Clemson
ncaa: the bureaucracy
wayne lyons
letter of intent
byu
austin hatch
mike weber
recruiting is weird and scares me
tj weist
gwendolyn bush
san jose state got the wrong band back together

Unverified Voracity Got A Job Just Yesterday Comment Count

Brian

nli_0[1]

DON'T DO THIS

WEBER FIASCO DEFCON 1. The damn day after Mike Weber signs a LOI to Ohio State, running backs coach Stan Drayton leaves for the Bears. Weber:

Tony Paul:

The timing of this move is odd, to put it mildly.

John Fox was named the new Chicago Bears coach in early January, and much of his coaching staff was in place shortly thereafter. It seems curious Drayton would be making the move only after Weber signed his letter of intent to play for Ohio State.

UCLA pulled a similar stunt with their DC. Roquan Smith managed to find out before he used the fax machine, but you have to think that maybe some of UCLA's defensive commits would have looked around if UCLA had announced when they knew about it a month before signing day. Just more of the usual crap.

Recruits! DON'T SIGN A LETTER OF INTENT.

DON'T SIGN A LETTER OF INTENT

I mean, if you're a random three star and they say sign this paper or we're moving on, go ahead. If you're a big deal, do this:

The NCAA last fall began allowing football prospects who plan to enroll in January to sign financial aid agreements with college programs as early as August 1 of their senior year. The agreement, which allows the college program to have unlimited contact with the player and publicly speak about him, binds the school to the prospect, but not the prospect to the school. So there's nothing to dissuade a situation like that of Josh Malone, who signed financial aid agreements with four schools before ultimately signing with Tennessee.

Sign a financial aid agreement. It's like the LOI, except backwards, and that makes schools hate it. Instead of stuff like this happening to you, you can have hilarious quotes like this apply to your situation:

"You're basically taking the word of the kid," Mallonee told the AJC. "That's part of the issue."

Yeah! A kid who might drop a school for no reason or sell a school a false bill of goods. Damn kids. Always doing mean things with all the power they have.  

Meanwhile. Can't say I'm surprised about this.

Upshot. Could this lead to Weber flipping back to Michigan? Maybe. Schools can release players from LOIs.

Institutions are now empowered to grant a full and complete release from the NLI at anytime. To do so, an official Release Request Form must be initiated by the prospect and submitted to both the NLI office and the signing institution.

There's also an opportunity to appeal when school refuses to release a player, a process that ND signee Eddie Vanderdoes successfully went through a few years back. I'm unclear on what, exactly, this means as part of the Vanderdoes case:

The victory for Vanderdoes comes after a rather lengthy (and sometimes public) spat with Notre Dame and head coach Brian Kelly, who allowed Vanderdoes to enroll at UCLA, but refused to release him from the letter of intent he signed with Notre Dame in February.

Kelly can't prevent a guy from enrolling wherever he wants, and there appears to be no partial release from a LOI. The Bylaw Blog post on the topic implies that this was a straight-up win for Vanderdoes after Kelly refused to release him.

In any case: OSU could release him if the publicity gets bad enough, or Weber could decide to go somewhere else and attempt to appeal. If he did not win that appeal he would have to sit out his freshman year and he would lose that year of eligibility, making him a true sophomore in 2016.

Weber would have to want to pursue that, of course. It's possible he gets over it.

ESPN doing Hatch things. Hatch things:

Hiring various people for 'crootin' and 'lyzin'. Michigan announced they've hired longtime college coach and Harbaugh family associate TJ Weist as a "senior offensive analyst." Weist was the WR coach at Michigan in the early 90s, when a guy named Desmond Howard was hanging out, and was most recently the OC at Connecticut.

This analyst position is not a full assistant job, so Weist won't be able to work with players directly or recruit. He'll do film, find tendencies, and advise. Usually when established coaches take these jobs they're short-term gigs before something opens up elsewhere.

Michigan's also hired Gwendolyn Bush as "director of player development." Bush is the mom of Wayne Lyons, the fifth-year Stanford transfer who's supposed to be landing in Ann Arbor.

This has led to a couple of assertions that Michigan is getting down and dirty. If so, let's be clear why: it's not because Michigan wants a defensive back who will be around for one year. It's because Bush was—uh—"team mom" for South Florida Express, a high-powered 7 on 7 outfit that launched the careers of Teddy Bridgewater and Geno Smith, amongst many others.

SFE won the national 7-on-7 championship, which is apparently a thing that exists now, and got profiled in SI, etc etc.

Meanwhile, Lyons. The Lyons transfer thing has broken loose from the paysites and made the Mercury News:

Stanford coach David Shaw on Wednesday enthusiastically described all 22 players who signed letters of intent as part of another well-regarded recruiting class. He was slightly less eager to discuss a player who might be leaving the program.

Cornerback Wayne Lyons is reportedly considering a transfer to Michigan, where he would play one season (as a graduate student) for former Stanford coach Jim Harbaugh.

