THE FULMER CUP LIVES: RULES AND EDITS

The Fulmer Cup has technically been open since the final second of the BCS Title Game ticked off the clock, but we've been busy with other forms of accounting (we went to Blacksburg this year? Really, Old Receipt We Found Stuck In Our Laptop Bag Pocket? He who does not have a memory must make one out of old QT receipts.)

So to clarify, we reprint the rules in italics with a few edits to bring the rules up to date, and answer a few questions commonly asked along the way.

SO ARE YOU GOING TO RENAME THE CUP HURRRRR--

No, because branding durrrrrrr. Once the Fulmer Cup, always the Fulmer Cup, though we are considering the addition of the Meyer Award For Harsh Punishment this year to celebrate the greatest differential between crime and punishment.

WHAT ARE THE RULES?

From the archives, and with some notes for clarification's sake.

The player in question MUST BE ON ROSTER at the time of arrest. No Ex-Players!

Seriously. Must be on team. Must be on team. Must be on team. No incoming recruits, and must be registered and taking at least a class. 

• Murder: 5 points. 

We've had to award this once in the whole history of the Cup. Not funny, but necessary for scoring

• Rape: 4 points. Downgraded to one if either participant is wearing a clown mask.

Again, not funny, but if it's on board, it's on the board. BTW, cutting off the stupidest complaint we get about the Cup: we can only award points for charges filed. We can't make things up, and that's too bad because some schools obviously get charges dismissed with legal muscle (COUGH COUGH FLORIDA), but charges filed are the sole main source of points.

• Bestiality: 4 points. It's a form of rape, really, no matter how much the goat has had to drink. High point value justified further by the fact that it involves having sex with an animal. You could say this was unthinkable, but in the past year alone two stories involving college athletes and at least the association with barnyard bonhomie of a most intimate degree have been reported, including the EDSBS Official GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD: the arrest of Oregon State player Ben Siegert for stealing a sheep used in a study on homosexuality in sheep.

Really, any kind of serious sex charge, arson, or federal charges fall in the 4 point category. It's a catchall for "you didn't kill anyone, but seriously that's closer to frighteningly amoral than immoral" charges and offenses.

• Grand Larceny: 4 points. We use this as a catchall for players being involved in crime so outrageous and well-planned it can only be described as 'nefarious,' 'professional,' or 'legislation.' Applies to large drug rings, chop shop operations, and the Haitian human trafficking ring that's been run out of the Miami locker room since '93. (We kid! They didn't get that thing humming 'til '95 at the earliest.)

Daring counts, so bonus points are sometimes added for flair. Hitting girls always gets a bonus point since we frown on this. A spectacular variation of a crime will also merit a bonus point, as will any offense committed after the team racks up three arrests in an offseason. (The prior system for doing this was insane, so now we'll simplify: more than three arrests, and a single bonus point is tacked on to the total for the individual offense.)

• Hitting Girls: 3 points. We'll downgrade this to 2 if the girl can hold her weight and requires daily medication to prevent her from gouging her own eyes out (since those were the ones we always ended up dating, and we understand); or we'll upgrade to 4 points if the damage includes intensive care. Dad always said never hit girls, so we take this one seriously. Dad also said always double down with split aces, too, but we'll be damned if we didn't end up selling bone marrow in Macau the last time we followed that bit of advice.
• Car theft/Assault/Driving through houses drunk/Drug possession of the Tyrone Biggums variety: 3 points. "Drug possession" never sounds all that bad until you add in 'crack cocaine,' which is society's signifier that your life has gone from that of high functioning simian in a complex society to that of a rat with electrodes in your brain's pleasure centers hitting a pedal in a glass box in a lab. Weed? Par for the course, especially if you're NFL-bound. Crack? Break out the Sports Century 'Weepy Sonata' music, because the story of your descent from boundless potential has just begun, and they haven't even begun to show the grainy shots of 130-lb you huddled in a shelter on Skid Row.

Again, subject to bonus points. If charges are dismissed, we will dismiss the points. An important clarification follows: though we will vacate dismissed charges, for simplicity's sake reduced charges will not result in a reduction of points. Your lawyer's skills are not our concern at the margins. Your initial charge is, and that is what counts here. Otherwise we spend the offseason tracking the long trail of counterargument and legal folderol, and that makes us sad and tired

• Fightin' in 'da Club/Weed Possession/Standard DUI: 2 points. Any scenario involving group fighting of a thugged-out, 'we run this place' variety, and marijuana possession of the nickel bag level. Possession of 100 pounds of marijuana is a totally different thing, and takes you right back up to the 4 point 'nefarious' level.
• Drankin'/Suspended License/Assorted petty misdemeanors: 1 point.

The Ellis T Jones III rule states that no team can win the Fulmer Cup based solely on the performance of one player. If the top scoring team does not have more than one player arrested, the Fulmer Cup is awarded to the next top scoring team.

We'll catch up with the scoring in a bit, but for the moment the archives at SAS WIki are ready for your perusal for past performances of note.  And remember: this is lighthearted fun about potentially darkhearted things, so if you're too sensitive/dumb to really do this, excuse yourself now.