Thoughts on Scout and Rivals...

I checked my school's Scout site the other day.

I mean, it's a good reference source of sorts, but there were a shitload of factual errors -- including a glaring one where a kids' high school was misidentified. He had been gone from the high school he was listed under for well over a year in a recruiting transfer situation. That can't be good.

The other problem is that they take as gospel whatever these kids tell them. An assistant coach from a school might have talked to them once and only once, and these sites list it as a school that's interested in them. There's one example of a prominent national recruit (prominent more because of his connection to someone famous than his balling ability) who is listed as a recruit right now, and I know for a fact he isn't being considered, never really was.

But to Moddy's point, these sites can be helpful, and they sure as hell have more time and less of a moral compass than I do to manage it.

 

I don't doubt that, for the most part, these guys know recruiting forward and backward. But that's not the real issue here. When you have people "covering" a team who have a vested interest in that team doing well (in recruiting, on the field, everywhere), you open the door for all manner of shadiness.

The NCAA has greatly limited the amount of time coaches can speak with recruits. So in a lot of cases, the yahoos who run these web sites have essentially become extensions of the coaches. And don't think for a minute that they don't post stories at the behest of coaches who are trying to play mind games with recruits.

 

You sound like you have someone in mind.

 

24/7 badgering of 17-year-olds and their coaches aside, Rivals.com is great in terms of being on top of recruits and schools in the running and gauging the caliber of recruit each kid is.

 

other than that, mrs lincoln, how was the play?

 

At some point, does the journalism world need to make some kind of stand/statement (maybe APSE?) about its thoughts on recruiting coverage?

 

With so much uncertainty surrounding the future of the newspaper industry, does anyone think that rivals could become a major player - in areas other than recruiting - if they used their money to go out and hire 10-12 experienced, respected, successful journalists to be their national writers?

 

Yes. But I think you or I could do the same thing if we created a Web site together and make the commitment to the right talent.

 

I work at a well-known (well-known in our state, that is) niche paper that covers high school sports. Our bread-and-butter used to be recruiting. Now because of Rivals.com, we're more into coverage of the entire state and things like that. We still do recruiting, but not as much as Rivals.com does. In our state (it's obvious I'm in South Carolina with my screen name), we have three Rivals.com sites (Clemson, USC and just general preps) and a Columbia-based radio guy who specializes in recruiting. I talked to a kid one time who fielded four straight calls from reporters (all three Rivals sites and myself). I feel for these kids. I'm glad that we've essentially backed out of it mostly, because I feel like such an idiot calling a kid just so he can tell me who his "top five" colleges are.

In our state, the South Carolina and Clemson Rival guys are pretty good people. We have a big statewide media day, and even though they're considered our "competition" we invite them. The prep site guy is essentially a wannabe sportswriter who got into this because he wanted to "help the kids." Then he signed on with Rivals, started a newspaper (which went out of business after a year because they couldn't compete) and thinks he's generally above everybody. I guess that's why not many people visit his site. The radio guy is a good guy, for the most part, but he's a USC homer (based in Columbia, he probably has to be).

But people eat this shit up. That's why Rivals.com has grown to be what it is. I just think it's kind of lame.

 

people like kiddie porn, snuff films and ann coulter, too

 

Does Rivals extend the same courtesy? Attribute stuff to newspapers when they pick up info there?

 

Web site yahoo: "So, which school are you favoring?"

Recruit: "I don't have a favorite. All I have is a top five."

Web site yahoo: "What's your top two?"

Recruit: "I don't have a top two. All I have is a top five."

Web site yahoo: "If you had a top two, would Podunk U. be one of them?"

Recruit: "I don't have a top two. They're all equal."

Web site yahoo: "Could you see yourself in a Podunk U. jersey?"

Recruit: "Well yeah, I guess. But I could also see myself in the jerseys from the other four schools."

Five minutes later, this is the headline: "Five-star recruit Joe Blow could see himself at Podunk U!!!"