DeflateGate just one of many examples of rules manipulation

While much of the free world has been obsessing about deflated footballs for the past couple of weeks, letting air out of a pigskin is hardly the only area where rules are bent or broken in the sports world.

IndyStar sportswriters weighed in with a few examples from other beats.

AUTO RACING

In an effort to contain costs and keep the playing field as level as possible, IndyCar has testing limitations; there are two instances where teams were found to be in violation.

•In 2005, a team that wasn't publicly identified went to the Milwaukee Mile, an oval track, for an unapproved test session. Justification came by way of saying non-IndyCar equipment was used, but that didn't fly with series officials.

•Ganassi Racing built a secret indoor facility a decade ago. For years, Chip Ganassi and his associates denied the existence of the converted tunnel east of Pittsburgh, but it's not only there for straight-line running, it's now an approved IndyCar testing facility.

The Laurel Hill Tunnel was created in the late 1800s for a railway that was never finished. It later became part of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. However, the popularity of the four-lane roadway eventually caused too much congestion at the two-lane, nearly mile-long tunnel, and in the late 1960s it was again abandoned.

How Ganassi came to control the tunnel and the extent of its usage remain part of its mystery, but there is no doubt that having a controlled environment to simulate actual racecars is a significant advantage, especially given the testing limits.

A third example of an IndyCar team going to the extreme to gain an advantage was Team Penske secretly building the 209-cubic-inch Mercedes pushrod engine for the 1994 Indianapolis 500. The difference was, what Penske did was legal.

Like Bill Belichick's recent use of a running back as a lineman ineligible to catch passes, Penske found a section of the rulebook to exploit, and he did. With extraordinary horsepower, Penske drivers Emerson Fittipaldi, Al Unser Jr. and Paul Tracy dominated that month of May, leading 193 of the 200 laps to win running away. The engine wasn't allowed in 1995.

— Curt Cavin

OLYMPICS

In four decades of covering track and field and other Olympic sports, doping has always been a scourge. In a week in which Deflate-gate captured attention of American media, a far bigger scandal unfolded.

The IAAF, world governing body for the sport, announced five new cases of Russians violating the athlete biological passport program, which reveals effects of doping rather than detecting the substance or method. That increased the number of Russian violators to 23, more than half the number (37) since the program was introduced in 2009. The IAAF called the development "a major concern," especially in race walking.

Another Russian, women's Olympic steeplechase champion Yulia Zaripova, is under suspicion for violating biological passport rules. Russian athletics' top coach, Valentin Maslakov, has resigned. A recent documentary on German television alleged Russia has used a systematic doping program involving 99 percent of its Olympic teams and that positive tests have been covered up.

In addition to the Russian scandals, there is an ongoing investigation into about a dozen Kenyan runners, notably Rita Jeptoo, a three-time Boston Marathon champion. She tested positive for the blood-booster EPO.

Such cheating is nothing new. More than half the world records in 23 women's Olympic events, especially those set by East Germans in the 1970s and '80s and Chinese in the '90s, are implausible — i.e. impossible without doping. Such incredulity has also been applied to the 100-meter world record of 10.49 seconds set by Florence Griffith-Joyner in the 1988 U.S. Olympic Trials at Indianapolis.

Track fans in Indianapolis turned out to watch sprinter Justin Gatlin at the 2006 USA Championships, only to learn the supposed world record-holder had a positive drug test before the meet. He was subsequently banned, then reinstated, and in 2014 was the world's top sprinter again at age 32.

Gatlin's resurgence introduced anew an old debate: Should cheaters be banned for life, or be applauded for coming back and winning while clean?

There is reason to be skeptical of anti-doping agencies, and the theory goes that the cheaters always will be ahead of the testers. The IAAF and International Olympic Committee have not acted to annul records or medals they must know were achieved dishonorably. Knowing it and proving it are different.

On the other hand, two of the most decorated athletes of their respective sports – sprinter Marion Jones and cyclist Lance Armstrong — have had results invalidated and reputations besmirched. Those who cheat now run the risk of ruining legacies later.

