As I was sitting in the Phoenix office Monday night (yes, in the middle of production) trying to figure out what the Blurbz should cover this week, absolutely nothing was coming to me. The Super Bowl victory by one Blurbosphere champion over another would be old news (Fun fact: It was the most watched TV program of all time, surpassing the finale of M*A*S*H), I’m not a huge basketball fan, we have the Blackhawks covered and baseball is pretty far away.
Then I was reminded to finish my FAFSA application, and it hit me.
As some of you die-hard college football fans may know (See? I cantotally stretch football out another week … ), National Signing Day was last week, meaning that it was the first day that high school and junior college student-athletes could sign their official letters of intent. For decades, it has been a day of relief (or frustration) for coaches all over the nation. But for the last few years, the recruiting process has changed drastically in all college sports, not just in football.
A few years ago, before the NCAA implemented an 85-scholarship limit, coaches would keep recruiting classes secret for months after Signing Day so that they could stockpile talent without revealing that they already had several players at one position (for example, Hall of Famer Joe Montana was one of seven quarterbacks brought in to Notre Dame in 1974). The process brought out the inner ninja in college coaches everywhere.
Now, like many parts of the media, everything has changed because of 24-hour news outlets like ESPN and the Internet. Whereas recruits were largely unknown by anyone but the craziest and most connected fan a few years ago, now whole stadiums have been known to chant the name of a highly regarded recruit when they see them up on a JumboTron.
All major college sports have a year-long magnifying glass put upon them to make sure they can deliver on the recruiting front. Coaches are hired and fired based in part on how online recruiting services like Rivals and Scout.com rate their classes every year. Fans clamor for the latest news of their teams’ conquests on the hunt for new talent and go gaga over “five star” recruits. Ever since LeBron James was in his wunderkind days, ESPN has been televising the occasional high school basketball or football game with high-profile players in it.
Now coaches face even more pressure than ever to bring in the top recruits. Dozens of basketball players have gotten official scholarship offers while still in middle school, and new USC Head Coach Lane Kiffen just offered a full-ride to a 13-year-old quarterback. Coaches started getting Facebooks and Twitters and began texting recruits with such fury that they had to be banned by the NCAA.
Millions upon millions of dollars are spent on both recruiting ($13 million from the SEC in football alone) and coaches who are known as great recruiters. For example, Pete Carroll, Charlie Weis and Nick Saban, all known as top-notch recruiters, are the three highest paid coaches in football. Programs like USC and Oklahoma have been threatened with NCAA sanctions due to illegal gifts from program boosters given to potential recruits. Pressure to perform throughout a year-long recruiting sledge is at an all-time high.
I’ve always tried to keep the fact that sports were meant solely as entertainment somewhere in the back of my mind when judging the athletic world. But at the high school and college level, it has always been, and always should be, about the players growing as men and women. The present system is not only putting tremendous pressure on teenage kids to perform (see Michael Beasley), but also inflating their egos.
Last year’s number one football recruit, Bryce Brown from Wichita, Kan., hired an extremely sleazy man named Brian Butler to manage his recruiting and news media requests who sold updates of Brown’s recruitment on his Web site for $9.99 a month. He put off signing until March 16, when he announced in the Kansas Sports Hall of Fame that he would attend the University of Tennessee. The year before, current Ohio State starting quarterback Terrelle Pryor waited to sign, as has current top offensive tackle Seantrel Henderson out of St. Paul’s Cretin-Derham Hall. The sports world was enthralled. But why?
Is this just another outlet for our sports frenzy? Does it make us feel important to be “in the know” about where some 18-year-old kid decides to play a sport? These same kids are often personally attacked by anonymous fans when they commit to anywhere but their school. The same posters who, upon the commitment of a sought-after recruit, will anoint him or her a savior. It has become more about publicity for both the player and the program.
So what’s the lesson from all this? Truthfully, I’m not sure. I, like most people reading this, am a member of the information age, Generation Y (or Millennials, if you prefer). Therefore, I love information, and I especially love information that comes at me fast and in large quantities.
I admit I read the blogs and message boards for my favorite teams and get caught up in the recruitment process. They are under tremendous pressure to perform, oftentimes with the weight of thousands of fans’ expectations upon them. It’s important to remember that these young men and women are the same as us, albeit generally bigger, stronger, faster and physically superior.
Nathan Lurz is a sports editor
nlurz@luc.edu
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