The NCAA's beef with Reggie Bush erased a college football legend... sort of. We'll explain.

Reggie Bush did some truly amazing things while playing college football at Southern Cal – and most of them happened on the field! Ha. Anyway, this is a very real story about the disparity between labor and ownership – sorry, "educators" – in modern college football. If you don't know anything about Reggie Bush, the NCAA, or what happened in the 2000s, just understand that this dude took a semi-free place to live and paid a steeper price to the college football gods than O.J. Simpson.

Written and produced by Steven Godfrey
Directed by Jiazhen Zhang
Illustrations, animations and additional editing by Tyson Whiting

[turnermedlicott]

Coming back to this to celebrate Bush getting his Heisman back. We did it Joe

[mcain]

If you don’t like or agree with the NIL, blame the NCAA for it. They’ll make tens of millions off of a guy, but let someone find out a restaurant owner said you don’t have to pay for your steak and they’ll nail the entire program to the wall.

[BirdGang]

Just give Reggie his damn Heisman back, the benefits he got weren’t performance enhancers, he still had to go out there and be the best player in college week in and week out and that’s exactly what he did.

[jackmanley]

I HATED USC back in the day, but what the NCAA attempted to do to Reggie Bush, the best RB to ever play college football, was just pathetically laughable. Still the Heisman winner.

[BigBoyJay_]

Insane how good the audio is considering it was recorded on a potato

[scrub_jay]

Reggie isn't the only one who suffered. The punishments, especially the recruiting limitations, set USC back for damn near 10 years. It could be argued that the ripples of this case are felt in the ongoing death of the Pac-12.

[Job.Well.Done_]

I still see Reggie as a clear Heisman Trophy recipient even if that title was “stripped” from him by the NCAA.
His performance on the football field at USC is legendary and speaks for itself.

Edit: Vince Young is a real one for not accepting the trophy after it was ‘stripped’ from Bush. Legend. Vince Young was one HECK of a college football player.

[bradleythornock]

Did the NCAA throw the host down a well when he was recording this video?

[lastsinnersa]

Steven Godfrey is just gold in these vids. Loved his work all the way back from the 4 part series about the Ole Miss recruiting saga & NCAA hypocricy.

[Flow_Easy]

I hope that Reggie and other past college athletes come together and put a lot of heat on the NCAA. They need to have past cases and judgements reviewed, becuase if they screwed up in Reggie's case, I wouldn't doubt it if it happened in others.

[URLIamnot]

The irony is how much money he made for USC, the NCAA, and EVERYONE else who was on the take. I was at the Hawaii game when Hawaii hosted USC in 2005. It was a spectacle! I say this as someone from Louisiana and a die-hard bayou Bengals fan. Give him his trophy!

[nedisahonkey]

It's crazy to me how many people STILL argue against college athletes getting paid. Its especially egregious when it's people who played high school or college football because 95% of the time its coming from a place of pure jealousy. I don't know if it's more hilarious od deeply sad to be honest.

[samortmann]

This gets even crazier when you watch the Johnny football documentary and nobody looked into the oil money cover story

[echo_lley]

Note to the team: I will still watch the video even if it comes out weeks after a related major news release if I can expect high quality content.

[Los]

Who’s here after it was announced Reggie is rightfully getting his Heisman back?

[Loui]

In the Johnny Manziel documentary he literally made tons of money off of autographs but he was never stripped of his heisman

[charlesariyibi]

Secret Base, I love you guys and your videos, the beef history series in particular. I watch and rewatch these almost daily, even just to throw them on in the background. The drop in quality in these recent videos is astounding, who is letting these be posted? The audio quality is poor, and the musical background which is supposed to complement the narration has been turned down because of the poor audio so it makes us feel like we are sitting in an echoey room being lectured, instead of a fun narration of sports beef. Still love you guys, but some of the latest videos have been unwatchable.

[Ivantheterrible]

Let’s also not forget nothing was done to Pete Carroll. Skipped out of town and went to the NFL.

[primetime__]

As a Texas Fan, Reggie Bush deserves his Heisman and what NCAA is doing is not justified in any way. Give him his Heisman back!

[Pseedholm]

Why is the production value of this video so atrocious? No cold open, no opening title, graphics straight outta a 1998 mac book running photoshop 1.


Oh wait. It’s probably bc it was rushed out when news broke that Reggie bush is suing the NCAA.