Deadspin: Manti Te'o's dead girlfriend story was a hoax

I thought I read that it was a two part interview and he would be "doing the voice" (from behind a screen) on today's episode.

 

http://www.buzzfeed.com/jpmoore/hear-manti-teo-hoaxer-do-his-lennay-kekua-voice-f

 

http://deadspin.com/5980822/heres-ronaiah-tuiasosopo-attempting-to-perform-what-he-claims-is-lennays-voice-on-dr-phil

(the link that got a h/t from buzzfeed)

Voice experts all agreed it was his voice.

 

There are Deadspin commenters still arguing that this was clearly a publicity stunt engineered by Te'o to increase his Heisman Trophy chances. Still. I mean, you've got to be pretty dedicated at this point to cling to that, right?

 

I really haven't bothered to follow this too closely -- just checked out headlines, really -- because the story was changing every day and I figured I'd wait until it had kind of run its course and everyone knew basically what happened.

So to boil this all down, and filter out all the extraneous stuff, is this approximately what happened to the best of our knowledge:
Tuiasosopo fell in love with Te'o
Tuiasosopo created a fake online persona named Lennay Kekua and contacted Manti
Manti began exchanging emails, texts, social media messages and phone calls with Tuiasosopo, believing it to be Kekua
Manti fell in love with this persona, without ever having met her
Manti was embarrassed about the online nature of his relationship and lied about having spent physical time with her to his parents, friends and teammates
Tuiasosopo finally felt that it had gone too far, knowing that at some point Manti would need to meet "Lennay," so he faked her death the day after Manti's grandmother died
Manti believed in her death and dedicated the Michigan game to her and his grandmother, so began his legend
Tuiasosopo contacted Manti as "Lennay" again on Dec. 6, saying she had faked her own death to avoid drug dealers
Manti accepted this as fact, but was now too far in the shit to cop to it when asked about her by reporters, so he kept up the facade
Manti became aware "Lennay" did not exist when Deadspin published its story.

Is that about it?

 

It's been strange seeing Deadspin commenters -- the hippest, funniest, smartest, crudest, see-through-all-the-bullshit commentariat on the Internet (just ask them) -- being the ones who have been clinging to that longer than anyone else.

 

You've almost got it, but I believe this part is off a bit.

Rather than "accepting it as fact", I believe Te'o said that Dec 6 call is when he became suspicious and asked her to provide photo proof of her with the date, her initials and her doing some weirdass hand gesture. She/he later complies by sending this:



Then, on Dec. 26, he first tells Notre Dame of his suspicions. ND commences investigation. Then, in January, Deadspin blows the roof off the whole thing.

Also, to my understanding, this oft-stated thing about how he supposedly "kept up the facade" seems rather exaggerated. I only know of one instance where he mentioned the girlfriend after he became suspicious on Dec. 6, and that was just a brief mention in an interview at the Heisman ceremony two days later on Dec. 8. Otherwise, I believe he pretty much kept his mouth shut about it after Dec. 6. Or are there other examples I'm unaware of?

 

At this point anything and everything either Te'o or Tuiasasopo says can be safely presumed to be complete bullshit.

Tuiasasopo is lying and making up shit to escape legal consequences (ie. the latest 'i was molested as a child' sympathy-trolling bullshit, boohoo) and Te'o is too fucking stupid to figure out how to dress himself in the morning.

 

Honest question: Does this hamper ND's ability, at least somewhat, to play the we've-got-smarter-student-athletes-than-other-schools card the way it so frequently does, including in recruiting?

 

They have been revealed to worship at an altar, just like the supposedly unsophisticated sports fans that they revile. It's just that their god is Deadspin rather than ESPN or NBC or a team or institution. Deadspin said that Te'o had to be involved in its initial story, and they won't give that up until Deadspin tells them to think otherwise. It's positively Randian.

 

Game, set, match.

 

How did Ronaiah get Manti's phone number?

I think Te'o created the girlfriend story to cover up his relationship with Tuiasasopo. If this was a dupe why the BS interviews with Schaap and Couric with lies and misleading information?