Reeves quote issue EDITED

...as too many recruiting experts.

Hello everyone, my name is ClarkiefromCanada and I have a recruiting problem. Every day I check MgoBlog, Benji's MGoRecruit, Brice's Recruiting, Tremendous...once I even checked Magnus' list of recruits that were about a year away. I don't obsess about the Michigan class versus other classes but everyday I just find I need moar recruiting info. It started about seven years ago with Mike DeSimone, then MGoBlog, Tom VH...I started checking two, then three sites per day. Soon enough it started taking over various aspects of my life: iphone apps, a quick check before bed...sometimes I was even following recruiting at work. It never really affected my job performance or family life as I am what they call a "functional recruiting addict" whatever that means...

nothing against any one of the guys doing this type of thing, but there is just too many of these guys floating around now IMHE. When I first came to this site we had TomVH and then Tim started contributing as well. A few short years later and pretty much any nutcase with a cell phone thinks he has what it takes to be a recruiting analyst. 

Again, I have nothing against any of these guys personally, but if it comes to a point where either the sheer number of these recruiting experts or the nature in which they gather and dispense their information starts hurting UM recruiting I will be a little more put off. 

Again, nothing against you personally aquaman these are just my thoughts of late. I can remember the first time I saw one of your posts my first thought was "Another recruiting guy...". I just think it might be getting too much.

we could look forward to much larger issues down the road.

I can guarantee that the vast majority of commenters on here have the intelligence to neg the everloving shit out of anyone who tries to scapegoat Aquaman.

is this real?  I hope so, I love that our incoming (& prospective) student-athletes seem to be coming together as friends.  should make for great times & success on the field.  I wish I was as cool as Shane Morris, but alas.

Not that it means much but I appreciate the hard work you and the others from your site are doing.  Like you said, this wasn't a big deal and mistakes, misunderstandings happen and being upfront about them shows a lot of character IMO.

I would also like to thank Ace for his contributions to this site.  All of you are doing great work. 

There is no reason to offer any defense.  You have provided a wonderful service to our insatiable recruiting appetites, and this is plainly a simple misunderstanding.

You're doing a good job and reasonable members of the MGoBlogosphere are completely in line that in any business miscommunication can happen. You're just getting hit with a little of the blog irrationality.

Keep up the good work and ignore the irrational anger; it's a blog involving recruiting to a football team...srsly.

First and most importantly I've really enjoyed the prolific output Aquaman and co. have provided in the brief history of Tremendous.  

This misunderstanding and the ensuing discussion makes me wonder if Aquaman, Keith, and any others at the Tremendous site could better avoid these situations by being more explicit about who they are and what their motivations are.   Based on what I can gather from the very first post on Tremendous (check here), Aquaman is a Michigan grad and huge M sports fan in his mid 20s who has been thinking about doing something like this for the last five years. 

I think that's, well, tremendous and the quality of the site and its rapid ascent speaks highly of those involved and arguably the Michigan fanbase as a whole.   

However, unless I'm missing something, this is a very different thing than what the folks who work for the recruiting services are doing.  These are generally guys who've been in the recruiting game as a career for a while and have built an extensive network of contacts among college and high school football coaches and other influencers.  They are paid for their expertise and are accordingly held to a high standard.   When those guys make mistakes--and they often do--they have to be accountable.

So it would seem unfair to both sides to compare what Aquaman is doing to what veterans at Rivals, Scout, or 24/7 are doing.   Aquaman is a Michigan fan, a very knowledgeable one, and Tremendous by extension is a Michigan fan site.  

I, for one, think we should be careful in our critiques of Aquaman and Tremendous.  He's been very conscientious about his work and has always stepped up when he feels he's made mistakes, no matter how insignificant.   There is an argument that this type of thing should be left to the professional recruiting analysts/commentators, but as long as Aquaman is not misrepresenting himself or his site's intentions, I think the pros of getting some quality insights into Michigan recruiting at no cost far outweigh the cons.   And who knows, given how quickly the site has taken off, we could be witnessing the next Ace or TomVH.   Everyone starts somewhere.