The Southeastern Conference has finally decided to take action to burnish its tarnished image.

It’s about time.

The Kansas City Star, way back in 2012, featured a lengthy STORY about the sordid history of the conference which, when Mike Slive was appointed commissioner in 2002, half the conference’s 12 teams were either on probation or under investigation.

Slive, who died last year, retired in 2015 and was succeeded by Greg Sankey but the problems didn’t go away.

Folks still remember the controversy swirling around the alleged payments to Cam Newton in order to get him enrolled at Auburn.

But the conference is rife with such stories:

There was Pat Dye at Auburn, Charlie Pell at Florida, John Callpari, Eddie Sutton and Dwayne Casey at Kentucky, Alabama’s paying $150,000 to entice football prospect Albert Means to pay for the Tide.

Some coaches got caught up in recruiting misadventures prior to being hired by SEC schools.

Auburn assistant basketball coach Ira Bowman was suspended for violations involving the University of Pennsylvania. Auburn head basketball coach Bruce Pearl was caught up in an FBI investigation of recruiting violations while at Tennessee and Auburn assistant basketball coach, Chuck Person was charged with corruption and bribery in another FBI investigation involving then-Louisville coach Rick Pitino.

Of course, cheating isn’t limited to the SEC. There were these, to name a few:

• The Reggie Bush saga at USC;
• The academic fraud scandal at Florida State;
• The illegal cash payments to North Carolina players by a sports agent;
• The tutoring scandal at North Carolina;
• Tattoogate at Ohio State;
• God knows what-all at Miami and Oklahoma;
• A number of recruiting violations at SMU, including claims by Eric Dickerson that the school paid him while he was enrolled there;
• Michigan booster Ed Martin and the damage he did to the school’s basketball program;
• Jerry Sandusky at Penn State;
• Sexual assault at Baylor that forced Kenn Starr out as president;

And now we have our most current embarrassment: the suspension of LSU basketball coach Will Wade after FBI wiretaps surfaced in which he is allegedly heard discussing payments to a highly-recruited basketball player currently enrolled at LSU.

So, now, in a LouisianaVoice exclusive, we have learned that Sankey, with the near-unanimous backing of SEC coaches is taking action that should keep the conference at the head of the pack in NCAA athletic competition—without the stigma of recruiting violations.

A draft to replace the arduous rigors of bribing 18-year-old high school kids.

And why not?

A draft will not only dramatically slash the cost and time devoted to recruiting, but will level the playing field for the perennial have-nots like Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Tennessee and South Carolina in football, practically everyone but Kentucky in basketball and several of the mediocre teams in baseball.

And it would obliterate cheating and payoffs in recruiting and take unscrupulous boosters out of the equation.

Those are just the men’s sports, of course, but to be totally honest, that’s where the most expenses are and it’s where the most cheating occurs. Women’s sports just seem to be a bit more ethical and virtuous and grounded in the true spirit of SPORTSMANSHIP.

So, now, beginning in 2020, the SEC will conduct a draft of high school prospects with the team with the worst record in 2019 drafting first, the second-worst next and so on until the reigning SEC champion drafts last.

Also like the NFL, teams may trade up in the draft in order to get a player that might not be available in the later rounds.

But unlike the NFL, the draft won’t be binding to other conferences.

In other words, if a high school player wants to play in the SEC, he must play for the team that drafts him but at the same time, he would be free to go to any other non-conference school that recruits him.

Orgeron said the SEC draft could actually be a benefit to other Louisiana schools. “If a player was drafted by, say, Missouri but wanted to play closer to home, he could stay in state and play for Louisiana Tech, ULL or some other state school that might not otherwise be in the running for his services,” he said.

Undrafted players, of course, would be free to play for any SEC school as walk-ons.

High school players could declare themselves for the SEC draft following their junior years, Sankey said. “Opting out of their senior year of high school wouldn’t put any additional academic pressure on them since once enrolled in the school that drafts them, class attendance will be, as always, optional,” he said. “We will continue to have tutors and test stand-ins for those who opt not to go to class.”

“We’ll be instituting the draft only in football and men’s basketball at first to determine if the plan is feasible,” Sankey said. “If it’s successful, as we expect it to be, we will phase in all the other sports for men and women.”

Sankey said the next step in his long-range plan to eliminate the cloud of corruption that has come over the conference far too often is expected to be approval of the payment of stipends, or salaries to players. “To help combat any negative publicity, each school will also provide free legal representation for players,” he said.

“If we can negotiate salaries with the players in the same manner as the NFL,” he said, “there’s a good chance we could keep more players for the full four years of their academic pursuits, thus increasing the conference’s graduation rate for student-athletes.”

Sanky said if salaries for players are phased in, players would also be allowed to be represented by agents.

“The times, they are a-changing,” he said, quoting from the Bob Dylan song of the ‘60s. “We have to change with them to remain competitive.”

As noted earlier, the plan was “near-unanimous” in its acceptance. LSU’s head football coach Ed Orgeron and Alabama Crimson Tide’s Nick Saban came down on opposite sides of the issues of both the draft and payments.

“Go Tigers. I think it’s a great idea,” said Orgeron. “This will allow LSU to keep some of those great players from West Monroe here in the state and maybe one day we can beat ‘Bama’s butts. Go Tigers.”

Saban, however, was vehemently opposed to the plan. “Why would I want to be the last team to draft and lose a great player that I would normally get with minimal effort?” he asked, red-faced and with veins popping out on his forehead. “Why should I get penalized for winning by making me draft last? This is just an attempt by the media to create controversy at Alabama and I’m not going to fall for it.

“Trust me, ‘Bama will continue to get the players it wants, one way or another. Some things never change.”

The initial high school draft is scheduled for one year from today.