’t know…” and “I didn’t know…” and “I had no idea…”). Unless you know you’ve screwed up, you don’t deny it that vehemently.

    Number three, and there’s really no getting around this for Butch and UNC, there seems to be an increasingly large number of “goings on” that as head coach Butch SHOULD have known about. If he admits to knowing then he is directly branded a cheater. If he denies them, as he has so far, then its lack of institutional control.

    And the case can then be made that not only did Butch not know things he should have known, but also Baddour and others as well. This is especially compounded by the previous and well known past history that Blake brings to the situation that everyone involved should have known about, but apparently they all want to try to convince everyone else they had no clue. That’s not going to go well for them with the NCAA either, unless someone takes the fall on the proverbial sword.

    Their attempt at cutting Blake loose as the scapegoat won’t work, either. Of course HE knew what he was doing. But that doesn’t absolve Butch, et al of their responsibility to monitor a known loose cannon.

    The difference between these two scenarios (Butch knew nothing vs. Butch is a cheater) is huge, by the way. The difference is that in one scenario Butch is professional toast. In the other, UNC’s football program (possibly their entire athletics dept.) is NCAA toast.

    So the question boils down to how much is Butch willing to sacrifice his own future professional well-being, his own “employability” as it were, in order to give UNC plausible deniability? Or, said from a slightly different if more cynical point of view….

    How much is UNC willing to PAY Butch to throw HIMSELF under the bus, rather than the university?

    Knowing that we have two entities, one institutional and one individual, both of whom are extremely narcissistic and self-serving makes for a very interesting situation, indeed.

  8. Wufpacker 09/08/2010 at 5:09 AM #

    So, as usual it boils down to “Who knew what, and when did they know it?”

    These guys might very well be friends and their friendship may very well pre-date any business issues or relationships. But these were NOT personal calls….these were business calls as sure as shit.

    As if these phone records weren’t enough to show a pre-existing BUSINESS relationship, there are two things that make this situation even more obvious, AND more damning for Butchy. Those things are….

    THIS…..

    “It turned out that a pamphlet existed that represented that Blake was employed by Wichard’s company.”

    AND THIS….

    ” In the article Butch Davis is quoted explaining that he had no idea as to the frequency of Blake’s communications with Wichard — ‘I didn’t know that he was talking to him that frequently. I didn’t know if he was talking to him once a year, twice a month. I had no idea.’ ”

    The difference between these two scenarios (Butch knew nothing vs. Butch is a cheater) is huge, by the way. The difference is that in one scenario Butch is professional toast. In the other, UNC’s football program (possibly their entire athletics dept.) is NCAA toast.

    So the question boils down to how much is Butch willing to sacrifice his own future professional well-being, his own “employability” as it were, in order to give UNC plausible deniability? Or, said from a slightly different if more cynical point of view….

    How much is UNC willing to PAY Butch to throw HIMSELF under the bus, rather than the university?

  9. Phang 09/08/2010 at 6:11 AM #

    I’m beginning to think that BMFD may NOT have known about this stuff going on. That, of course, doesn’t excuse nor in any way lessen a finding of lack of institutional control.

    Instead of being evil, he might just be stupid.

  10. PackMan97 09/08/2010 at 6:49 AM #

    What kind of idiot would use his work phone for this type of contact?

    Either he’s friends and should use his personal phone, or it’s work in which case UNC-CH is in deeper trouble.

  11. OAB 09/08/2010 at 7:00 AM #

    We’re all going to feel like crap if he was calling him that much because Wichard’s wife had cancer or something like that.

    But I seriously doubt that’s what happened.

  12. wufpup76 09/08/2010 at 7:09 AM #

    “We’re all going to feel like crap if he was calling him that much because Wichard’s wife had cancer or something like that.

    But I seriously doubt that’s what happened.”

    ^There was a fairly large discrepancy in call/text volume based around certain time frames pointed out in the story.

