***Scroll for updates***
I received an email this morning referencing a blog called The Sporting Agent Blog saying that Ed Davis’ name had appeared on the client page of a Chicago based sports agent, PTA Sports Management. Here is a screen shot they capture of the site:
According to The Sporting Agent Blog, there was no picture but if you clicked on Davis’ name the subsequent page had the correct bio information. Davis’ name has since been taken down from the PTA site.
Let’s go through the possibilities of what his could be:
- PR stunt by the sports agent(not likely)
- PR stunt by The Sporting Agent Blog(less likely)
- Davis’ father had conversations with PTA and they jumped the gun.
- Davis has agreed to hire them once the season ended and someone at PTA misunderstood and accidentally posted Davis’ name.
- Davis is not going anywhere and this is some random fluke.
I am thinking three and four here are real possibilities. It is possible Davis has already made his mind up considering all of the mock drafts still have him in the top five and since he is basically done for the season, he might as well start working on getting ready for the draft. Since Davis’ father is a former NBA player, he has connections and is probably gathering information. The one thing that gives me pause is I am not sure Davis would use an agent with such a limited and low profile clientele. That seems odd to me unless there is some previous relationship at work we don’t know about.
Now, I am going to toss something out there I heard a few weeks back that is basically hearsay about three times removed. The chain this info followed puts it on the same level as Ferris Bueller passing out at 31 Flavors last night. However, when I put the rumor I heard together with this it seems…well..more interesting and worth putting out there for your consideration. So here it goes:
I have a friend and UNC grad who talked to a guy who was co-workers with a former UNC athlete. Said athlete had stated that one of the problems with the team was Ed Davis mainly because all Davis would talk about was his father, going to the NBA and making millions.
Let me again stress that this is as pure a rumor as you can have and I am not taking a position on whether I believe it or not. Why? Because I have no freaking idea because I don’t know Davis. I will say that aside from a few Tweets, I have little issue with Davis. He seems like a good kid and while I think he has not played as well as he is capable of playing, it is pretty clear from Twitter that he knows that.
At any rate, that should keep you guys busy for the balance of the day.
UPDATE: That was quick. The Big Lead spoke with the agency and they are saying it is a mistake. I maintain it is an interesting mistake since the person who edits the website it probably contracted out or a on staff person and not one of the agents. Someone had to tell them to put it on there right?
UPDATE #2: If you had “has not signed but agent has had contact with the family” treat yourself to a snowcone. ACC Now said there has been contact between the agency and Davis’ family though a mutual friend. Oh and PTA is claiming they were hacked:
Porter said he believes someone hacked his site, ptasportsmanagement.com, and added information that looked as if it had been cut-and-pasted from the UNC’s media guide — such as where Davis played in high school, his high school statistics and his family information. Davis’ picture had not been added to the site, and the information looked different from what was listed for other clients.
That is possible and would explain the absence of a picture since you often need access to different areas of the websites file structure to post both the picture and information. At the same time there had been contact between the family and the agency and I am not a huge believer in coincidences. The bottom line is Davis has not signed and so there are no NCAA issues to worry about. And yes, for anyone who asks if it could get worse, the NCAA vacating the 14 wins would certainly make it worse.
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i’ve spent most of the year thinking he was going, so, not at all shocking.
now, back to our previous thread!
Here is one thing I find really odd. I looked up the basketball players. I have never heard of Herb Gibson. I follow college basketball fairly in depth but I had to dig to find anything on him. He had a career scoring average of .8 points a game at Michigan… Wow
http://statsheet.com/mcb/players/player/michigan/herb-gibson
Ryan Sydney of Boston College was more productive.
http://statsheet.com/mcb/players/player/boston-college/ryan-sidney
I would also like to point out that a lot of the players listed have Michigan ties.
WOW!! I know Ed is gone after the season
Money is hard to turn down, and doing it twice is even harder, but please wait till the end of the season.
Agency dont just randomly put players names on their page, they had to get that info from somewhere.
If this is a mistake I will apologize, but Ed please respect Roy Williams enough to wait till the end of the season. He gave you your shot, and you got a lot of exposure off of last years team.
