The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-10-08

| ringers as alleged by Georgia and some southern papers. I would consider it a personal favor if anyone don't care who it is, would prove to me that any man on the Tech team was ineligible, re- ceiving pay or inducements for his serv- ices or anything of the like. l would dis qualify them immediately.
 'I know I don't pay or offer induce ments to anybody to play with Tech and if I don't nobody else has the authority to do so.
 "As for Georgia, will state that I have positive proof that they have played ringers My skirts are clear I like to see clean football and Tech will always have that kind as long as I am con- nected with the college. Georgia should model after us"
 OTHER PLAYERS INVOLVED
 Butner, a star end from Brown uni versity, and Bowling, backfield man from the University of Florida are also in- cluded in the attack. Whatever may be the outcome of the dispute, whether or not Georgia establishes the fact that these men receive pay for playing, it has long been rumored in southern football circles that Tech has resorted to the unsportsmanlilSe methods of playing ring ers,' and it is well known that several prominent southern colleges have refused to play the Yellow Jackets for this req son. Tech, however, has never been di- rectly accused of employing ringers as the majority of southern colleges refuse to complain against the eligibility of their rivals men.
 Provided Tech did pay her men, every football player who performed against the Yellow Jackets would be made pro- fessional. Southern colleges would not stand for such a thing. There is but little doubt but that Tech, as all other southern colleges, has inducements for athletes, but the news would leak out sooner or later athletes were paid and then the college would be practically dis graced as far as sportsmanship was con- cerned.
 Tech is also criticized for the offering of athletic scholarships, system preva- : lent at every school or college which promotes athletics, in all sections of the country. Such scholarships, as they are called, are not to be condemned. The system is not bad, provided tuition alone IS given for in many worthy cases a really deserving fellow may be given an education which he would otherwise not get at the same time he gives his serv- ices to his alma mater
 DIFFERENCE IN PAYING"
 The giving of such scholarships is alto gether different from hiring" buying, ''
 
 It. It is this extra feature of giving the athlete board, and even pay for his serv- ices that puts college sport on a low plane and it is about this which the two Georgia colleges are fighting each other
 several suggest that the authorities of the $. I. A. A. hold general investiga- ton into the status of every player on any college team a member of the or ganization. There are but very few, if any, regular paid athletes in any college in the south and such an investigation would do more to injure the game than any other thing possible
 Let the colleges alone be responsible for the players they gather They if they violate the 'laws of sportsmanship. ? let the other colleges, who protest strike them off their schedule. The practice of getting ringers is not universal enough to hold such an investigation.
 The south can condemn the ringer" system, and it has, but the practice of giving an athlete his tuition for his services cannot be blackballed by the fairminded public of the south.