In honor of Signing Day, a proposed new NCAA rule:

93Devil...the kid changing to Auburn at the last minute and the Randle kid going to LSU at last second is in our coverage area. it was a circus here yesterday, dealing more with gung-ho fans hounding the media for details, updates, etc...yep, NSD always fun.

 

Many moons ago we, too, had a basketball player who was being recruited by everybody under the sun. She ended up playing in the WNBA. But we did a feature story on her at some point suring the season, and the picture was of her laying on her bed surrounded by the dozens of recruiting letters she had received over the previous two or three years. The letters covered the whole bed.

 

See, now that's the way to do it. We had one school yesterday where the football kid was playing the 'pick a hat' game. Drama, drama. But there were a bunch of kids from that school who were also signing -- in other sports, yes, but they had made their choices known beforehand and ended up being background noise for Mr. Drama. It was sad, because he stole what was their moment in the sun, too.

 

Needless to say, the pick the hat thing is another blight on the sports world perpetrated by the evil empire that is ESPN.

 

This thread is why no one gets their recruiting news from the newspaper.

 

Well, Poo, there are very large parts of this country where people don't live and die with every breath Billy Bob Quarterback takes.
We run a recruiting notebook every week, not about "leans" and "soft leans" and other rival-speak, but about kids actually announcing their intentions (NOT commitments) to attend schools or coaches/players telling us what official visits the real D-1 prospects have lined up...
You know, news, not bullshit.

 

I was watching some of the coverage on ESPNU in the private aviation waiting room at AHJIA yesterday. This kid commits to Alabama but has a Texas hat and another hat on the table. He picks up the Texas hat, says it doesn't "have enough swagger." Then procedes to pick up a gym bag that has a shopping bag in it with a box inside that that contains another bag that has the Alabama hat in it.

Fucking crazy.

Maybe they should just have a huge draft.

 

And how's that working out?

 

Apparently, your paper does more than many, because most of the previous whining has been about covering verbals, not even "leans" or whatever.

And that's all fine and good for newspapers or for the areas that apparently don't give a () about recruiting, but in some areas of the US, and in some beats/jobs, it's part of the duty.

If parents and hangers-on and such didn't love it so much, I'd bet it would have been done away with by now. The colleges that get picked love it, too, because then they don't have to tell folks that Johnny picked USC over Texas and Florida, people know.

 

I get amused at the recruiting lists and Web sites that will list a guy's name and beside it have, "soft" verbal...
is this like a "soft" taco, a half-baked idea, etc., etc.?
i mean, what the f...? how in the hell can anyone at that time even come up with that type of description where the dude is heading?
and so many buy into this crap.
but apparently, it sells and creates attention because we're all logging in about it, aren't we?
amazing.

 

I'm sure it won't be long before somebody pulls out a jersey and wipes his ass, stuffs it down his shorts, etc etc at one of these goddamn dog and pony shows -- if it hasn't happened already.

The NCAA goes apeshit over taunting on the field of play -- the entire purpose of these "choose-the-hat" or "stomp-on-the-jersey" charades is to taunt opposing schools.

Waving the ball in a guy's face after a touchdown is an impulse decision -- calling a press conference for the express purpose of throwing hats or jerseys on the floor is a completely-planned-out action. (And usually orchestrated by one of the hangers-on.)

The NCAA needs to put a fuckin' hammer on it. Start out with a 3-game suspension. Since a lot of freshmen are redshirted anyway, that might not work -- that's when it's time to go to 730 days (2 calendar years). That'll put an end to it in a hurry.