A lot of things could have happened here, but I think the agency just assumes he’s leaving after this terrible season capped off by a broken wrist. Fans are on the edge with Davis’ effort and toughness, so it might push him further to the brink of the NBA. I’m sure the agency thinks he’s leaving, like many of us, and posted a little too early. He hasn’t officially declared anything yet…
Judging by Ed’s twitter he is sick of having people asking him if he is leaving after this year. His game is nowhere near where it needs to be to play in the NBA but that doesn’t mean anything. I expect him to make the jump. Good luck to him if that is the case but I don’t see him being productive at the next level.
Am I the only one who thinks something is really fishy here? Ed Davis’ father played in the league for 10 years and THIS is the best agency he could hook his son up with? You mean to tell me that an agency that has a roster of D-leaguers and NFL Europe players is going to land a guy who some project as a Top-5 pick??
Nothing New Here, move on….
As usual, I love your movie references THF!
I agree, C.Michael. Even aside from his father being a former NBA player, players leaving early don’t sign with an agency like this… especially players from UNC.
From scACCHoops
UPDATE: According to ACC Now, the CEO of PTA Sports Management believes his site was hacked. He also states that while there is no verbal or written agreement with Ed Davis, he does admit he has had contact with Davis’ family.
Few things I need to say here:
1. This agency really does not have a very high profile, so I don’t see how a player who expects to get picked up in the lottery or high in the first round would choose this agent. Speculation? I have read a number of blogs where Richmond folks commented that Ed should not be in college but in the NBA making a lot of money, it just maybe that it was a fan who did this thing.
2. Ed’s father was in the NBA for 10 years, which is not much, he did earn a decent amount but his career was marred with injuries and he remained mostly a back-up player. He was also the person to urge Ed to stay in college when in fact he would been a high draft pick last year. So I don’t buy into the gossip about how Ed is all about going to the NBA. All players talk about that, he is not alone.
3. Finally given the horrid year this turned out to be, I would actually think that any player that has a chance to make the first round draft will take the plunge this year (watch out for Henson). Draft is about potential and not about abilities.
If the site was hacked, I will apologize to Ed because I still can not imagine a player in college basketball signing with an agent before the season ended
That website hack excuse is the weakest tbing i have ever heard. They just lost a client in ed, but it certainly means someone told them ed would sign.
^^someone told them ed SHOULD sign.
I am happy that they can blame unnamed, uncaught “hackers” for this, rather than having some low-level flunky lose his job. What normally happens is they say “Joe Blow put this up on our web site without authorization” and Joe Blow gets fired to take the heat off of the company.
@THF…. I thought you said you started this website because you did not like the negative atmosphere at IC, which I think also means unsubstantiated rumors. Even though you qualify it as an unsubstantiated rumor, you still post one here and it is now making its rounds on the internet:
74,
My posting a rumor I heard and which I couched at least twice as being a rumor has nothing to do with my opinion of IC. My issue with IC is the nature of the comments and the irrational message board discussions. It is a rumor. I said it was a rumor and described how much of a hearsay it was. I tossed it out there for discussion because it fit with the other item. Whatever someone at IC does with it is really not my concern since I am comfortable with the level of disclaimer I ascribed to it.
But the question should be is this a rumor you would say to Ed Davis’s face?
On second thought maybe that rule is too broad.
With all the problems this team is having the last thing we need is unsubstantiated rumors floating around. He could have easily gone last year on high draft pick and he is one of the few people who played well and showed consistent effort even on an otherwise dismal team, and now has a season ending injury. Remember it was “locker room rumors” that Ty Lawson was prolonging his recovery in his sophomore year because he was saving himself for the draft, which Ty took issue to. If anything he actually played the latter part of last season with what could easily have been a season-ending injury.
BTW this is the update from ACCNow:
74,
Point taken.
Let me be clear that it is not a hill I am willing to die on. When coupled with the other story I thought it warranted being tossed out there.
“I have a friend (1) and UNC grad who talked to a guy (2) who was co-worker with a former UNC athlete(3).
So there were 3 people between the rumor starting person and the UNC locker room?
