This whole Cam Newton saga has become seemingly more complex as each hour passes. More rumors, stories, accusations and unnamed sources then you can count. Nobody has any idea what information is true and what isn’t, and there hasn’t been any evidence to show that Cam Newton had any idea that any of this was going on (if any of this was in fact going on). The biggest problem is that the story is so confusing with so many moving pieces that its hard to get a grasp on the whole thing. We decided to scour the internet and try to put all these rumors/accusations/information together in a simple, easy to understand article. Remember that most of the information are rumors and speculation, but this is what we’ve gotten out of the Cam Newton situation and have written out a sort of “cliffs notes” version.

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The Auburn Board of Trustees is controlled by a bunch of good-old-boys, the most powerful of which ran a large bank that was seized by the FDIC and is now under FBI investigation for all sorts of misdeeds. Another Board of Trustees member/booster owns a casino/dog track in the state. Several Auburn Board of Trustees/boosters were also on the board of the seized bank.

In the course of the FBI’s investigation into improprieties at the bank, their wiretaps allegedly recorded several Auburn Board of Trustees members/boosters discussing pay-for-play schemes involving Newton and other members of the recent Auburn recruiting class, which was remarkably improved over the previous year’s lackluster class. Schemes included slot machines rigged to pay out cash to Auburn players, laundering booster money through the casino and into player’s hands, secret ATM cards from the bank in question, and funneling money from the university’s fundraising arm into the hands of recruits and their families. Auburn recruiting coordinator Trooper Taylor was also allegedly heard on wiretap discussing pay-for-play and how much money he needs to wrap up the recruiting class.

Then speculation is that an Auburn booster funnels $250k from a non-profit org. to Newton’s uncle in Michigan, who sends it to Cecil. Cecil’s downtrodden church is suddenly repaired. Cecil Newton owns a small trucking company with just a couple drivers. After Cam Newton signs, business picks up to the point where over a dozen drivers are needed.

The most recent story being reported by people such as ESPN is claiming a payment plan was laid out. Text messages from a representative of Cecil Newton were sent to a Mississippi St booster. The plan was to pay $80,000 up front with another $50,000 coming 30 days later and then another $50,000 coming 30 days after that.

People that are apparently in the know believe Auburn knows they are screwed, but instead of sitting Cam Newton for the rest of the year, they figure they’ll try to win a MNC, SEC Champ., and Heisman Trophy and deal with the consequences later. It sounds like Auburn’s President wanted to sit Cam against UGA but was overruled by Athletic Director and boosters. Auburn was threatened with loss of accreditation (academic equiv. of the death penalty) earlier this decade, but was only hit with probation. The SACS (accrediting body) would not be likely to show such leniency to  this time if these stories come out as truth. So not only is Auburn looking at a possible death penalty from the NCAA, it’s possible that it could become unaccredited as an academic instritution, meaning loss of all federal funds and obviously dismissal from the SEC.

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That is the stripped down version of all the internet rumors and speculation. As you can see this whole thing could end up being way bigger then anyone imagined. Also, don’t plan on seeing this being over any time soon. It will take the FBI, NCAA, SEC and SACS a long time to get this whole mess sorted out. Could you imagine Auburn being booted from the SEC?

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