The Recruiting Hat Dance

[JackReacher]

Pretty good story on Grantland about the hat dance most elite recruits use on signing day. You know, picking one hat up and choosing that school, only to toss it aside before grabbing the REAL hat. It's all a bunch of nonsense, but the author makes a good point. In a college football world full of nonsense, the hat dance is the least of our concerns.

http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-triangle/post/_/id/47079/in-defense-of-the-college-football-recruiting-hat-dance

I remember hearing about former VT star Kevin Jones (a Pa. prep) who was seemingly all set to choose Penn State. I can't remember if he threw a Penn State jersey or hat in the trash can, but it was something like that. Really pissed off an entire state, it seemed.

Anyway, I know there are some good stories out there about the hat dance. Please share them here.

 

[Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!!]

Pacman Jones (I think) is the guy who stands out for me.
He pulled the same hat stunt (in fact he's the first one I recall doing it) when he walked into his signing with a UGA hat or something and chucked it in favor of a WVU lid.



We had a kid who signed with WVU ... Our sports guys broke the story the night before his signing day and it pissed the kid off because he didn't get to do the hat dance horse****.


Edit: And I love how the first comment mentions Kevin Hart and his Cal.-Oregon debacle.

 

[Dick Whitman]

I went down to that abomination in San Antonio one year and chased a big-name recruit around all week and couldn't get any time with him. Not even a minute. Entourage protecting him, basically. Most humiliating experience of my career, probably. The beginning of the end.

 

[heyabbott]

still like the douchebag who proclaimed that he's going to the University of Penn State.

 

[Alma]

Pretty good story on Grantland about the hat dance most elite recruits use on signing day. You know, picking one hat up and choosing that school, only to toss it aside before grabbing the REAL hat. It's all a bunch of nonsense, but the author makes a good point. In a college football world full of nonsense, the hat dance is the least of our concerns.

http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-triangle/post/_/id/47079/in-defense-of-the-college-football-recruiting-hat-dance

I remember hearing about former VT star Kevin Jones (a Pa. prep) who was seemingly all set to choose Penn State. I can't remember if he threw a Penn State jersey or hat in the trash can, but it was something like that. Really pissed off an entire state, it seemed.

Anyway, I know there are some good stories out there about the hat dance. Please share them here.

Bunch of fluff and here's why:

Curtis never proves this line:

"So why do we fans hate the hat dance?"

anywhere in the story. It's not there. Fans don't hate it, or, at least, if they do, Curtis provides no evidence. One dude on a message board? Yeah, that's "fans."

I get kick out of the hat dance, personally. It's showmanship. Life needs a little more of it.

The purpose of the column is to strike back, once again, at the anonymous moralizers of college football. It's a popular target these days. Why not just celebrate the quirk of the hat dance and leave it there, instead of creating some false opponent from the Newspaper Age for the Internet Truth Avenger to slay.

 

[JackReacher]

still like the douchebag who proclaimed that he's going to the University of Penn State.

Is that it? Sounds like dummy, not a douchebag. Unless there's more to it than just that.

 

[Alma]

Whatever you do, just make sure your mom approves first:

Landon Collins won a national title. Mom's OK by now.

 

[Starman]

The NCAA has rules about everything under the ****ing sun.

In a game, on the field of play, if you point a finger at an opponent after scoring a touchdown or ramming home a dunk, you are immediately penalized with a 15-yard flag or a technical foul, on the grounds you are engaging in unsportsmanlike behavior and taunting (sometimes debatable in the heat of play).

The hat dance is an entire premeditated, pre-planned, orchestated media event whose entire ****ing purpose is to taunt MULTIPLE SCHOOLS AT THE SAME TIME (i.e. all the schools the hotshot does not select).

The NCAA has a zillion ****ing rules about everything. Here's one they should adopt right now:

"At any press conference or other media event of any type conducted by a student-athlete to announce his/her choice of institution, the ONLY logo/insignia of any NCAA institution which may appear shall be the institution chosen by the student-athlete. If any article of clothing, paraphernalia, artwork or any other representation of ANY OTHER NCAA institution appears in public at any such announcement event, the student-athlete shall be ineligible for 50 percent of the scheduled contests, plus one, in the succeeding season of competition. It is the responsibility of the student-athlete to ensure, by any means necessary, nobody attending any such announcement event violates this rule."

 

[joe king]

The NCAA has rules about everything under the ****ing sun.

In a game, on the field of play, if you point a finger at an opponent after scoring a touchdown or ramming home a dunk, you are immediately penalized with a 15-yard flag or a technical foul, on the grounds you are engaging in unsportsmanlike behavior and taunting (sometimes debatable in the heat of play).

The hat dance is an entire premeditated, pre-planned, orchestated media event whose entire ****ing purpose is to taunt MULTIPLE SCHOOLS AT THE SAME TIME (i.e. all the schools the hotshot does not select).

The NCAA has a zillion ****ing rules about everything. Here's one they should adopt right now:

"At any press conference or other media event of any type conducted by a student-athlete to announce his/her choice of institution, the ONLY logo/insignia of any NCAA institution which may appear shall be the institution chosen by the student-athlete. If any article of clothing, paraphernalia, artwork or any other representation of ANY OTHER NCAA institution appears in public at any such announcement event, the student-athlete shall be ineligible for 50 percent of the scheduled contests, plus one, in the succeeding season of competition. It is the responsibility of the student-athlete to ensure, by any means necessary, nobody attending any such announcement event violates this rule."

Good luck with that.