I personally think Ed will move on to the NBA. I also think that lots of those guys talk about NBA. I know when I’m warming up to play golf, my group talks about the PGA Tour, but then we hit our first tee shots……….
“I never slice. ‘You can owe me’ I owe you nothing ! ”
Phil Mickelson has requested taking his mulligan from the Tour official…here at Augusta on #18, Sunday’s final pairing.
I’ll tell you where I’ll find out if he’s going to the NBA. The Barber in downtown Oxford, NC. This man is a sports prophet if I’ve ever seen one. Back when we were waiting to find out about Hansbrough, Wayne, Ty and Danny he said that they would all be back (This was when we thought at least 2 were gone for sure) and he knew about Hansbrough for sure because he knew the guy who rented his apartment to him. Sure enough the next weekend Hansbrough said he would be back and the others eventually followed suit. Then last spring when the Yankees were playing awful he looked at me as I was leaving and said in a weird almost cryptic way that by the time I needed another haircut the Yankees would be in first place (which they were) and that they would eventually win the world series. Up to that point we had not talked about the Yankees at all.
You all can follow your Draft Express and random rumors but when it comes down to it I’m driving to Oxford and talking to that barber. He knows whats up.
I think a lot of people (including me) are very tense right now because the team is so shaky this year. The foundation we thought we were building for future success has turned out to be less solid then expected, so we are all holding our breaths and hoping that next year we will turn things around. Turning things around will be much easier with Ed then it would be without him. I don’t think he’s ready to succeed in the NBA – he’s ready to be drafted – but he’s not ready to succeed, so I hope he comes back. If he doesn’t come back I don’t expect him to sign a contract with some cracker jack outfit like this agency. UNC has better contacts in the NBA then these guys. But lets just keep our fingers crossed and hope that Ed makes the same decision at the end of this year that he made at the end of last year (when his draft stock was just as high).
It really must be all about potential and not at all about performance. Anyway, it’s their $$$ to invest. Sort of like the banks recently.
If Ed comes back, we have a shot to be pretty good next year, because we are going to have an ACC caliber rotation, however if Ed leaves, we will be sorely lacking in the post.
While nothing about the Davis/agent story rings completely true, something is very fishy. I’m guessing that someone in Ed’s camp–whether with his knowledge or not–is involved with this agent.
It would be a share to have to forfeit those 2 spectacular wins over State.
^Maybe Ed figures that if they take away the wins then they have to take away the losses too – see, he’s just trying to help us out. Then, next year we can start from scratch and win our 2000th game and – oh wait – thats not going to happen until next year anyways – never mind…
I keed, I keed.
Is Roy having a Bob McAdoo moment?
On the front of the PTA website:
“The Athletes with PTA trust us because of the ethical way we do business”
So there, nothing going on with Ed Davis………;-)
This is scary, freaky, and way out of the ordinary.
I don’t think Ed will be leaving, and it’s seems that I’m a one girl show in that area.
The consensus of the board seems to be that Davis would be highly sought after by the NBA. I have to question that. He has had a decently productive but not spectacular season. He does not have the muscle to play his position at the NBA level. He can be a good defender, but the NBA does not draft defense. There have been questions about his toughness.
That said, I tend to be a suspicious type (like C.Michael and ap1). The old saying is that where there’s smoke, there’s fire. In Washington DC, near where I live, the saying is that where’s there’s smoke, there’s a smoke machine.
Whether it’s a smoke machine or fire, however, something is going on that we’re not getting the whole story about. Things like this do not show up by accident, or by the actions of alien beings.
I guess my question is: What amount of agent contact is enough to requre us to forfeit the season? If there were ever a season to forfeit, of course, this would be it, but it would be a black mark on Carolina’s great record, and the “perfect” cap to this nightmare.
Not sure about how much contact would render him ineligible. His family can talk to an agent all they want as long as he is not in the conversation. Also, nothing probably happened during the games in which he played so I don’t think there is any danger of that.
As far as I know, as long as there is no exchange of money/goods/favors, then everything is kosher. And if there was an exchange of money/goods/favors, then as long as Davis didn’t play in any other games after said exchange, then UNC would be clean.