    Quoted from the article:

    “The records do not distinguish between phone calls and text messages, but they show that Blake and Wichard communicated 61 times in the 61 days leading up to UNC’s Jan. 4 announcement that six Tar Heels players – Marvin Austin, Kendric Burney, Greg Little, Deunta Williams, Quan Sturdivant and Bruce Carter – decided to return for their senior seasons in 2010 rather than leave for the NFL draft.

    Over the other 174 days, the communications were about half as frequent, with 92 total calls or texts. Blake and Wichard also communicated six times on April 24, the final day of the NFL draft, for a total of 63 minutes. Four calls on April 24 lasted at least 10 minutes.”

    The volume of contact leading up to the Draft probably means business discussions were taking place. Can it be explained away another way? Sure. But why resign AND get lawyers involved?

    ^I think this is one of the biggest issues alluded to in the article. They did some good homework. Credit due.

  13. ryno84 09/08/2010 at 7:44 AM #

    I would think that the 1 minute phone calls were either missed calls or voicemails. This might include some of the 2 minute phone calls. That is unless they had some sort of code they were using to communicate.

  14. wufpup76 09/08/2010 at 7:53 AM #

    ^Those may be text messages.

  15. Phang 09/08/2010 at 8:09 AM #

    ^ yup

  16. StateFans 09/08/2010 at 8:21 AM #

    Good stuff, what were the dates the UNC players announced they were coming back for their senior year?

  17. Phang 09/08/2010 at 8:25 AM #

    According to what I’ve read (don’t have the links handy) the phone activity happened just before the players announced their return.

  18. wolfpackdawg 09/08/2010 at 8:25 AM #

    SMUNC made me pee in my pants…LOLOLOLOOLOLOLOOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOOLOLOLOL

  19. coach13 09/08/2010 at 8:26 AM #

    93Pack Says:
    September 8th, 2010 at 1:11 am A friend of mine suspected her husband of cheating so she installed spy software on his blackberry. She purchases either MobiStealth or MobileSpy, I forget witch one she went with. She was able to read ALL of his previously deleted text messages. Maybe investigators could do this to Blake’s university-paid phone to retrieve all of his previous text messages.

    Maybe they did!!!

  20. tmb81 09/08/2010 at 8:58 AM #

    I found it interesting that there were two outgoing calls in early in the 4PM hour on 11/28/09. That would have been shortly after the end of the State/Carolina game at Carter Finley last year. As I recall it was a 12PM kickoff.

    (He must have a good cell service provider, I had a hard time dialing out then. I was trying to text a picture of the scoreboard to some UNC fans and could not get connected!)

  21. Pack Mentality 09/08/2010 at 9:01 AM #

    To anybody who says Butch Davis didn’t know:

    Of course Butch Davis didn’t know. He hired somebody who is well known to be dirty on his staff. The reason you hire somebody like Blake is so they do all the dirty work and you don’t have to know. He knew who he hired and was purposely ignorant of what that hire did, even though he knew that there was no ethical line that Blake would not cross or rule he would not break. I bet when they were talking and Blake’s phone rang BD would excuse himself from the room.

    So whether Davis knew the spcifics of what Blake was doing doesn’t matter at all. Davis is every bit as guilty as Blake.

  22. packalum44 09/08/2010 at 9:52 AM #

    If Butch last till the end of the season I’ll be shocked. I feel like those text messages that were not released are extremely damaging (almost all of the 1 minute calls have to be text messages whereas the 2 minute calls are voicemails).

  23. PackerInRussia 09/08/2010 at 10:02 AM #

    Not even a call on Christmas day to wish each other a Merry Christmas? Maybe they sent cards instead. Or maybe their Jewish.

  24. ncsuinpa 09/08/2010 at 12:23 PM #

    I was thinking the same thing about the no contact on Christmas. They probably spent the holidays together, since they’re so close. No need to call/text then. Also, no Happy New Year’s text/call.

  25. StateFans 09/08/2010 at 12:23 PM #

    Guy on Twitter just commented:

    @Wolfpack_Lamb NC State vs UNC on 11/28/09 ended @ 3:10 & blake called wichard at 4:01 and 4:10. Butch was probably still in press conf

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