Report: Background checks rare in college football

NEW YORK (AP) - An investigation of 25 top college football programs by Sports Illustrated and CBS News has revealed that Oklahoma and TCU were the only ones to do criminal background checks on recruits.

SI and CBS News did various criminal background checks on all the players on the rosters of the teams in Sports Illustrated's 2010 preseason top 25 as of Sept. 1.

According to the story posted Wednesday on SI.com, the study found about 7 percent of the 2,837 players - 204 total - “had been in trouble with the law either before or after entering college.”

The report also stated in the cases where an outcome was known, “players were guilty or paid some penalty in nearly 60 percent of the 277 total incidents.”