THF –
Thanks. I guess the next “best” thing to forfeiture of the season would be the invention of the Memory Blocker, i.e., the machine that takes me directly from April 4, 2009 to November 2010.
^Make sure you check for flys before you get in that thing…
C.Michael –
And likewise thanks to you!
C.Michael –
Actually, I always wanted to walk into a biker bar (at my 5’7″ 135 lb. frame), challenge the biggest, toughest, meanest dude in there to an arm wrestling contest, and not only beat him but break his arm.
^Either way Ed, and his family, need to understand that having contact with agents and being part of the team are two things can’t happen at the same time.
^ at this day and age of mock drafts and draft experts, where the draft itself has become a multi-million dollar industry, it is impossible for a player or the player’s family to isolate itself from touts, agents etc. Dino Gaudio attributed this predatory behavior to the early departure of Teague and Johnson, both of whom were clearly not ready for the NBA.
I’m not convinced of Ed’s effort for the season, or his consistency. I know the NBA drafts on potential, but if I was an NBA GM, I would be concerned about those two things as well. Ed can come back for another year and show everyone his effort and consistency in a year with better talent, but I would prefer him to go pro than come back for another year and not be prepared to give everything he has to the team.
I’m pretty skeptical of coincidences also, but I doubt that Ed himself has anything to do with this directly, and I doubt that his immediate family would jump the gun like this after what happened last year. Ed and his family may have decided he’ll declare for the draft, which is fine with me, but to my mind it wouldn’t make sense to sign with an agent while he can’t even work out, it wouldn’t make sense to sign with an agent this this quickly without doing an exhaustive search, and it wouldn’t make a lot of sense to sign with an agent without first consulting one of the finest support systems you’re going to find. The information and insights that Roy, former players and extended members of the Carolina family of basketball have to offer would be invaluable to him. If he had an agent he could get a head start on working out in preparation of the draft process, but he can’t work out for the next six weeks or so anyway. He could also get lines of credit, or money fronted to him by an agent, but why close the door on your eligibility when the draft process is a fluid thing, especially after forgoing the opportunity a year ago. Without more information than what we have here I’m not going to assume that Ed and his family wouldn’t avail themselves of all the advantages that his affiliation provides him. Again it is quite likely that maybe someone affiliated with Ed talked with this agency, but it could be a cousin or other family member who has nothing to do with the decision process.
So disappointing. No matter how this turns out, I never really got the impression that Davis was happy or fully invested here. If he leaves, it just might be a blessing.
I want guys with true grit and fire in their eyes. Guys with a burning intensity to compete and win. Davis hasn’t shown me that.
^ If by fully invested you mean averaging a double-double in this dismal team then yes he was not totally invested.
Ed Davis is not going anywhere next season. He blew his chance to become a lottery pick.I think the people in the nba have watched him closely this season thinking that he might bulk up some and improved his game some.He has done either. Only if he don’t care anything about basketball and just filling his pocket might he leave. Two more years of college ball and he will be a top pick and start in the nba, with all the money he could ever spend.
Old school,
Ed davis helped us win it all last year.He was huge for us last year. He played last year with players who refused to lose. Thats why the pros wanted him. How would you fill if you were on this team now and gave it your all in practice and the begining of the season and then look at your teamates who could care less if they win or not.It enough to drag us fans down,I believe it brought the players down also.
Davis is averaging 12.9 ppg, 9.2 rpg, and 2.7 bpg with what appears to be almost minimal effort. Those would be decent numbers for less talented players.
I recall a story early in the season (maybe on this blog) about Davis being the only player who didn’t show up with his preseason fitness goals met. I’m sure he’s a good kid, but I don’t see the fire in his eyes or the grit in his play that I’d like to see. And I NEVER see any leadership ability from him.
Ed Davis was kind enough to sign an autograph for my son during the summer league this year, and he is by all accounts a decent and good person. He’s also part of Tarheel Nation (just like us), so you know I’ll be rooting for him even if he leaves to go pro.
My point in this thread is simply that I don’t see any real fire in his eyes. Maybe I’m just spoiled from watching four years of Hansbrough and company play with unbelievable intensity almost every game.