The curious case of Cody Keith

http://highschool.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1010325

An interesting, well-written story from Rivals.com

I remember reading about him prior to the season.. Sounds like he will transfer again - fourth school in four years.
He might be a nice kid, but he ain't a college QB.

 

he looks a little disturbed, kind of like the kid in American Beauty.

 

Watch it ETNIOR, or he'll put a boot in your ass. Oh, wait ....

 

In the course of research for my BLOG!, I found stories about him and his folks from the Charlotte Observer that didn't paint his family in such a positive light. Graeme Keith took time out from running a huge development company and managing Billy Graham's ministries to call the Observer to complain about coverage of his grandson. Pulling your kid out of a school because he didn't get enough playing time is a family tradition: Graeme put his son, Greg, in another school because his basketball coach wouldn't play underclassmen. (Greg ended up with a scholarship at Georgia). Cody's mother is a lawyer who still wonders what-if because her parents couldn't afford to keep her in sports.

Rivals paints Greg as just a caring dad, but that fits the Rivals profile because a site devoted to hyping high school athletes to near-pornographic levels is not going to shit on someone who is funding the youth sports-industrial complex. Greg tried to buy his son's way to the starting job by making all sorts of contributions to the high school, but it didn't work, so he transferred him to another one in Charlotte by buying a $787,000 house in the district, on top of the $2.8 million home he already owned. When Cody did nothing but hand off, suddenly Greg wanted the family to be close to a daughter in southern California, so Cody was transferred there.

Greg's also allowing a documentary filmmaker to trail Cody for a film called "The Hopeful." Can't wait to see how that ends. Probably not well. Greg bought Cody's way into sessions with quarterback guru Steve Clarkson, who described Cody as having a lot of upside. In other words, he's not even close to being a D-I quarterback.

What I don't get is, Cody Keith's parents clearly know the value of an education. They are successful people. So why does it matter so much that their son is a big-time quarterback?

 

Million dollar question. But the kid works his ass off and is dedicated to doing it, so they're probably using their resources to make sure he's at no disadvantage whatsoever.

99 percent of us just don't have the talent, though, and it looks like he's one of them.

 

Kid makes Derek Anderson look as accurate as Peyton Manning.

 

Re: Hey wannabe Marv Marinovich: Your QB son just isn't that good

He sounds a lot like this kid:

http://www.sportsjournalists.com/forum/threads/74189/

 

Re: Hey wannabe Marv Marinovich: Your QB son just isn't that good

Maranatha plays schools like Calvary Chapel and Brentwood. That is like Class Z of southern California football.

If you come all the way to California, and you are playing at Maranatha, its like you are trying to hide from competition.

 

Here's a thought: How about daddy just saves the money spent on traveling around, and uses it to pay for the kid to get where he wants to go, and then try to walk on?

Because this kid is going nowhere.

 

To dad (and the kid), the scholarship is a sign that he is legit and he is worth it. It doesn't matter that dad could pay the tuition at any school. In their escapist fantasy, when Urban Meyer or Pete Carroll see this kid, they need to have him so badly that they will offer one of their precious scholarships.

 

A commenter on one Cody Keith story in the Observer figured the Keith family also bought another son a walk-on spot (for only a year) for the basketball team at Wake Forest, where they are big donors.

 

This kid is going to need to be taken care of his whole life. Way to go, family.