 

[qtlaw]

The hat dance is being done by HS players. NCAA only has jurisdiction over NCAA "student-athletes"(UNPAID PLAYERS); so hat dance continues.

On hat dance day, there should be an expose by someone with b*lls to highlight the inequity of how on one side the kid signs four one-year commitments; renewable at the University's discretion; while kid is bound to the university for FOUR years.

I'm glad the kids can make the NCAA and the other mongers squirm; because that's the last time the player can until 3 years later.

Let's ask Manziel how much $$ he's gotten this year? Now how many Manziel jerseys and memorabilia has A&M received? Yeah, its fair.

 

[Starman]

The hat-dance fandango is basically nothing more than ritualized crotch-grabbing.

 

[Layman]

still like the douchebag who proclaimed that he's going to the University of Penn State.

Actually, the d-bag was Terrelle Pryor, with the "university of ohio state". I love/hate that guy....

 

[dog eat dog world]

The NCAA has rules about everything under the ****ing sun.

In a game, on the field of play, if you point a finger at an opponent after scoring a touchdown or ramming home a dunk, you are immediately penalized with a 15-yard flag or a technical foul, on the grounds you are engaging in unsportsmanlike behavior and taunting (sometimes debatable in the heat of play).

The hat dance is an entire premeditated, pre-planned, orchestated media event whose entire ****ing purpose is to taunt MULTIPLE SCHOOLS AT THE SAME TIME (i.e. all the schools the hotshot does not select).

The NCAA has a zillion ****ing rules about everything. Here's one they should adopt right now:

"At any press conference or other media event of any type conducted by a student-athlete to announce his/her choice of institution, the ONLY logo/insignia of any NCAA institution which may appear shall be the institution chosen by the student-athlete. If any article of clothing, paraphernalia, artwork or any other representation of ANY OTHER NCAA institution appears in public at any such announcement event, the student-athlete shall be ineligible for 50 percent of the scheduled contests, plus one, in the succeeding season of competition. It is the responsibility of the student-athlete to ensure, by any means necessary, nobody attending any such announcement event violates this rule."

Who winds up with the losing hats?

 

[Versatile]

Whatever you do, just make sure your mom approves first:

Landon Collins won a national title. Mom's OK by now.

That's kind of the ****ed-up thing about the recruiting game, though. You can point to his two rings, or you can point to how he likely will have to wait until his senior year to start and even then could be topped by an incoming recruit.

 

[dog eat dog world]

Whatever you do, just make sure your mom approves first:

Landon Collins won a national title. Mom's OK by now.

The little kid is thinking "Now remember Landon, they told you I'd get a new car too."

 

[Norrin Radd]

It's just part of the peripheral stuff that surrounds sports now. It's fun for the kids.

Glad I no longer have to cover recruiting, mind you. As Whitman's story (the "abomination in san Antonio?" That a reference to that Army stupid thing?) displays, covering recruiting can be a humiliating process.

 

[RecoveringDesker]

I was living between Charlottesville and Blacksburg at the time and never will forget Marcus Vick and his hat dance. He had a few hats on the table -- maybe just two, Virginia and Virginia Tech -- and said something along the lines of, "I choose the University of," and started reaching for the UVa hat, then went the opposite way and concluded with, "Virginia Tech." Yep, he chose the University of Virginia Tech.

 

[HanSenSE]

No thread about recruiting is complete without the story of the kid who made up his whole recruiting process. Last I heard, a juco in Northern California gave him a chance:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=wojciechowski_gene&id=3236039

EDIT: Juco, than Div. II http://espn.go.com/college-sports/recruiting/football/story/_/id/7525340/kevin-hart-recruit-lied-california-golden-bears-sign-missouri-western-state

 

[Big Circus]

It's just part of the peripheral stuff that surrounds sports now. It's fun for the kids.

Glad I no longer have to cover recruiting, mind you. As Whitman's story (the "abomination in san Antonio?" That a reference to that Army stupid thing?) displays, covering recruiting can be a humiliating process.

As a random aside, I wasn't covering it, but I had an opposite experience last week. We were waiting to go through security in the Orlando airport and a bunch of football players in All-America Game gear (I think it was the Under Armour one) were ahead of us. My two-year-old was getting restless and didn't want to stand in line any longer, and one of the players started talking to him and making goofy faces at him. He helped get us through that line. I'll root for him wherever he goes.

 

[Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!!]

The NCAA has rules about everything under the ****ing sun.

In a game, on the field of play, if you point a finger at an opponent after scoring a touchdown or ramming home a dunk, you are immediately penalized with a 15-yard flag or a technical foul, on the grounds you are engaging in unsportsmanlike behavior and taunting (sometimes debatable in the heat of play).

The hat dance is an entire premeditated, pre-planned, orchestated media event whose entire ****ing purpose is to taunt MULTIPLE SCHOOLS AT THE SAME TIME (i.e. all the schools the hotshot does not select).

The NCAA has a zillion ****ing rules about everything. Here's one they should adopt right now:

"At any press conference or other media event of any type conducted by a student-athlete to announce his/her choice of institution, the ONLY logo/insignia of any NCAA institution which may appear shall be the institution chosen by the student-athlete. If any article of clothing, paraphernalia, artwork or any other representation of ANY OTHER NCAA institution appears in public at any such announcement event, the student-athlete shall be ineligible for 50 percent of the scheduled contests, plus one, in the succeeding season of competition. It is the responsibility of the student-athlete to ensure, by any means necessary, nobody attending any such announcement event violates this rule."

Who winds up with the losing hats?

The same people who get the losing teams' NFL Super Bowl champion hats and tees.

Poor people in Africa!