Recruiting

Doesn't bother me either way. I know the readers at my former stop soaked up any recruiting news we gave them, though. Here, not so much.

 

Careful. One of these days the internets are going to threaten to steal readers away from newspapers. I know that seems like a far off pipe dream, but it's coming.

 

I think Inky's still bitter ...

 

Not bitter, just disgusted with the attention given to recruiting.

At some point, a recruiting beat writer will become involved in an NCAA investigation. Too many of them function as de facto scouts for the programs they cover and help pitch schools to the kids.

 

OK, I don't like where this thread is going. I mean really, OK, what recruiting writer would be willing to sell his soul just to get the cellphone number of a 17-year old kid.
That's just crazy man, just crazy, OK.
For those who haven't figured it out, the above passage contains a coded message.
First one to figure it out, wins!!!

 

Make fun of recruiting writers all you want.

But when you turn your nose up at something you don't like and suggestpeople run to the internet to get their news, don't blame the fall of newspapers on cheap corporations and stockholders.

 

I'm all for writing on recruiting, but it's not the job of college beat writer who has too many other things to do.

 

I don't love when parents hire some schlock to promote their kid, and then said schlock goes over everyone's head by calling the new managing editor to announce the kid is being nominated for an All-American team (while lying several times during the e-mail), and then the managing editor falls hook, line and sinker for the ploy and demands coverage of little Mary Jane Rottencrotch getting a little plaque.

Sorry for the run-on sentence. Rant over.

 

I love the story some years ago about Arthur McDuffy, a prep stud someone invented out of thin air and managed to get into the recruiting pipeline. Played for some Christian school in Mississippi which, it turns out, didn't have a team. Recruiting services raves about young Arthur, saying all the usual things without realizing there was no such person.

 

Brilliant.

As for my take, recruiting is the main reason I look at the message boards. The hard-core fans at the I-AA I cover tend to read every newspaper known to man, and most of the smaller papers in and around my state cover recruiting a bit more than we do.
That said, unless its a huge committment -- and they rarely are -- we don't do much with it. We've got a list to run Wednesday morning, and then we'll cover the song and dance that afternoon.

 

And even if he does sign, there's still a decent chance he won't get in school.

 

As much as I hate it, it's not going anywhere. In fact, it'll only get worse. If you follow it even in cavalier fashion, it's great drama. Take what happened with my alma mater with the 2004 class. Our Real Man of Genius had a star-studded class heading to Pitt, led by local stars Anthony Morelli and Andrew Johnson. Then, a couple of weeks before LOI day, Morelli starts wavering and inevitably winds up at Penn State. The rest of the class up and bails as well. Pitt had a top 15 class with verbals. I think they ended up 40-something.

The problem I have is when Johnny Douchebox, the two star blowjob linemen, holds a press conference - yes, a press conference - to tell the masses that he's chosen, after much thought and consideration, Bowling Green over powerhouses like Temple, Buffalo and the opportunity to walk on at East Carolina. And I have a real problem with press conference stupidity, a la, Kevin Jones ripping off a Penn State jersey to reveal a Virginia Tech jersey underneath.