The Big Ten's latest solution to tampering is as outrageous as the problem itself

With the birth of the transfer portal, there's been a massive rise in claims from schools all over the country that their rivals are "tampering" with their players. For Nebraska and other schools, allegations of tampering have even led to the scrapping of spring games. Now the Big Ten has a "solution" to tampering that is more than a little outrageous.

Tony Petitti and his gang that can't shoot straight want the NCAA to put a "moratorium" on tampering investigations until the organization can come up with new and better rules. In other words, the short-term solution to tampering is to just pretend it's not happening.

ESPN's Pete Thamel obtained a letter sent from the Big Ten to the NCAA asking for the moratorium and published it on social media Wednesday evening. In addition, speaking for Nebraska and the other conference schools, the B1G asked for other sweeping rules changes, declaring the current guidelines are "designed for a world that no longer exists."

In the letter, the Petitti's gang argued the House settlement – which ushered in the revenue-sharing era in college athletics – has made current rules unworkable. As a result, enforcement is a challenge in the new landscape.

The Big Ten's tampering moratorium request puts Nebraska football in a strange position

The letter laid out a "path forward" to usher in change. For starters, it called for a pause of NCAA bylaw 13.1.1.4, which deals with impermissible contact (in other words, tampering), and the conference said membership should work to figure out a new policy strategy "that fits the realities of today's world."

"The cumulative effect of these changes is a marketplace that bears no resemblance to the one that existed when the current rules were written," the letter reads. "The structural pressures are evident in the data: more than 1,000 FBS football student-athletes who entered the portal on January 2 took campus visits that same weekend – visits requiring travel and institutional coordination that cannot plausibly have been organized in hours – and more than 300 had signed with a new school by the end of that weekend, with some signing as quickly as 90 minutes into the portal."

The real oddity of this request is that the Big Ten has fought tampering as hard as any conference. Several coaches, including Nebraska's Matt Rhule, have talked about how prevalent it is. The conference has even joined lawsuits against other conferences and programs, accusing them of tampering.

It's a weak-kneed approach to a real problem that needs to be focused on, rather than scrap any attempt to stop it. Yes, rules need to be better. Enforcement needs to be better. But the Big Ten wanting the NCAA to ignore completely what's happening in this era of college sports couldn't be more wrongheaded.