A Couple of Quick Thoughts

Sorry for the lack of updates lately, but I've just been swamped at work and haven't had enough time to really do anything properly other than eat a lot of junk food and not get enough sleep. There are a couple of things that have happened this week, though, that I want to comment on. First, Auburn fans really shouldn't try and talk shit about the misspelling of Antoine Caldwell's name. And that's not to mention Auburn having the king of all embarassing photos to their credit. Second, the scholarship brouhaha just won't die, as Rappaport went and got Saban all riled up at the A-Day press conference over it. SMQ has a good post up on it, which naturally references the great Bama/Brian Cook kerfluffle of a few months ago, but even he seems to be missing the point here. Saban and his staff are not stupid. They are all great recruiters and they all know how to make the numbers work without negatively affecting their ability to be great recruiters, i.e. not screwing a bunch of kids over and getting a reputation for being unable or unwilling to live up to their word. I suppose we're all just going to have to agree to disagree about the "sketchiness" of greyshirting (personally, if they're upfront with the recruit about that possibility and he still signs, then it doesn't sound sketchy to me), but as far as I'm concerned this is a non-story until there's some sort of proof that shady dealings are going on to make room for the incoming class. And by shady dealings, I mean things like this, not being honest enough to encourage a kid that hasn't played and isn't likely to play more than a snap on senior day that seeking some playing time elsewhere might be a good idea. Is SMQ right in thinking that coaches should be more transparent with the public and, more importantly, their players and recruits on how they are doing this and that official steps should be taken to guarantee that transparency? Yeah, he is. But until there's a reason to single out Nick Saban as the poster child for what's wrong with college football recruiting then this is all a load of crap. more...