Fiu's Daily Cavalcade of
Whimsy
Recruiting 2009 ... Feb. 3
a.k.a.
Frank Costanza's Festivus Airing of the Grievances ... or the obvious attempt to keep readers coming to the site on a
regular basis during the off-season.
By
Pete Fiutak
What's your beef? ... Fire
off your
thoughts
This
Week's Whimsies:
Monday - The NFL announcers
"That's
the way we are here at Tech U. We show love. Why beat around the bush?
We scouted you since you were in junior high school. We know all about
you. We love you. You're a great kid. Not only a great ballplayer, a
great student, but a beautiful human being. When I read about how you've
been raising your sister all by yourself, it made me want to cry. I said
to myself, "That's the kind of young man that will be the backbone of
this great country not just the Tech University basketball team." When I
heard that you were coming to visit, I got down on my hands and knees
and I prayed to God. Dear Lord, please... Please deliver Jesus to us." ...
I'd like to take this opportunity to announce the official end to my
personal disinterest in the world of college football recruiting.
Unfortunately, I took the red pill a long time ago and know way too much
about what an ugly, hypocritical, slimy business the world of college
football recruiting is. To go 13-year-old girl, it is what it is. The
rules of the game aren't going to change, and while I can bang my head
against the wall and scream about how the whole process is ridiculous,
and I'll continue to do so, I'm going to try to enjoy the ride a bit
more.
Why such a sour taste for this time of year? 2002.
In 2002, CFN was going to jump into the recruiting coverage with both
feet. While we weren't calling up recruits to find out what they ate for
breakfast, we had several insiders in well placed areas who did.
The CFN No. 1 prospect, and in everyone's top five, was Lorenzo Booker,
a lightning quick do-it-all back who was making everyone across the
nation, from USC to Notre Dame to Florida State to everyone in between,
hold their collective breath. Where Booker was going was the biggest
story and the biggest mystery of the recruiting season, and it was all
going to finish up with a dramatic afternoon press conference.
Early on the morning of Signing Day, I got a call from an unimpeachable
inside source at Notre Dame who said Booker had contacted then-head
coach Ty Willingham and said it was a done deal ... Booker was going to
South Bend. I furiously called anyone and everyone possible to try to
confirm this bombshell with little luck, but my source assured me it was
110% solid to go with the story. In the world of wild west reporting
when it comes to recruiting, I did as much as anyone could possibly do
to go through the proper channels for a story like this. Willingham and
Notre Dame wouldn't, and couldn't, officially go on the record, but
again, my source assured me to run with it because it was going to be
leaked out soon.
So we went with it.
Longtime CFN readers might remember, we went with the biggest font size
headline possible, "CFN Exclusive: Booker To Sign With Notre Dame." And
then the phone lit up like a Christmas tree with everyone in the
business trying to find out if this was for real. We were credited for
the scoop and had one of the biggest traffic days in the history of the
site. Making me feel easier, two hours after we ran with it, one of the
bigger wonks in the business also reported, independent of our story,
that Booker was indeed going to Notre Dame.
And then came the press conference.
Booker sat at a table with several hats, picked up the Florida State
hat, and decided at the last possible second that he was going to go
with his heart and his real dream, which was to go to Tallahassee.
If a player of Booker's caliber was going to be so flaky, then how is
everyone else going to be? I couldn't handle the flake factor and I
didn't want to spend my life worrying about the whims of
17-and-18-year-olds until they actually arrived on campus. But now I'm
into it again.
I know, the entire exercise is overblown and overrated, especially when
it compares to spring football, which actually matters, but I'm bored of
the sports world now that football is over and Nadal and Federer aren't
going to battle in another major for several months.
I'm really curious to see where Hawaii LB Manti Te'o
is going to go. I'm floored by North Carolina and Stanford, who appear
to be the hot teams coming out of recruiting season. I'm going to dive
back in for the next week or so and revel in everyone else's hair being
torn out as more Bookers emerge. I'm going to pay extra attention to the
hot teams to try to sniff out the next Alabama situation.
With all that's going on in the world, a little goofy escapism is a
must. Wednesday, it's as big as it gets for a few months. Let's have fun
with it.