"For those guys going into their fifth year that want the opportunity to play someplace else,'' Shaw said, "I've never said no, never tried talk anybody out of it.''

Lyons started seven games last year for Stanford's kick-ass defense. Michigan doesn't really need a defensive back but they've got a slot if Joe Kerridge isn't guaranteed a scholarship (and since it's highly likely someone leaves the team before fall that's probably moot anyway). May as well fill it with a quality player.

Michicon Valley. SJSU hires a familiar name:

Then they did the thing:

SAN JOSE -- San Jose State officially announced two of its coaching hires on Thursday, with Al Borges being named offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach and Dan Ferrigno the special teams coordinator/tight ends coach.

Greg Robinson is of course the DC. It will be… interesting to see how SJSU does this year. I predict bad.

Meanwhile in offensive coordinator hires that Michigan fans are extremely skeptical of. Tennessee is actually, officially doing their thing:

DeBord has never coordinated anything approximating a mobile quarterback and couldn't even find a position coach job after leaving the NFL, instead landing at Michigan for an Olympic sports administrator thing. Let's see if he can submarine Butch Jones's 80 recruits per year.

Dabo's very particular. This private bathroom thing is a thing.

I've heard worse ideas. BYU signed a guy who's never played football before. Does this sound like an idea on par with hiring an Olympic Sports Administrator to be your offensive coordinator? Not so fast my friend:

That's no moon. Unless it's orbiting a planet. Then it totally is.

Etc.: In case you were considering taking Dave Zirin seriously about anything ever, you probably shouldn't. Vegas odds for the hockey national title are bonkers. Iowa wasn't real happy with the Higdon flip.

Signing day interviews with JayHar, Baxter, Jackson, and Wheatley (Jr).

Comments

BrownJuggernaut

February 6th, 2015 at 1:33 PM ^

What can I say Iowa? Jim Harbaugh plays his piccolo and the recruits come in droves. Harbaugh can use its powers on recruits, but he can't control the collateral damage. Enjoy your four offensive linemen cuz that's exactly the position I'd imagine Iowa's top four recruits would be playing.

Joined: 10/02/2010

MGoPoints: 8235

turd ferguson

February 6th, 2015 at 1:49 PM ^

So we've learned that schools will hide the following information from recruits until after signing day:

  1. information that assistant coaches are leaving, since these coaches might be a major reason that the recruit committed; 
  2. information that that Mike DeBord was just hired as OC, since Mike DeBord not being OC might be a major reason that the recruit committed.

Joined: 12/09/2009

MGoPoints: 26493

growler4

February 6th, 2015 at 4:13 PM ^

I think you're being unfair, as is Brian, who, IMO, has too often become a cheap shot artist ... particularly towards any offensive coach not running his beloved spread offense.

He was a good assistant coach while at Michigan. Perhaps not my favorite OC, however.

Yet give the man some credit for helping hold together our football team and verbally committed recruits during the transition between Hoke's dismissal and the hiring of Harbaugh. All of that did NOT take place in a vacuum.

Joined: 11/24/2014

MGoPoints: 1692

ih8losing

February 6th, 2015 at 2:23 PM ^

I thought I read the other day we've reached the 85 scholarship limit. Do we anticipate more attrition or are there more players with "career ending injuries" a la OSU?

Joined: 12/29/2013

MGoPoints: 15652

alum96

February 6th, 2015 at 2:46 PM ^

Disagree with Brian we dont need a DB.  If Peppers goes to S and you want to play Blake at nickel your choices are hope, Stribling, and Watson.  One is still a string bean who was phased out last year, one is a RS FR and one is hope.   Lyons would be a great 1 year rental.  If Stribling  beats him out that means good thing for Stribling.  Otherwise you are starting a player who has never seen a college football field in Watson other than in practice.  So  yes we do have a need.

Joined: 04/28/2012

MGoPoints: 82272

amir_al-muminin

February 6th, 2015 at 3:06 PM ^

I'm confused about the knock on Dave Zirin.  He was in no way endorsing the theory in his article, only reporting that it was indeed a theory--emanating from the Seahawks own locker room which, in and of itself is a story.  He even ends the article by giving reasons that it's probably not true.

Zirin has done a lot of important work shedding light on corruption in the NFL and NCAA.  You may not like his politics, but to say he does not deserve to be taken seriously over something like this is unwarranted in my opinion.  

Joined: 06/15/2009

MGoPoints: 234

EGD

February 6th, 2015 at 10:26 PM ^

Have to disagree. I e-mailed The Nation twice and commented on their Facebook posts about that Zirin thing. I can't believe the editors let that by. If you are the New York Times and one of your columnists writes something dumb, it's not that big a deal. But if you are The Nation, and the sports guy gives credence to a ludicrous conspiracy theory, it just makes it that much more difficult to persuade on the issues that actually matter.

Joined: 09/16/2009

MGoPoints: 35199