— David Woods

COLLEGE BASKETBALL

Butler coach Chris Holtmann said college basketball coaches sometimes push the rules on contacting a player. NCAA rules prohibit a coach from most forms of contact with prospective recruits until the end of their sophomore year in high school, but that rule is all too often ignored, he said.

"I've been at (high school) games and seen coaches have 15 of 20-minute conversations with them," Holtmann said. "You can't do that."

Holtmann said he sometimes hears stories about coaches allegedly working with players beyond the 8-hour limit required by NCAA rules during the off-season. He also hears about some programs using administrative personnel for on-court instruction, such as a the director of basketball operations. That's prohibited by NCAA rules, too.

As for game-day itself, Holtmann said he hasn't had too many issues with how opposing teams conduct themselves, but sometimes, the condition of the visiting team's locker room when his team has been on the road is, shall we say, interesting. He added that has not been an issue in the Big East.

"I've been in some really, really, really hot locker rooms," he said. "Like unbearably hot. You couldn't hardly stand it. The furnace was very intense."

Earlier this week, NCAA vice president of enforcement Jon Duncan said academic misconduct is on the rise in college athletics. He said his department currently has 20 open investigations involving incoming athletes seeking eligibility for competition and enrolled athletes receiving impermissible assistance from university and athletics department personnel.

— Michael Pointer

HIGH SCHOOLS

Recruiting is a dirty word in high school athletics, but proving it or figuring out exactly what to do about it remains a topic for debate.

The Indiana High School Athletic Association has strict rules in place to prevent schools from recruiting for athletics. If the IHSAA find that a student has transferred for "athletic reasons," he is ineligible at his new school for 365 days.

The IHSAA also prohibits undue influence, which is defined as "the act of encouraging or inducing a prospective student to attend a school for athletic purposes." For example, high school coaches are only allowed to attend middle school games and practices of their feeder schools.

Enforcing rules on transfers and undue influence was made more difficult for the IHSAA in 2009 when the open enrollment law went into effect. No longer did a family have to pay tuition if their child attended school outside of their home district. The number of transfers rose by nearly 500 per year as a result.

Some question how the IHSAA can arrive at its ruling on a "transfer for athletic reasons." In a high-profile case this year, the state association ruled that standout basketball player Eron Gordon had to sit out an entire year after transferring from North Central to Cathedral. A Marion County Circuit Court judge recently overturned the ruling and Gordon will play his first game this week for the Irish.

In some states, Michigan included, rules are in place to prevent athletes from playing for a non-school coach and then transferring to the school where that coach is employed. Michigan's rule calls for an athlete to sit for 180 days in the sport where the link between the athlete and coach is present.

The transfer/recruiting issue is nothing new. Indiana's first high school basketball state champion, the 1911 Crawfordsville team, featured Lebanon transfer Orville Taylor in its starting lineup.

— Kyle Neddenriep

NBA

While the NBA has not been burned by PED scandals or deflated Spaldings, the league has had its share of guys who have tried to circumvent the rules of fair play.

The act of flopping — when a player exaggerates subtle or even no contact to earn a foul call against his opponent — has been part of the game as much as dribbling and shooting. To some, it's just smart; a way to earn an edge. Even Pacers legend Reggie Miller mastered the skill of drawing attention to contact as an offensive player, ever so gently kicking out his leg on jump shot attempts in order to get a foul call.

However, flopping had reached such egregious levels that before the 2012-13 season, the league had to make a rule against it.

"Flops have no place in our game," said then-Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations, Stu Jackson at the time. "They either fool referees into calling undeserved fouls or fool fans into thinking the referees missed a foul call."

In defining flopping as "any physical act that appears to have been intended to cause the referees to call a foul on another player" and if the physical act is "inconsistent with what would reasonably be expected given the force or direction of the contact," the NBA set out a punishment scale — something Pacers backup point guard C.J. Watson knows very well.

Watson became the first player this season to be fined for flopping. His first offense drew a warning from the league but his second meant that he would have to cough up $5,000. And if Watson gets caught flopping again, he'll have to pay $10,000.

Cheating doesn't pay, but floppers sure do.

— Candace Buckner