The folks at Prokick Australia, it seemed, had hacked the punting game. The company capitalized on the nation's sporting culture -- where Australian Rules Football makes kicking a ball akin to how we dribble a basketball, with their eyes disconnected to the ball -- to deliver ready-made punters to American college football programs. Colleges received punters that were better than their American counterparts, Australian families secured American college scholarships for their sons with a shot at NFL riches, and Prokick Australia made money as the middle men. Win, win, and win.
Prokick was founded in 2007, and eight of the last 12 Ray Guy Award winners were born Down Under.
However, a report from the Fox affiliate in San Antonio alleges massive fraud in the export process of Australian punters to American universities. According to documents obtained by the station, Prokick regularly falsified documents to show their clients had better grades than they really did, or had more eligibility than they really did.
From the report:
In one case, an athlete's real transcript from an Australian school showed failing grades. However, the transcript submitted for NCAA eligibility we were shown had significantly higher grades allegedly altered to meet academic requirements.
"He had three sets, right? So we had one from the school, okay, one from Prokick. But when they looked at it and they sent it to him, his GPA wasn't high enough out of high school, so they redid it and he sent it to me. I said, Why is it that this one, you gotta B in it. And this one you gotta C ” said a recruiting expert in Australia
This trainer and recruiter, who also requested anonymity, provided us with several transcripts. He claims were altered by Prokick to help players secure U.S. scholarships. These were some of the documents Gamble investigated.
"There was a kid that actually outed himself. They sat down. He sat down with his advisor and said, "Oh, you need to take these classes and these classes. And then he was like, no, no, I already took that in university. And they said, What?" They did some research. And they said, "You've already gone to uni? You've got, you know, two weeks to pack your bags and get out of here,” said the trainer.
The Fox report did not mention specific players who may have fraudulently obtained a scholarship, nor did it estimate a number of players who may have reached American shores via falsified documents.
Prokick's website, which shows seven former clients now punting in the NFL on its homepage, boasts that 97 percent of its athletes obtain full scholarships in the United States.
"We can place guys into college who have completed yr 12; we can place guys into college who have left school but NOT completed yr 12; we can place guys into college that are currently at university here in Australia," the site reads. "We can NOT place guys into a US College who have done more than 4 yrs of university here in Australia (if you were a full time student)."
The report raises ethical concerns, given that there are only 134 punting jobs in the FBS funneling up to 32 NFL punting jobs, and legal ones. Falsifying documents to obtain a student visa could constitute immigration fraud.
"These students that we've investigated have attended university full-time, and we don't believe that it was disclosed. If there has been a misrepresentation of their educational standards, then this is not only a violation of the NCAA eligibility rules, but it's also fraud in their visa documents,” said IFW Global chairman Ken Gamble.