David Beaty disputes key evidence against him, says KU Athletics overstated its case
Former Kansas football coach David Beaty claims any violations against his program under his watch should be classified as Level III and not Level II, according to his legal team’s official response sent to the NCAA.
Beaty’s response to the notice of allegations — obtained Tuesday by The Star through an open records request — also reiterates many of Beaty’s main arguments as he continues to pursue a separate $3 million lawsuit against KU Athletics for buyout money originally owed to him from his contract.
The Level II vs. Level III distinction in the NCAA rulebook, Beaty’s lawyer Enrique J. Gimenez argues, is an important difference. Under Beaty’s watch, KU football was initially issued two Level II sanctions, one for video coordinator Jeff Love meeting impermissibly with KU’s quarterbacks, and the other to Beaty as a “coach control” charge for failing to properly monitor his staff.
“Coach control,” however, is only reserved for the NCAA’s more-severe Level I and Level II violations. If Love’s misconduct were classified as Level III, then Beaty’s specific allegation, his team argues, is no longer valid.
“To the extent any minor countable coach violations occurred, they were unintentional, more isolated than alleged, and most appropriately classified as Level III,” his lawyer’s response reads.
Beaty’s team also had strong words against KU Athletics, saying Beaty’s “reputation and career have been irreparably harmed” by KU following its “mischaracterization” of the NCAA case to potential future employers. Last week, unsealed court documents revealed that Beaty testified in February that he was offered an analyst job with the Texas Longhorns before Texas athletic director Chris Del Conte received a warning from KU AD Jeff Long about Beaty.
Long, during his own deposition on Feb. 27, said in sworn testimony that he came to a more harsh conclusion regarding Beaty than the NCAA Committee on Enforcement did in its notice of allegations against KU, believing his actions were more serious than the document alleged. Long also said he spoke to Del Conte about Beaty, recalling that he told Del Conte that “David Beaty is involved with serious violations under investigation by the NCAA.”
A majority of Beaty’s 55-page response to the NCAA attempts to not only question the legitimacy of the violations alleged under his watch, but also points out Beaty’s previous commitment at KU to compliance.
In particular, Beaty’s team claims that at the time Love’s disallowed meetings were said to have occurred in January 2018 — when KU quarterbacks said in interviews that Beaty would sometimes attend — KU’s recruiting records indicate that Beaty was not on campus any weekday from when school began in mid-January through Feb. 2. In addition, Beaty’s team says, Love was only on campus one week in January that year, while also attending a video coordinators conference during that month.
Beaty’s team also pointed to an interview with KU football compliance officer Jeff Smith, who said he could not recall seeing the quarterbacks meet with any coaches in the morning during January 2018, while also stating that no one had mentioned to him anything about Love conducting coaching activities or meetings.
One potential explanation, Beaty’s team says, is the quarterbacks were describing permissible meetings with Love where he was providing IT instruction for videos that were meant to be self-directed. Beaty admits that it’s possible, when that occurred, that Love may have “unintentionally” made passing comments that crossed over into impermissible instruction.
Even if those did occur, Beaty’s team says, they “fall well short of the orchestrated, preplanned misconduct put forward by the institution and even the volume and scope implied in the allegation.”
Beaty’s lawyer also alleges KU Athletics of trying to improperly use Cooper Flower, a former KU football video employee who came forward about Love’s potential impermissible coaching in her exit interview, to further its case against Beaty. Beaty’s team says that KU Athletics asked Flower to review some video of KU practices that took place before she was hired to look for potential violations. Beaty’s team also said that 30 of the other 45 clips she was asked to view were from after Oct. 10, 2018, when Love had been promoted to assistant coach and was allowed under NCAA rules to work on-field with KU’s players.
The response works to provide numerous examples of Beaty’s compliance efforts at KU, which included an open system that allowed coaches to ask questions that would be researched by the compliance department then answered and shared with staff members. This initiative, Beaty’s team says, resulted in 400 pages of emails of Beaty’s staff regularly consulting with compliance while also asking questions on topics before acting.
Establishing Beaty’s record of compliance could be significant. Beaty’s team cites an NCAA ruling against Oregon from 2018, where men’s basketball coach Dana Altman avoided individual “coach control” charge penalties, even after his director of basketball operations impermissibly participated or watched practice at least 64 times while also sometimes refereeing practice, which was later self-reported.
In its ruling, the NCAA infractions committee noted “that even a coach with a strong record of following the rules can make mistakes” and “recognized the head men’s basketball coach for promoting an atmosphere of compliance, which was evident in his self-reporting the referee violation.”
Beaty’s lawyer also argues “there is no suggestion ... that Coach Beaty intentionally participated in the single impermissible instruction allegation,” before comparing that to KU men’s basketball coach Bill Self, who is alleged to have “personal involvement in violations” with a Level I charge in the same notice of allegations.
There’s also a reference to KU’s present football staff under coach Les Miles, which had Level III violations self-reported by KU after two non-coaching members were alleged to have assisted with on-field football drills. Beaty’s lawyer claims the two Level II charges in Beaty’s tenure are “overstated,” while claiming the Level III allegation under Miles’ watch is “similar (or worse) Level III misconduct.”
Beaty’s lawyer claims, to make the allegations under Beaty a Level II charge, it would become the first NCAA case where the impermissible coach violations weren’t committed at the direction of the head coach; weren’t committed with a clear awareness the violation was occurring; involved a violation that took place over a systematic period of months; and “arguably” added up to less than 10 clear and distinct infractions.
“There seems no reasonable basis,” the response said, “to depart from that precedent here.”
